13,000 Palestinians reportedly missing in the Gaza Strip
Palestinians inspect buildings destroyed by Israeli airstrikes in Jabaliya refugee camp on the outskirts of Gaza City in October 2023
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor reports on 11 April 2024:
Palestinian Territory – Urgent international action is needed to set up special mechanisms and specialised teams to remove debris from homes and buildings that Israel’s army has bombed, rescue those trapped alive under the rubble, and retrieve the thousands of dead bodies stuck under it since the genocide began on 7 October 2023.
Decisive international pressure on Israel is necessary to facilitate the labour of the individuals and crews working to remove this rubble, including civil defense crews. Pressure must also be put on Israel to release information on the fate of the thousands of Palestinian prisoners and detainees from the Gaza Strip who are being held by Israeli army forces, plus those who have been victims of murder, unlawful execution, and enforced disappearance in Israeli prisons and detention centres.
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor estimates that over 13,000 Palestinians are either missing under debris, buried in indiscriminate mass graves, or forcibly disappeared in Israeli prisons and detention facilities, where some have even been killed. The circumstances surrounding the deaths of these prisoners and detainees have not yet been made public by the Israeli army, nor have any independent investigators been able to confirm or determine the details of their deaths. These victims’ bodies have not been exhumed, their identities have not been established, and their remains have not been repatriated, nor have their relatives been informed.
This estimate is based on initial reports of missing people, and the true number is likely higher. Given the ongoing military attacks and siege by the Israeli government, as well as the illegal practices of the Israeli army that have scattered Palestinian families—particularly by forcing them to repeatedly evacuate without safe passages, separating family members and forcing them to move to different areas, arresting and forcibly disappearing some of them, and cutting off communication between families—it is not possible to confirm the precise number of missing people at this time.
Euro-Med Monitor field teams together with civil defense crews and rescue teams recently used their limited resources to recover the bodies of 422 Palestinians from Gaza City’s Al-Shifa Medical Complex as well as Khan Yunis, which is located in the south of the Gaza Strip, after the Israeli army withdrew from these areas over the course of the past few days. Family members of the victims also took part in the search and recovery process, where the victims were occasionally buried next to their homes or in haphazard mass graves, or moved to nearby hospitals.