Rescuers in Gaza have already recovered hundreds of bodies from under the rubble in Gaza in less than a week since the ceasefire began, Gaza officials reported on Wednesday, with thousands more Palestinians’ bodies still trapped under the rubble.
The Palestinian civil defense agency and medical facilities have reported that, since Sunday, about 200 bodies have been recovered from under debris. Since the ceasefire, 248 deaths have been added to the official death toll, with health facilities reporting receiving 54 bodies in the last 24 hours — a mix of bodies rescued from the rubble and Israel’s seeming ceasefire violations in recent days.
This has brought the total death toll of the genocide to 47,161 people, according to official counts, with over 111,100 injured.
As the rescue efforts demonstrate, the true toll is likely far higher, with thousands of people missing under the rubble. One recent study in The Lancet found that the death toll from traumatic injury alone is likely over 64,000 people, 40 percent higher than the official toll — and that’s before counting deaths from other causes like starvation and disease.
Officials estimate that there are 10,000 bodies still trapped under the rubble, including thousands of children. Each of these bodies represents a family member, friend and neighbor who effectively went missing amid the genocide, some of their deaths presumed but never confirmed by loved ones.
Some bodies may never be found. An estimated 2,840 bodies have been evaporated by Israeli attacks, impossible to count because all trace of them is gone, Gaza civil defense spokesperson Mahmoud Basel has said. Others may be buried in unmarked mass graves.
Many bodies were torn into pieces by Israel’s bombs and rendered completely unrecognizable, forcing Palestinians to search for any scrap that may identify them, like a shred of a shirt or a shoe.
“My children are still under the rubble. I am trying to get them out,” Mahmoud Abu Dalfa told Reuters, saying that he and the civil defense workers lack the tools to excavate his family, who were killed in the early months of the genocide. “My wife was killed along with all my five children — three daughters and two sons. I had triplets.”
“I hope I can bring them out and make them a grave. That’s all I want from this entire world. I don’t want them to build me a house or give me anything else. All I want is a grave for them — to get them out and make them a grave,” Abu Dalfa went on.
According to the UN satellite assessments, there are 50 million tonnes of debris in Gaza as of December, with over 170,800 structures damaged or destroyed by Israel’s bombardments. Removing the debris would take 21 years at least, officials say, and cost up to $1.2 billion.
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