VARIOUS: Family of girl whose life was saved by the donation of Palestinian boy's organs meets his parents

Record ID: 643433

  • Title: VARIOUS: Family of girl whose life was saved by the donation of Palestinian boy's organs meets his parents
  • Date: 16th November 2005
  • Summary: AMBULANCE LEAVING SITE
  • Embargoed: 1st December 2005 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: Health
  • Reuters ID: LVAFZTCLSU33RWDM9DHLO4Y9TJ8
  • Story Text: The parents of a Palestinian boy killed by Israeli troops, who donated his organs for transplant, visited Israeli girl, Samah on Tuesday (November 15, 2005), after she received a successful heart transplant .
    The scene was very emotional, with Ahmed Khatib's parents embracing Samah like their own daughter and calling her by terms of endearment they had often used with Ahmed. "I hope that this message has reached the whole world and specifically the Israeli people, and for this to be a message of peace and love between the two sides the Palestinian people and the Israeli people," Ismail Khatib, father of Ahmed told reporters.
    Ismail Khatib received an award from the head of the hospital in appreciation of his gesture which has saved Samah's life, a girl with a weak heart who has been living on medication for the past five and half years. "Every mother says to her son in Arabic 'My heart, my love,' and Ahmed's heart which is dearest to his mother is now beating in the body of Samah. And they gave her life as a gift," said Samah's mother visibly emotional and grateful.
    Samah Riad is an Israeli Druze girl from a village in Galilee. Her transplant was carried out on Monday (November 7) at the 'Shneider' children's hospital in the Israeli city of Petah Tikva.
    The Khatib family donated Ahmed's heart, after an Israeli soldiers shot and killed the 13-year-old boy last week during a raid into the West Bank city of Jenin. The army said troops mistook the boy's toy gun for a real weapon.
    After consulting with Muslim authorities, the Khatib family decided to donate his organs to six Israelis awaiting transplants.
    Officials at Israel's Beilinson and Schneider hospitals, confirmed that the Israelis who received Khatib's lungs, kidneys and liver included several Jews. But a member of Israel's Druze minority, 12-year-old Samah Riad, received the most symbolic of Ahmed's organs - the boy's heart.
    The Riad family celebrated the successful heart transplant surgery on Monday (November 7) while members of Khatib's family gathered at their home to continue mourning Ahmed's death.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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