Ibrahim Muhammad Ismail was a 12-year-old Palestinian boy killed by the Israel Defense Forces on October 30, 2004. A refugee camp resident in the West Bank town of Jenin, Ibrahim was with a group of boys protesting the Israeli military presence in Jenin when he was shot and killed by Israeli soldiers.

The Israeli military claimed that soldiers were surrounded by people throwing stones, shooting, and hurling fire bombs at them while they were inside a Palestinian house and that the soldiers had fired at the "main provocateur in the demonstration." They could not confirm shooting a child.

Palestinian witnesses claimed that the protesters were throwing stones from rooftops as the soldiers searched for resistance fighters in the camp. Israeli soldiers opened fire on the stone-throwers, killing Ibrahim Muhammad Ismail instantly.

Israel Defense Force officials promised to investigate the incident. The Code of Conduct of the IDF explicitly prohibits targeting non-combatants and dictates proportional force. It also stipulates that they should avert unnecessary casualties and hardships to civilian population, as well as "accord dignity and respect to the Palestinian population and those arrested."

See Also

• Israeli violence against Palestinian children
• Palestine, Arab-Israeli conflict
• International law, Laws of war

External Links

• Child killed by Israeli troops (Al-Jazeera)
• IDF kills boy, 12, in Jenin clashes (Haaretz)