Daijiworld Media Network - Gaza City
Gaza City, Oct 1: Hundreds of Palestinians gathered in Gaza City on Thursday for the funeral of 105 Palestinians whose bodies and remains were recovered from beneath the rubble of residential buildings destroyed in Israeli bombardments in October 2023.
The remains were recovered from the Al-Taj residential complex in the Al-Yarmouk area of Gaza City, where buildings were destroyed during the early days of the war. Families of the victims and local residents performed funeral prayers before the remains, wrapped in Palestinian flags, were taken to the Martyrs Cemetery in the Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood for burial.
According to Gaza Civil Defense officials, the recovery operation took 17 days and was carried out with assistance from technical teams from an Egyptian committee and the International Committee of the Red Cross. The remains were recovered from beneath 16 residential buildings in the Al-Taj area.
Mamdouh Atallah, who attended the funeral, said the recovery work began around 20 days ago. He said the buildings had been targeted on October 25, 2023, and the complex contained around 138 apartments.
According to the Civil Defense account, around 450 Palestinians were killed in the attack, including women, children and elderly people. The remains of 105 people have so far been recovered, including 37 children and 38 women, while others are still believed to be buried beneath the rubble.
A farewell ceremony was held at the site on Wednesday, where relatives gathered around the recovered remains and lit candles before the mass funeral.
The recovery operation comes amid continuing difficulties faced by Gaza's Civil Defense teams in locating people buried under destroyed buildings. Officials said they need heavy machinery, including 10 excavators, 30 bulldozers and 100 heavy loaders, to accelerate the recovery of remaining bodies.
Gaza Civil Defense officials estimate that more than 8,000 bodies remain beneath the rubble of destroyed buildings across the Gaza Strip. The shortage of heavy equipment has significantly slowed recovery operations.
The latest funeral follows several similar recovery operations in recent months. In September, the remains of around 100 Palestinians, including 60 children, were recovered from destroyed homes in Gaza City's Zeitoun neighbourhood and buried in a mass funeral. In August, the remains of 112 people, including 40 children, were recovered from another residential site and buried after more than two years beneath the rubble.
The recovery of the 105 victims has allowed families to give their relatives a formal burial nearly three years after the October 2023 attacks and the subsequent war in Gaza.