Remains of 40 Martyrs Recovered in Gaza
The Palestinian Civil Defense teams recovered the remains of 40 martyrs from the Sheikh Radwan Cemetery in Gaza City on Tuesday. Parts of the cemetery were bulldozed and desecrated by Israeli occupation forces during their ground incursions into the area over the last two years.
Civil Defense personnel pointed out the remains of the martyrs were then transferred from the cemetery’s eastern side to forensic teams, in preparation for completing a full medical examination to identify the victims, a long procedure by itself. Representatives from the Ministry of Religious Endowments and Affairs were also present in the recovery of the 40 martyrs.
A Civil Defense statement explained the bulldozing of the cemetery resulted in the remains being unearthed and mixed together which necessitated in their transfer to the relevant authorities for examination and identification.
Director of Public Relations of Civil Defense Abdullah al-Majdalawi, confirmed the teams now face significant challenges to identify the recovered remains. He explained most of what was found consisted of decomposed body parts and skeletons of martyrs, including children and the elderly.
Al-Majdalawi pointed out the excavation and bulldozing operations by the Israelis obliterated the features of many graves and mixed the body remains, meaning great heartache for the families seeking to learn the fate of their loved ones and document their identities. “How can names be reduced to numbers” he wondered while highlighting the scale of the human tragedy caused by these practices.
These developments come at a time when the burial crisis in the Gaza Strip is worsening. Since the outbreak of the war, residents have been forced to establish mass graves and makeshift cemeteries in public squares, roads, and around hospitals, including in Al-Shifa, Kamal Adwan, and the Baptist Hospital, due to the siege and the difficulty of accessing the main cemeteries.
Gaza City also suffers from a severe shortage of burial space. The only functioning cemeteries are the Sheikh Radwan Cemetery and the Baptist Cemetery in the eastern part of the city. This has led many families to reopen old graves and bury multiple martyrs in a single grave, while simultaneously increasing the costs of preparing graves.
Human rights organizations and media outlets documented the bulldozing and desecration operations targeting a number of cemeteries in the Gaza Strip during Israeli ground operations. This resulted in the exhumation and mixing of the remains of the dead and martyrs, practices that constitute a violation of international humanitarian law and the sanctity of the dead.
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