Boy carrying strange image in Iraq

I’m sure someone has commented on this at some point, but it’s a testimony to the incredible richness of this film that after, countless viewings I have absolutely never noticed this before:

Like so many other images in the film, once you notice it, you never miss it afterwards.  In fact it leaps out at you every time.  HOW could I have missed it all these years?  Anyway, what the heck is it?  Demon?  Djinn?  Egyptian hieroglyph?  Is it, like Pazuzu, from ancient Babylonian paganism? What are in the figure’s hands?  The first thing it made me think of, due to the figure’s redness, is Regan’s bird sculpture.  The kid carrying it looks about the same age as the boy who tells Merrin “They found something.”  Wonder if it’s the same actor.