Yahoo!News/Reuters: Organs of slain Palestinian boy donated to save Israel lives

"By Wael al-Ahmad
Mon Nov 7, 9:49 AM ET


JENIN, West Bank (Reuters) - The family of a Palestinian boy killed by Israeli troops have donated his organs to be used for transplants in Israel, voicing hope that the life-saving gesture could bring peace a little closer.

Soldiers shot and critically wounded 13-year-old Ahmad al-Khatib last week on a raid into the West Bank city of Jenin to look for militants. The army said troops mistook Khatib's toy gun for a real weapon.

Khatib died of his wounds in an Israeli hospital. After consulting with Muslim authorities, his family decided to give his organs to six Israelis awaiting transplants.

"We are doing it for humane purposes and for the sake of the world's children and the children of this country," Khatib's father Ismail told Reuters on Monday.

"When I donated my son's organs I did not say (they should be) for a Jewish child, an Arab child, whether Muslim or Christian."

Officials at Israel's Beilinson and Schneider hospitals, said that the Israelis who received Khatib's lungs, kidneys and liver included several Jews. A member of Israel's Bedouin Arab minority, 12-year-old Samach Riad, received the boy's heart.

"They changed her heart and now everything is good," said Riad's father Gabdan. "I hope that, thanks to the Palestinian family from Jenin, peace will be coming now."

Medical personnel on both sides have tried to remain free of the bloodshed and recrimination during violence that erupted after peace talks stalled in 2000. Fighting surged again recently, striking a blow to a nine-month-old truce.

Israeli and Palestinian ambulance teams often cooperate in evacuating victims of violence. Some sick Palestinians receive treatment in Israel, although the Jewish state restricts entry permits citing security needs.

In 2002, a 7-year-old Palestinian girl received the kidney of Jonathan Jesner, a Briton killed in a Tel Aviv suicide bombing.

"I think the most important principle here is that life was given to another human being," Jesner's brother, Ari, said at the time.
"

I pray for peace between Israelis and Palestinians.