A 17-year-old girl who was wounded by a Qassam rocket strike in Sderot on Saturday was pronounced brain dead yesterday. Ella Abukasis was returning from a meeting of Bnei Akiva, together with her siblings and a friend, when they heard a warning that a rocket was approaching.
Abukasis suffered severe head wounds from shrapnel. Her friend and her sister were lightly wounded, while her brother was moderately wounded. According to one eyewitness, Ella had tried to shield her brother Tamir, 10, from the Qassam.
