Four children ‘killed on beach’

Medics say that four children have been killed in Israeli shelling on a Gaza beach where they have gone to play to avoid the hostilities of the 2014 Gaza conflict. Cousins Ismail, Zakaria, Ahed and Mohamed are members of the Bakr clan which is one of Gaza’s largest extended family groupings, and had wandered toward the port where many of their parents worked as fishermen to avoid airstrikes in their neighborhood, before withdrawing to a nearby beach to play a game called ‘Arabs and Jews.’ The Daily Telegraph is among foreign media who witness the strike, and reports that journalists hear two loud explosions outside the Gaza City hotel nearby the beach, before children are pulled into the restaurant area for treatment. It says a journalist who saw the incident said some of the children who survived were running away when another shell seemed to be aimed at them. The mother of Mohamed Bakr:

Why did he go to the beach and play — for them to take him away from me?

A #Palestinian mother reacts to the news that her son was one of 4 boys killed in Israeli shelling of #gaza seaport pic.twitter.com/2LdGY5p9GU

— Ayman (@AymanM) July 16, 2014