Israel returns ‘unidentifiable’ bodies of 80 Palestinians to Gaza

Israeli occupation authorities today handed over the bodies of more than 80 Palestinians killed in various circumstances during the Gaza war.

The corpses were transferred to the Strip in coordination with the International Red Cross (ICRC), which in turn handed them over to the Ministry of Health in Gaza in the city of Khan Yunis, where they were buried in a mass grave and a ceremony took place.

According to sources, the bodies were in different stages of decomposition and most had numbers but no names and were not identified.

Some 10,000 Palestinians are missing from Gaza, including those forcibly disappeared by Israel and the bodies of those Israel has exhumed from cemeteries across the enclave.

As a result of the occupation forces’ bombing campaign, medical facilities are very limited in Gaza and DNA tests cannot be carried out on the bodies returned today in an effort to identify them.

A report published last week by the UN Human Rights Office said that 53 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons and facilities since the beginning of the Gaza war last October, including 36 at the notorious Sde Teiman facility in southern Israel.

Israeli occupation authorities return ‘unidentifiable’ bodies of 80 Palestinians to Gaza, on 5 August 2024 [Mohammed Asad/Middle East Monitor]

Israeli occupation authorities return ‘unidentifiable’ bodies of 80 Palestinians to Gaza, on 5 August 2024 [Mohammed Asad/Middle East Monitor]

Israeli occupation authorities return ‘unidentifiable’ bodies of 80 Palestinians to Gaza, on 5 August 2024 [Mohammed Asad/Middle East Monitor]

Israeli occupation authorities return ‘unidentifiable’ bodies of 80 Palestinians to Gaza, on 5 August 2024 [Mohammed Asad/Middle East Monitor]

Israeli occupation authorities return ‘unidentifiable’ bodies of 80 Palestinians to Gaza, on 5 August 2024 [Mohammed Asad/Middle East Monitor]

Israeli occupation authorities return ‘unidentifiable’ bodies of 80 Palestinians to Gaza, on 5 August 2024 [Mohammed Asad/Middle East Monitor]

Israeli occupation authorities return ‘unidentifiable’ bodies of 80 Palestinians to Gaza, on 5 August 2024 [Mohammed Asad/Middle East Monitor]

Israeli occupation authorities return ‘unidentifiable’ bodies of 80 Palestinians to Gaza, on 5 August 2024 [Mohammed Asad/Middle East Monitor]

Displaced Gazan couple: ‘What’s happening to us, never happened to anyone before’