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.
CROSSFIREARABIA – Palestinians in Gaza City hold a protest, Monday, against the continual Israeli violations of the ceasefire that was signed on 10 October, 2025. Since that time, Israel chose to violate the skies of Gaza thousands of times and the killing of over a 1000 Palestinian and the injury of over 3000. Through different banners, the protesters called on the international community to pressure the Israeli occupation to desist from violating the ceasefire and respect international law.
CROSSFIREARABIA – Israeli occupation forces continued, Wednesday, to violate the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip through strikes and gunfire in different areas in the east and south of the Strip. Israeli warplanes continue to roam the skyline of Gaza while striking at different areas as it did on a school in the Tuffah neigborhood in northeast Gaza. Since 10 October, 2025, Israeli violated the ceasefire 3338 times resulting in the deaths of 1027 Palestinians and the injury of 3208 civilians according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
Israeli authorities and security forces have deliberately targeted Palestinian children, resulting in genocide and atrocity crimes in the Gaza Strip and war crimes in the West Bank, a UN independent commission of inquiry said in its latest report released on Tuesday.
“The evidence shows that Palestinian children have been deliberately targeted and killed by the Israeli security forces,” said Srinivasan Muralidhar, chair of the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel.
The report refers to the period following Hamas’ invasion of Israel in late 2023, which resulted in 1,200 deaths and 250 taken hostage, and the subsequent war Israel waged against Gaza that has to date killed more than 70,000 Palestinians in the besieged and occupied territory.
“Even after the October 2025 ceasefire, children continue to be killed and seriously injured, with continued disregard by Israel for the ceasefire and for the protection owed to Palestinian children under international law,” he said.
Last year, the commission concluded that “Israel had committed genocide against the Palestinian group in the Gaza Strip, found that the intense scale and systematic nature of the Israeli military operations have continued, resulting in unprecedented death, injury and trauma of Palestinian children.”
Israeli forces have killed over 20,000 children & injured 44,000 more since 7 Oct. 2023, Srinivasan Muralidhar, chair of the @UN Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory & Israel, told reporters today. #HRC62
— UN Human Rights Council Investigative Bodies (@uninvhrc) June 23, 2026
Here are some findings in the commission’s latest report:
Israel has killed 20,000 children and injured 44,000 more since 7 October 2023
Severe physical and mental injuries, mass trauma, orphanhood, separation, disability, repeated displacements, starvation and the collapse of education and healthcare have erased childhood and will continue to affect children in Gaza throughout their lives
Palestinian children have been arrested and subjected to torture and other severe forms of mistreatment in Israeli prisons and detention facilities, with no information on their whereabouts
Israeli security forces have used sexual violence against children as part of the collective shaming and oppression, entrenched within a prolonged, ethnic, gendered and intergenerational pattern of occupation and hostilities
“There can be no doubt in anyone who reads today’s report that every international legal norm has been violated by the actions of the Israeli authorities towards Palestinian children and they need to be held accountable,” Commissioner Chris Sidoti said at a press conference in Geneva, citing cases from the report.
In one instance, a 14-year-old boy was shot by an Israeli military patrol as he was leaving his house, Mr. Sidoti said, explaining that the patrol had been in the area, but at the time there had been no fighting taking place.
“He was shot, badly injured and was lying on the ground,” Mr. Sidoti continued. “He was surrounded by a company of Israeli soldiers who were chatting and probably some of them smoking, over a period of 45 minutes, while this 14-year-old boy bled to death.”
Starvation and targeted attacks
Also highlighted in the report was the widespread devastation of critical infrastructure that served children. Israel’s targeting of neonatal and maternity care centres in Gaza have directly harmed the survival of newborns and Palestinians’ reproductive future.
In addition, starvation imposed by Israel through blockade and siege have further caused the death of Palestinian children and severely impacted the health of many others.
Dismantling and destruction of orphanages and education facilities in Gaza and the West Bank have obstructed cognitive, social and emotional care and development and disrupted the foundations of Palestinian society, the report stated.
They ‘will not simply recover overnight’
Palestinian children have suffered immense psychological harm, having been stripped of any sense of safety and future, according to the report. Such mental harm is an intergenerational condition, producing a distinctive “occupied psyche” in which the freedom to play, imagine, hope and develop an identity has been eroded.
“Even if the bombs and guns fall silent in Gaza and West Bank, Palestinian children will not simply recover overnight,” Mr. Muralidhar said. “The destruction of their health, education and development is irreversible.”
By targeting children, Israel is eroding the foundational structure of Palestinian society, weakening the demographic vitality and overall capacity of the Palestinian people to sustain and exercise its right to determine its future as a people.
“The protection, care and survival of Palestinian children are inseparable from the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination,” Mr. Muralidhar said. “By targeting children, Israel is attacking the very capacity of the Palestinian people to exist and to determine their future.”
Fresh calls for Israeli action
In its latest report, the independent commission called for Israel to cease committing violations and crimes against and affecting Palestinian children and for the end of Israel’s continuing presence in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, in compliance with the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
Having identified military units within the Israeli security forces responsible for killing and injuring of Palestinian children, the commission issued recommendations to Israel and to all Member States to ensure accountability for such crimes.
“The international community as a whole must uphold their international legal obligations and call for an end to the hostilities, for Israel to end its occupation and to prioritise accountability and access to justice for victims as an integral component of any political process, grounded in the meaningful participation of Palestinians, including children,” the commission stated.
Member States of the UN Human Rights Councilestablished the commission in 2021 to “investigate, in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and in Israel, all alleged violations of international humanitarian law and all alleged violations and abuses of international human rights law leading up to and since 13 April 2021.”
Hezbollah Secretary-General Naem Qassem said on Tuesday Israel “has no option” but to withdraw from Lebanese territory under a set timetable.
“The withdrawal must take place after the current ceasefire under a timetable,” Qassem said in a televised speech.
“Israel has no option but to withdraw completely from all Lebanese territory,” he stressed.
Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have repeatedly said that the army will not withdraw from territory occupied in southern Lebanon, despite a recently signed interim deal between Iran and the US, which calls for respect for Lebanon’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
The Hezbollah chief said the Lebanese army will deploy “exclusively” south of the Litani River after the Israeli withdrawal.
“We will cooperate with the Lebanese army to the fullest extent within the framework of mutual security, as we have done previously,” he added.
Qassem’s statements came as Israel and Lebanon held a fifth round of direct negotiations in Washington on Tuesday. The talks follow four previous rounds between the two sides that began in April as part of a track aimed at ending the Israeli war in Lebanon.
Israeli attacks in Lebanon have killed more than 4,100 people and injured over 12,000 others since March 2, according to official Lebanese figures.
Israel continues to occupy areas in southern Lebanon, some held for decades and others seized during the 2023–2024 war.
The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and Lebanon’s government-linked National Council for Scientific Research estimated the direct cost of damage to buildings in southern Lebanon from Israeli attacks exceeded $1.38 billion, with rubble estimated at around 3.1 million cubic meters. Anadolu
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CrossFireArabia
marwan
Saleem Ayoub Quna
