Emad (16) went out to the house alley to check his play arena. Some of the neighborhood boys asked him to go with them to collect wood for bread baking. He agreed. When the children started to tour the plantation to collect the wood, an Israeli reconnaissance plane shot one of its rockets at them. Emad was martyred and two other children were injured.

His mother says, “I wish he had tasted the pastry he persistently asked me to make. May Allah almighty protect us. They had not allowed him to taste the pastry neither did we taste it as we were shocked by the news of his death.” His mother remembers how Emad asked her to lend her electric pan to his uncle’s house. She told him she needed the pan to bake bread. Emad said to her, “Mother, give it to them. Nobody is going to eat your food today.” Indeed, Emad had gone and nobody tasted food that day.

One day before his death, Emad was sorry for his mother who cid not have the wood to bake bread as there had been black out for days. He went out, in spite of his father’s objection, and brought her some wood from a nearby farm. He then kept out of his father’s sight for fear of being punished. His mother remembers how keen he was to satisfy the house’s needs.

Nobody in the house of Jamal Abu Khater wanted pastry after Emad had gone. His mother said, “He always urged me to make different kinds of pastry.” Like other children, Emad loved pastry, and loved to wear new clothes. However, the economic conditions did not help him. His most favorite hobbies were computer games.

Whenever Emad’s mother went to the cemetery to visit his tomb, she found groups of boys who had gone there before her. A journalist noticed that and interviewed them about their love for Emad and their grief to have lost him. There, the boys pick flowers to decorate the tomb of their beloved late friend, Emad. Today, his cousin Reem comes to his mother and says, ”Where is Emad? When will he be back?” Emad’s mother, the, gives her money as Emad had used to do.