When Kaouther Ben Hania heard Hind Rajab’s voice for the first time, she was in Los Angeles airport scrolling through social media. The five-year-old’s cry for help cut through the clamour around her. This was in February 2024 and Hind had already been dead for at least a week, left to bleed out among the corpses of six of her relatives after their car was targeted by an Israeli tank, leaving it with 335 bullet holes, according to the Forensic Architecture research group.
More than 20,000 Palestinian children were killed in two years of Israeli bombardment of Gaza, according to UN estimates. Another 82 have been killed since 10 October when a ceasefire was declared and then routinely breached. The pictures of the dead have often been published online, including those of Hind, showing her dressed in pink with a floral tiara, or smiling in an oversized academic cap and gown, but her voice also remains to haunt the world after her death.
