On Wednesday, Israeli forces sent a shipping container to Gaza that contained bodies of 88 Palestinians that were decomposed to the point that they were unidentifiable, sparking horror over Israel’s treatment of Palestinians even after death.
Israel delivered the Palestinians’ bodies in a large yellow container loaded on a truck, with no identification or information about how, when or where the people were killed.
The Gaza Health Ministry rejected the shipment, saying in a statement that officials told Israeli authorities that they would not carry on with procedures to collect the bodies until Israel returned with the names and times of death of the Palestinians, as well as the locations they were abducted from. Palestinian officials decried the shipment as an “inhumane and criminal move.”
Not only did the Israeli military not provide any information about the Palestinians, it also seemingly allowed the bodies to rot before trying to return them to Gaza. According to Al Jazeera reporter Tareq Abu Azzoum, “the bodies are unidentifiable because they are mostly decomposed.”
Gaza health officials have set up a committee with “all relevant parties” to handle the bodies.
Israel has abducted thousands of Palestinians from Gaza and the occupied West Bank over the past year. Many of these people were imprisoned in Israel’s torture camps, where they were subject to horrific conditions like beatings, food and water deprivation, and sexual assault. The number of Palestinians the Israeli military has killed in these camps is unclear, but the UN reported in July that it knows of at least 53 deaths in Israeli custody since October. A UN expert reported this week that a third Palestinian doctor has died in an Israeli torture camp.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) noted that it was not involved in the transfer of the bodies, but said that “all families have the right to receive news about their loved ones and bury them respectfully and in line with their traditions.” The group also noted that it is a violation of international law to mishandle dead bodies.
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor called for an immediate international investigation into the shipment, saying that Israel has likely violated international humanitarian law in its desecration of the Palestinians’ bodies.
“The ‘container’ holding the dead bodies was left in one of Khan Yunis’s streets. This is a grave violation of the rights of the dead people and their families, as well as a catastrophic situation that could result in a health catastrophe,” the group said.
Israel has delivered the bodies of Palestinian people in this way multiple times amid its genocide. This past August, Israeli forces delivered the unidentified bodies of over 80 Palestinians in a container.
Palestinian officials noted that it was unclear whether the bodies were people who had been abducted by Israeli forces or if the bodies had been exhumed from their graves by the Israeli military. Officials said that Israeli forces have stolen 2,000 dead bodies from Palestinian cemeteries since October.
Israel has a long history of maiming Palestinians’ bodies after death. Last week, video circulated of Israeli forces pushing dead bodies off a rooftop amid a raid in the occupied West Bank.
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