'Heinous crime': Outrage as Israeli soldier abducts infant girl from Gaza
The Israeli army has yet to comment on the incident, which sparked outrage on social media, with critics demanding clarification.
Israeli media reported that an Israeli officer admitted that an army captain had taken a Palestinian baby from Gaza and took her to an unknown place in Israel. / Photo: AA Archive
Palestinian officials called an Israeli soldier taking an infant girl from Gaza "a heinous crime," saying she should be handed back immediately.
"The kidnapping of the infant girl from Gaza is evidence that the (Israeli) occupation army is committing the most heinous crimes against civilians without oversight or accountability," the Palestinian Foreign Ministry, based in the West Bank city of Ramallah, said in a statement on Tuesday.
It called on Israeli authorities "to immediately hand over the infant to the Palestinian National Authority."
The ministry added that the commission of such an act indicates that it was not the first or the last to be committed in Gaza at the hands of Israeli soldiers.
On Monday, Israeli media reported that an Israeli officer admitted that an army captain had taken a Palestinian baby from Gaza and took her to an unknown place in Israel.
A close friend of the captain said he found a crying baby in Gaza during Israel’s assault on the strip and took her to Israel.
On Israeli Army Radio, Shahar Mendelson, a close friend of Israeli Capt. Harel Itach, who recently died in combat in Gaza, told journalist Yael Dan that Itach took the baby to Israel, presumably after her family was killed by Israeli forces.
The Israeli army has yet to comment on the incident, which sparked outrage on social media, with critics demanding clarification on the incident as well as the fate of the infant.
Muslim community angry
The International Union for Muslim Scholars (IUMS) has called on the Islamic world to reclaim a newborn allegedly taken by an Israeli soldier from Gaza.
"We call on governments and leaders in the Arab and Islamic world to take back this newborn," Ali al Qaradaghi said on X.
"I declare that I bear the responsibility to care for this baby. Our honour is precious, and we cannot accept this humiliation," he added.
Israel began its attacks on Gaza after the Oct. 7 cross-border offensive by Hamas. It has since killed nearly 22,000 people, mostly women and children, and left Gaza in ruins, where more than half of the population does not have enough food, water and medicine.
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