On 18th March 2025, it was reported that two children and one woman were killed and another civilian was injured during an alleged Israeli artillery shelling attack in the city of Rafah in the Gaza Strip.

Multiple sources reported that two children, 11-year-old Adi Muhammad Suleiman al-Arja and four-year-old Naji Anas Naji al-Arja, and a 29-year-old woman, Sabreen Emad Yousef al-Arja, were killed as a result of a reported bombing in the city of Rafah in the Gaza Strip.

According to the Facebook post by Ibrahim Jihad al-Arja, the late Sabreen was his cousin, and his other cousin, Nawaf Abu al-Walid, was injured, and he asked to prayers for his recovery.

Muhammad al-Arja, the father of Adi, mourned the death of his son, writing: “The death of a firstborn son is a heartbreak that only those who have suffered it can feel…. Adi, your face and the reassuring tone of your voice are still in my memory, and the pain of loss is in my heart…. There are no words to describe the pain of your departure. Your departure, Adi, created sadness and pain in my heart.” He added an image where he was holding the face of his son in his face after he had already been killed.

Yaser Yousif shared an image of the two young boys, Adi and Naji, and multiple prayers were shared for the children.

Where possible, the names of the victims have been matched with the Palestinian Ministry of Health (MoH) lists, which include national ID numbers. Since October 26, 2023, the MoH has released a number of lists, along with an additional list of medical professionals, which was released on September 17, 2024. Airwars is matching individuals to the first list where their name appeared. In regard to this incident, names are matched to the eighth “Palestinian Ministry of Health List of Fatalities in Gaza”, which was released on March 24, 2025.

Some sources claimed that the incident was a result of either shelling or bombing.

Although the sources did not explicitly attribute the strike to the Israeli military, the Ministry of Health list and the Genocide in Gaza website contain the names of the victims of the Israeli aggression in the Gaza Strip. Hence, Airwars considers this as the attribution of the strike to the Israeli forces and therefore has graded the strike status as “likely strike”.