Islam Hamoudah Khaled Abu Shahalah

Location Khan Younis

Four-year-old Islam, nicknamed Sallum, was from Khan Younis, southern Gaza. Sallum was a great, calm, and intelligent child. She was curious, always asking many questions. She used to go to the mosque with her grandmother. “Once her mother bought her a white dress, like a bridal dress, and she was so happy that she went to her uncle’s to show them the new dress and ask them, ‘am I beautiful?’ The memories of her are unforgettable,” said her grandmother. “Once she was injured, so she had to keep her leg in a cast for sixty days. Her father took her to the roof of the house to feed the pigeons he had there, and he put food and seeds on her legs, so that the pigeons would come and eat it from there,” added her grandmother.

“At 2:50 am on 26 July 2014, Israeli warplanes dropped a bomb on our house. We started to sink. Rubble and dust covered us. Our neighbors pulled me out and took me to hospital. I knew later that twenty-one people were killed,” her uncle Samir said.