Man with Down syndrome mauled by Israeli army dog ​​in Gaza Strip and left to die, family says

GAZA CITY, Palestine

In front of his mother, 24-year-old Mohamed Bhar was brutally attacked by an Israeli army dog ​​in the Shejaiya district east of Gaza City.

Bhar, who suffered from Down syndrome and autism, bled to death in the attack.

His mother, Nabila Bhar, recalled that her family was locked in their home for seven days during an Israeli army military operation in the neighborhood on June 28.

“On the seventh day of the operation, Israeli forces, assisted by dogs, searched the house. We were all panicked and scared,” the 70-year-old mother told Anadolu.

One of the Israeli dogs attacked her son.

“He was sitting on a sofa when the dog attacked him and bit his chest and hand. He was very scared,” the Palestinian mother recalls.

The mother shouted at the soldiers to stop the dog from attacking her son.

“Mohamed had Down syndrome. His appearance showed that he was injured and innocent. He could not move and only spoke simple words,” she said.

After the dog’s fatal attack, Mohamed is bleeding and his family is helpless and unable to help him.

Open wound

The merciless killing of her child has left an open wound in Nabila’s heart.

“Mohamed needed help after the dog attacked him,” she said.

“We asked the Israeli soldiers to help him, but they told us to stay away and wait for the army doctor to arrive.”

The Palestinian family was ordered to leave the house at gunpoint by the Israeli army.

“Mohamed was left bleeding in the room,” she remembers. “When we stood in front of the house, we heard Mohamed asking for water.”

“After a few moments there was silence,” said the mother. “That’s when we learned that my son had died.”

After her son’s death, Nabila said, her family was ordered by the Israeli army to leave the Shejaiya neighborhood.

The family returned to their home a few days after the end of the Israeli operation in Shejaiya.

“When we returned, we found Mohamed’s body covered in blood in his room,” said the mother.

Merciless killing

Mohamed’s sister Sara still cannot believe her brother’s tragic death.

“The dog brutally attacked Mohamed,” she said. “Israeli soldiers left him bleeding in the room until he died of thirst.”

The Palestinian girl said that two of her brothers were also arrested by Israeli forces during the military operation.

“When we returned to our house, we found Mohamed’s breathless body covered in blood.”

Mohamed was not the first Palestinian to be mercilessly attacked by the Israeli army’s dogs.

Last May, a 70-year-old Palestinian woman was brutally attacked by an Israeli dog during a military operation in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip.

Last month, the Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said the Israeli army systematically uses dogs in its raids on Palestinian homes.

Israel is ignoring a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire and is facing international criticism for its ongoing brutal offensive on Gaza since the Hamas attack on October 7.

Since then, more than 38,800 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed and over 89,400 injured, according to local health authorities.

More than nine months after the start of the Israeli attack, large parts of the Gaza Strip lie in ruins and there is a crippling blockade on the supply of food, clean water and medicine.

Israel is accused of genocide by the International Court of Justice. In its latest ruling, Israel was ordered to immediately cease its military operation in the southern city of Rafah, where more than a million Palestinians had sought refuge from the war before the May 6 invasion.

*Written by Ahmed Asmar

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