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Zynab Al Harbiya was killed by a suicide bomber near a Baghdad ice-cream parlour.

The father of a 12-year-old Melbourne girl who died in a car bomb explosion in Baghdad has spoken of his grief upon seeing her body, calling Islamic State attackers monsters who had killed a little girl with a big heart.

Zynab Al Harbiya, a year seven student from Melbournes Sirius College, was killed by a suicide bomber near an ice-cream shop in the Iraqi capital about midnight local time on Tuesday.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack, which killed 17 people including Zynab and injured 32, and another car bomb outside the public pension office in Shawaka, which killed 14 people and injured at least 17. The attacks came just days into the holy month of Ramadan.

Zynab and her family were visiting Baghdad from Australia to see her sick grandfather and she was on her way to break fast with her cousins at the ice-cream parlour when the bomb went off.

Her father, Khalid Al Harbiya, was five hours south in Al Nasiriya and told Fairfax Media he had driven back to Baghdad not knowing whether his family was alive. He saw his daughters body in the morgue of the neurosurgery teaching hospital.

I started banging on my head when I saw. It was so traumatic, he told Fairfax. May God avenge us from Daesh.

He added: Normally your child survives you, not the other way around.

He had last spoken to Zynab the day before when she asked if she could buy a new iPhone.

It was such a brutal death. She was just a little girl, what has she ever done to anyone? She was not in the army or a fighter. They are criminals, they have no mercy, no humanity they are monsters.

He said Zynab had strong convictions and was creative. She also had big ambitions.

She wanted to be a lawyer or a teacher or a doctor, he said. She wanted to help people, I swear. She had a big heart.

Harbiya said his wife had gone into shock at Zynabs death and his two sons, Haydar, 10, and Bilal, seven, were distraught.

They wanted to see their sister but we stopped them because the scene is too horrific, he said. They are crying all the time saying we want our sister back.

Harbiya fled Iraq during Saddam Husseins regime and has lived in Australia for 20 years, working as a labourer. Zynab and her brothers were born in Australia.

On Wednesday the foreign minister, Julie Bishop, described the attack as vicious and extended our deepest sympathies to her family, her loved ones, her fellow students at Broadmeadows.

This tragedy underscores the brutality of this terrorist organisation that shows no respect for religion, nationality, sovereignty, borders, no respect for humanity, Bishop said.

Harbiya said he was heartened by support from Australia, which included limited consular support.

We are Muslims being targeted and these terrorists know no difference. We must stand together to fight against Daesh and terrorism.

Zynabs funeral was held in Baghdad on Wednesday, and students at Sirius College prayed for her.

Sirius Colleges principal, Halid Serdar Takimoglu, said she was a passionate and well-loved student, whose death had deeply distressed the school.

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Zynab Al Harbiya's father says girl killed in Iraq had 'big heart' - The Guardian