The US and Israel both employ assassination as a tool in combating terror. The vast majority of those killed under this policy are innocent bystanders. Despite the fact that extrajudicial killings violate the right of all suspects to remain innocent until proven guilty or that the policy has shown to increase terrorism rather than eliminate it, the lives of the innocent always seem to be an acceptable loss to countries supposedly battling terrorism. Earlier this week, three innocent children become the latest in a long line of civilian Palestinian victims.

Three cousins, a 10-year-old boy and 12-year-old boy and girl, were playing tag outside of the Gaza town of Beit Hanun near some rocket launchers. The Israeli army detected movement in the area, then used aerial surveillance to direct tank fire at the children. “They were playing right next to the launchers, including touching them,” the army statement said. “At the very last second, it was apparent that they were children, but it was impossible to stop the explosion.”

Unfortunately, this kind of tragedy is common in occupied Gaza, an area which Israel is ethnically cleansing of its Arab population through economic “coercion”, murder, thievery, martial law, and isolation. Israel’s usual response is to blame Palestinians for using children as human shields, but video footage in this case forced the army to retract their original claim that militants had sent the children to get the launchers. Just last week, two more children were killed when they also strayed too close to a rocket launcher.

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