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Nearly 10,000 Palestinians have been reported missing by their families in Gaza, their fates unknown, with likely thousands more nowhere to be found because they were killed with their entire family unit, health officials have said.
According to Gaza Health Ministry information official Zaher al-Wahidi, about 6,000 people are believed by their families to be buried under the rubble in Gaza — the result of Israel leveling 70 percent of buildings in Gaza, including 92 percent of residential buildings, in its genocide.
Al-Wahidi noted that there are likely far more Palestinians buried under the rubble whose fates have not been reported because they were killed along with their entire family. Reuters found in an analysis of known deaths in March that Israel has wiped out at least 1,238 entire families, with no survivors, and left thousands more with just one remaining survivor.
In many cases where entire families are killed, they are massacred by an Israeli strike on the building they’re residing in, reports have found, leaving them or their bodies buried under rubble.
Further, the ministry has received reports of roughly 3,600 additional Palestinians from families who believe they are otherwise missing. AP reports that Palestinian officials have investigated over 200 of these cases, and found that seven of them are being detained by Israel, and that the others are not listed among those known to be buried under the rubble or killed.
Missing Palestinians could have been thrown into mass graves or their bodies rendered unrecognizable by Israeli attacks. In a particularly brutal Israeli strike on a mosque during morning prayer last year, Israel’s bomb shredded bodies to the point where Palestinians had to gather body parts in plastic bags to count the dead.
The Israeli military also often withholds Palestinians’ bodies. Last year, Israel delivered a shipping container holding 88 Palestinians’ bodies into Gaza. The bodies were so decomposed that they couldn’t be identified, and Israeli officials did not provide any information on how they were killed or who they were.
Humanitarian groups have previously estimated that there are 21,000 children missing, with 17,000 unaccompanied or separated from their families and the rest believed to be buried under rubble.
Israel is also holding thousands of Palestinians in custody, often for completely arbitrary reasons. Israeli forces have been detaining a huge number of Palestinians from Gaza and the occupied West Bank and refusing them access to legal counsel or their families.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has its own separate list of missing Palestinians in the Strip, AP reports. Seven thousand of those cases, including people buried under the rubble, are unresolved.
Last week, ICRC suspended its operations in Gaza City, where Israel is conducting a ground invasion. The group said it’s relocating staff to southern Gaza as the group’s “movement and ability to safely reach the civilian population has been severely constrained.” Gaza officials have criticized the decision as abandoning Palestinians at the time of their greatest need.
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