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Most of the coverage of the IDF drone strike on June 21 says that one of the victims, from Islamic Jihad, was 17-year old Ashraf Murad Saadi. Islamic Jihad's own press release for the attack said that their heroic martyr Saadi was 17, and most of the world's media accepted that as his real age.
But Saadi wasn't 17. He was 15.
Electronic Intifada mentioned his real age. And so did an article in Al Ayyam a week after his death, where it was clear that his mother knew that Saadi was a member of a terror organization.
She said, "When Ashraf went out of the house in the evening hours, I felt a lump in my heart, and I watched him until he passed out of my sight, and I said to myself that I would not see him again."
But, of course, she is proud of him. She doesn't say a word about trying to seriously stop him or forbid him from getting mixed up with militants, the way a normal, caring parent would.
Both that article, and a newer obituary in the Al Quds Brigades website, say that his birthday was April 14, 2008. That means that Saadi turned 15 only two months before.
If you ever had any doubt that Islamic Jihad recruits children barely out of puberty, this is proof positive.
But it turns darker than that.
Saadi was killed in a car along with two much older terrorists. They were 27 and 28.
Why would any older terrorists want to plan activities with a 15 year old? Why would they be hanging out together at nighttime?
Being a child soldier might not be the only child abuse that Ashraf Murad Saadi was subjected to.
