The murder of the Aroyo children was a terrorist attack which occurred on 2 January 1971, in which two Israeli children were killed when Palestinian militants threw a hand grenade into the moving car of the Aroyo family which was touring the Gaza Strip. The attack was a turning point in the way Israel began relating towards terrorist threats originating from the Gaza Strip. Following the attack Israel launched an extensive counter-terror operation in the Gaza Strip. Background The Aroyo family (Clare and Marco) had moved in the 1930s from Bulgaria to Malta, where they owned a textile shop in Valletta ("Swiss House"). Their children later moved to the UK. In 1969, Robert and Preeti Aroyo immigrated to Israel from the United Kingdom and settled in Kiryat Ono. The Aroyo family used to regularly travel across Israel during the weekends. The attack On Saturday, 2 January 1971, the Aroyo family was touring the Gaza Strip in their car. In the afternoon, when the family began to make their way back home, they got on the wrong road and as a result they passed along the main road north of Gaza City where a 15-year-old Palestinian boy threw a hand grenade through the window of the moving car of the Aroyo family. The hand grenade fell into the back seat where the children and their mother were sitting. The blast immediately killed 4-year-old Abigail. 7-year-old Marc-Daniel was severely injured and later on died from his injury at the hospital. The mother, Preeti Aroyo, was badly injured and needed lengthy rehabilitation and remained disabled from the incident. Immediately after the incident, The father, Robert Arroyo, attempted to call for help and turned to two young Arab men who witnessed the incident. His pleas were not answered, as it later turned out that these men operated as observers during the attack. Robert Aroyo, who was slightly wounded in the attack managed to turn the car around and reach an IDF checkpoint, before collapsing. Victims Abigail Aroyo, 4 Marc-Daniel Aroyo, 7 Aftermath The murder shocked the Israeli public mostly due to the severity of the attack. The children were buried in the cemetery of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. In their funeral they were eulogized by the IDF Chief Rabbi Shlomo Goren. Israeli security forces caught the perpetrators – 15-year-old Mohammad Suleiman Al Zaki who originated from the Shuja'iyya neighborhood (who threw the