A five-year-old Yazidi boy, who arrived in Arizona, just days after his family escaped the Islamic State militants in Iraq, was killed after he got hit by a car.
Alaa Mahmad and his family had fled the ISIS-occupied Sinjar province in Iraq after his father Farhan Beeso, an interpreter for the US Army, received death threats from the militants.
The family narrowly escaped from the clutches of ISIS and had migrated to Tucson as refugees less than 30 days ago, Tucson News Now reported.
The boy was crossing the road along with his parents and was hit by a car when he broke free from his mother and ran to cross the street on his own.
The boy's father said his family had seen many deaths in Sinjar, where he along with thousands of others, had hidden in a mountain to escape the ISIS.
The Yazidi-hating ISIS had been on a killing spree across the Sinjar region, where thousands of Yazidi women and girls have been sold as sex slaves, while men and boys were killed.
Beeso said that he was escaping from all that and wanted to start a new life in the United States.
"I want[ed] the best future for my kid, I didn't want him to die in Iraq," said Beeso.
The driver of the car that hit the boy has been cleared of any wrongdoing.
