‘Cruel’ and ‘heartbreaking’: Internet decries death of Palestinian with Down syndrome mauled by IDF dog

TRIGGER WARNING: THIS STORY CONTAINS MENTIONS OF VIOLENCE.

Mohammed Bhar, a 24-year-old Palestinian with Down syndrome and autism, was left for dead after being mauled by a combat dog of the Israel Defence Force (IDF) on July 3, during a raid on his family’s home in Shejaiya.

His mother Nabila saw the animal attack him.

“The dog attacked him, biting his chest and then his hand. Mohammed didn’t speak, only muttering ‘No, no, no.’ The dog bit his arm and the blood was shed. I wanted to get to him but I couldn’t. No one could get to him, and he was patting the dog’s head saying, ‘enough my dear, enough.’ In the end, he relaxed his hand, and the dog started tearing at him while he was bleeding,” she told the BBC.

IDF soldiers locked Bhar in a separate room to allegedly treat his injuries and prohibited his family from seeing him. Soon after, they were forced to leave their home at gunpoint — without Bhar. During the raid, two of his brothers were arrested and have not been released yet.

A week later the family returned to their residence to find Bhar’s body.

“They left him without stitches or care. Just these basic first aid measures. Of course, as you can see, Mohammed was dead for a period of time already because he was abandoned. We thought he wasn’t at home. But it turned out he had been bleeding and left alone at home all this time. Of course, the army left him,” Bhar’s brother Jibraeel told the BBC.

The ordeal has elicited anger and disgust on social media.

Actor Kubra Khan shared the news on her Instagram story, and wrote, “You think your heart can’t break any further… and you see this”. The actor prayed for God’s mercy.

X (formerly Twitter) users detailed how heartbreaking the incident was, highlighting that Bhar called the dog ‘habibi’ — Arabic for ‘my dear’ — while it attacked him.

Another tweet said that Bhar “saw the dog for exactly what it was born to be: a gentle companion” and accused the IDF of transforming the animal into a “killing machine”.

Netizens with siblings who have similar disabilities also decried Bhar’s death. “I can’t believe how anyone could inflict even the slightest amount of pain on anyone, let alone someone so pure and innocent.”

Others spoke about the cruelty being perpetrated in Gaza, adding that this was “only one of countless thousands of similar stories”.

A social media user also highlighted that if a similar occurrence “happened to an Israeli, you would never hear the end of it”, adding that “it would be on every media outlet and [they] would justify the literal obliteration […] of many people”.

The scene has traumatised Bhar’s mother. “This scene I will never forget… I constantly see the dog tearing at him and his hand, and the blood pouring from his hand… It is always in front of my eyes, never leaving me for a moment. We couldn’t save him, neither from them nor from the dog,” she told the BBC.

“People with disabilities in Gaza have been put in extreme distress with the expectation that they will be the first and the next to be killed because of the limited opportunities to flee or take part in evacuations due to their impairment,” the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities said in May.

This is not the first instance of a person with disabilities being harmed or killed by Israeli forces in Gaza; it is one of many stories reflecting the cruelty inflicted upon the Palestinian people.