Raghad Ashour - One more name for the list of children killed after the Gaza truce

"She is gone, my only rose..." mother of Raghad

By Tom McDermott

Reading the news often brings unexpected connections between the statistics in UN reports and real people.  The news of the death of Raghad Ashour on Monday in Gaza suddenly made real the numbers in the report issued the following day by the UN Indpendent Commission of Inquiry - see "About that shouting match".

Raghad was killed by an Israeli drone in Gaza on Monday morning while on her way to school to prepare for her final exams. She is now among the 1,011 Palestinians killed and at least 266 children killed since the ceasefire of last October.  

UNICEF Palestine was among many mourning her death: "We are devastated by the killing of Raghad, 17, a UNICEF Youth Champion, on her way to sit her high school exam in Gaza."

Who was Raghad?  - There is something in the details of Raghad's life that makes her death especially hard to absorb. Her father had been killed in an Israeli strike when she was about three years old. Her mother raised her and her four brothers alone through two years of war, multiple displacements, and the loss of their home in Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza. When a marriage proposal came — something her mother, according to family testimony, had dreamed of seeing — Raghad refused. She wanted to finish her education. She wanted to go to university.

"She didn't want to get married," her great-uncle Jamil Ashour told Middle East Eye. "She called me to come over and convince her mother. She wanted to finish her education and go to university."

"She was the flower of the house," Ashour said. "Her brothers adored her, and her mother always said she was more than a daughter — she was her friend and companion through the darkest days."

For its part, the Israeli Defence Forces merely acknowledged the drone strike, stating they had targeted "a terrorist in Hamas's military wing travelling in a vehicle," and that harm to "an uninvolved civilian" was known and regretted.

Sources:
Middle East Eye - ‘Killed pursuing her dream’
SG's Spokesman, Stéphan Dujarric - “We reiterate that we condemn the killing of any civilians, including children, and they must always be protected,”

Other relevant Quotes:
Srinivasan Muraldhar, Chair of the Independent Commission of Inquiry - ""The evidence shows that Palestinian children have been deliberately targeted and killed by the Israeli security forces. Even after the October 2025 ceasefire, children continue to be killed and seriously injured, with continued disregard by Israel for the ceasefire and for the protection owed to Palestinian children under international law."

James Elder, UNICEF - “For many, many months, the world has been told there is a ceasefire in Gaza. Yet for Palestinian children, this so-called ceasefire has become a cruel and deadly illusion.

“Since the ceasefire was announced in October 2025, 265 Palestinian children have been killed across Gaza. That is an absurd and devastating figure. During a period supposedly defined by restraint and protection, a child has been killed, on average, every single day for more than eight months.

“Let us be clear about what this means. These children were not killed in a warzone. They were killed in their homes. In their schools. Playing football. Fishing. They were shot, bombed, and struck by quadcopters.

“While the world continues to speak the language of ceasefire, families in Gaza continue to bury their sons and daughters. However, if a child is being killed every day, surely the debate is no longer about the quality of the ceasefire. It is about the credibility of calling it one.