Banksia primary school car crash victim’s father says he forgives driver

The father of one of the children killed at the Banksia Road Primary School in Sydney has forgiven the driver. Jihad Darwiche, 8, died after Maha Al-Shennag smashed her Toyota Kruger into a year three classroom in the Greenacre school on Tuesday.

Jihad was one of the two boys killed by the crash. The boys, both 8 years old, were critically injured and taken to The Children’s Hospital at Westmead, where they were pronounced dead. Two 8-year-old girls and one 9-year-old girl were taken to the hospital as well; the latter was in a serious condition.

On Friday, Jihad’s grieving father said he has forgiven the driver. In a dash cam video on their way to his son’s funeral, Raed Darwiche said he had a “special message” for Al-Shennag. He was speaking in Arabic and had Ahmed Hraichie translate his words to English from the driver’s seat of the car.

Darwiche said he and his family have forgiven the woman who had killed her son. He also called for the people allegedly abusing Al-Shennag to stop.

“The father says all this stuff happening about the threats to this lady and the abuse is not from them,” Hraichie translated for the father. “No retaliation is coming from the family of the boy. They have forgiven. If anything, they want to sit with this lady and talk with her and tell her, ‘we forgive you.’”

The family have been mourning and were busy with the funeral arrangements. But once it’s all over, they want to welcome Al-Shennag to a meal so they can talk how they can all move forward from the unfortunate event.

Darwiche also asked everyone to stop abusing the school because it had nothing to do with the accident. “This is the will of the creator. He has ordained this. This was written.”

The family saw the tragedy as an unfortunate accident that no one planned. It was an “honest mistake” and could happen to anyone. “This is the way a proper Muslim acts in a time of calamity and tribulation.”

Hraichie added, “We don’t throw the world down on our brothers and sisters when an accident happens. We forgive.” The video has amassed over 280,000 views as of the time of writing.

Al-Shennag, who was granted conditional bail, was uninjured from the crash but was still taken to Bankstown Hospital for mandatory blood and urine testing. Her licence has been suspended.

She was charged with two counts of dangerous driving occasioning death, driving in a dangerous manner and negligent driving occasioning death on Tuesday. She was also charged with additional offences relating to the children who were injured. She will return to Bankstown Local Court on Nov. 29.