"The number of missing is increasing"
The number of martyrs in this horrific war—whose intensity has not been seen in modern history—keeps rising after more than 200 days of aggression and atrocities against the Palestinian people in Gaza. It has claimed the lives of almost 34,000 martyrs, but these are only the ones who have been interred and officially documented. Over 10,000 individuals are thought to be missing under the debris in Gaza, according to the Palestinian Civil Defense. Retrieving the dead will be extremely difficult due to a lack of workers, heavy machinery, and equipment. With the crude instruments at their disposal, they cautioned that recovering the bodies might take up to three years.
Beneath the debris, almost 10,000 Palestinians remain missing. The worst and most agonizing part is that the relatives of those who are missing are in the dark as to whether their loved ones are martyrs interred in mass graves, have been killed inside Israeli prisons and detention facilities, or are forced to hide there. Up until today, neither the Israeli army nor any outside organization has been able to confirm or identify the conditions of these inmates or detainees. The identities of those who were martyred, their remains, or their families have not yet been located or notified.
The bulk of the bodies discovered among the missing were decomposed as a result of the prolonged period of time after the Israeli forces prevented their retrieval for months, some of which were obviously scavenged by cats and dogs. This violated the victims' and their families' rights to be buried with respect and dignity in individual graves that are marked in a way that permits constant identification.
Israel has broken every rule of international law, which states that parties to an armed conflict must take all reasonable steps to prevent the plundering of the dead and the deceased, preserve their dignity, and prevent their bodies from being desecrated. It also states that respecting the bodies of the dead, not looting them, and protecting them during armed conflicts are all requirements.