Child Profile: Mahmoud Sulaiman Mohamed Al Astal

Name: Mahmoud Sulaiman Mohamed Al Astal

Date of birth: 22 March 1997

Date of death: 24 July 2014

17-year-old Mahmoud Sulaiman Mohamed Al Astal from Khan Younis was a religious boy and very close to his sisters and his mother. He liked football and was a huge FC Barcelona fan. He also liked to draw. He hoped to go to university to study chemistry.

On 23 July 2014, Mahmoud got on his motorbike to go to pick up some groceries for the house; while on his way, he was targeted by an Israeli drone and seriously injured. He was taken to the hospital but died in the following hours.

“Once Mahmoud asked his sisters to take a photo of him so that they would remember him when he died,” his mother recalls. “I had this feeling that I was going to lose him, but my fear wasn’t enough to protect him.”