AL-ARISH: A teenage Bedouin girl was fatally shot on Thursday in the Sinai Peninsula near Egypt’s border with Israel, an Egyptian security official and medics said.
The girl, identified as 12-year-old Samah Nayyef Abu Garad, was hit in the head by a bullet, eyewitnesses and the security official said.
It was not clear who was to blame for the death, with Egyptian officials and eye witnesses citing a stray bullet coming from across the border, and the Israeli military saying no shooting had occurred on their side.
“She was shot by a stray bullet from the other side of the border (Israel), due to the ongoing fighting today between the Palestinians and Israelis,” the Egyptian security official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. He said he did not know whether the bullet was fired by Palestinian militants or Israeli forces.
The Israeli military, however, said there were no exchange of fire between Israelis and Palestinians in that area on Thursday.
Eyewitness Moussa Abu Freh said he saw his cousin Abu Garad collapse after she was hit in front of her home in the Bedouin village of Umm Ammad.
“She fell off her feet after she was shot in the head, she was in the house’s courtyard that faces the border’s side,” said Abu Freh. He said the family house stands some 300 meters from the border with Israel, and about 400 meters from the Israeli border point of Kerem Shalom, close to the Gaza Strip.
Imad Kharboush, head of the emergency unit at Al-Arish hospital, said Abu Garad was brought in a critical condition to the hospital and died a few minutes later of brain damage.
In early January, an Egyptian Bedouin man fell dead from a bullet while standing in front of his house at El-Dahniya village, just 300 meters from the Israeli border. Witnesses at the time had said he was shot by Israeli border guards.
