Suzan Hassouna

Suzan Hassouna, five years old, was killed in the early hours of February 12, 2024, with her twin sister Sidra, their one-year-old brother Malek, their parents, their grandparents and an uncle — eight members of the family in all — when Israeli airstrikes destroyed the one-story house the displaced family was renting in Rafah. The strikes that night served as cover for an Israeli operation that rescued two hostages elsewhere in the city; at least 74 Palestinians were killed in the bombardment, among them 27 children, according to a list compiled by the Palestinian Center for Human Rights and cited by the Associated Press.

The twins’ uncle Ibrahim Hassouna, the family’s sole survivor, had spent the night at a friend’s house. He told NPR that he found his niece Sedra (Sidra) by an earring in one ear, and identified Suzan by a small purse she always slept with. Before the war, Ibrahim had built an Instagram following with feel-good videos; one of the last showed him playing with the twins using a pot lid and an empty jar because there were no toys. A photograph of Sidra’s body, flung from the ruins by the blast, circulated worldwide, making the twin sisters two of the most widely recognized child victims of the war.

Sources

• Airstrike from Israeli hostage rescue wipes out entire Palestinian family in Gaza border town — AP
• A Gaza influencer built a following with feel-good videos. Now he mourns his family — NPR via KPBS