By Palestine Chronicle Staff
May 6, 2025
Hassan Ayyad was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Nuseirat. (Photo: via social media)
“The child who sang of death has now joined those he mourned — his farewell was as noble as his words.”
A young Palestinian child, popular in Gaza for his beautiful voice, which captured the tragedy of Israel’s genocidal war on the enclave, was killed in an airstrike in Nuseirat on Monday.
In a clip shared widely on social media following his death, Hassan Ayyad sang in a heartbreaking voice: “With the warplanes, we tasted the flavor of death, An airstrike from land and sea. They blocked the crossings — people are dying from hunger, Bear witness, world, to what they’ve done — they destroyed homes, While the Arabs sleep peacefully…”
Titled ‘Ishhad Ya ‘Alam – Bear Witness, Oh World’, the song is described as a powerful and emotional ode to the suffering of the Palestinian people under Israel’s onslaught.
Ayyad ‘Joined Those He Mourned’
“Today, his voice was silenced forever …The child who sang of death has now joined those he mourned — his farewell was as noble as his words,” Gaza journalist Mahmoud Bassam wrote on X.
Bassam is one of many who took to social media to lament Ayyad’s killing in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza. According to Bassam, his death was one of more than 60 Palestinians killed since dawn on Monday.
Proud Father
Activist Khaled Safi wrote that the boy’s father, Alaa Ayyad (Abu Hassan), “always praised his son Hassan, was proud of him, and supported him, considering him his successor in popular zajal.”
The boy, thank God, was talented, and despite his young age, he had the ability to perform and be accepted. Today the invaders assassinated Hassan, and his father’s heart became empty,” he added.
“Do you know why there are rivers of blood, revenge and long-lasting retaliation between us and the criminal?” Safi asked.
‘The Martyr Hassan’
According to an Al Jazeera Arabic report on his death, the Palestinian film director Rashid Masharawi said: “Hassan Ayyad, the child who dedicated a song to me from Gaza, was martyred today. He sang for the Zero Distance films with his sweet, heartbreaking childlike voice.”
He added that Ayyad “was a victim of an Israeli bombardment on the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip.”
“We lose our lives daily, Hassan… the clever Hassan, the artist Hassan, the martyr Hassan… you hurt me, Hassan,” Masharawi is further reported to have said.
The Al Jazeera report also quotes activist Ali Abu Rizq as having said on X: “There is a little child named Hassan Ayyad, who used to bring joy to orphans and the wounded in displacement camps, singing for the homeland, chanting for return, and planting hope despite the intense pain. Israel killed him today in cold blood.”
“They didn’t kill him by mistake, but rather assassinated him premeditatedly because he creates hope, and creating hope is more dangerous than creating a rocket,” he added.
Rising Death Toll
Since Israel’s reneging on the ceasefire on March 18, it has killed and wounded thousands of Palestinians throughout the Gaza Strip through a bloody and ongoing aerial bombardment.
On October 7, 2023, following a Palestinian Resistance operation in southern Israel, the Israeli military launched a genocidal war against the Palestinians, killing over 52,000, wounding more than 118,000, with over 14,000 still missing.
Despite habitual condemnation by many countries around the world of the Israeli genocide, little has been done to hold Israel accountable.
Israel is currently under investigation for the crime of genocide by the International Court of Justice, while accused war criminals — including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — are now officially wanted by the International Criminal Court.
The Israeli genocide has been largely defended, supported, and financed by Washington and a few other Western powers.
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