War in the Gaza Strip
Israel’s fight against Hamas has wiped out entire families
Pain and grief in the Gaza Strip: A boy kneels at the grave of a war victim
© Mohammed Hajjar / AP / DPA
Death is omnipresent in the Gaza Strip. According to an AP investigation, in some families almost all members have fallen victim to Israeli attacks. This could also play a role in the genocide trial before the ICJ.
According to the Ministry of Health, which is controlled by the terrorist group, more than 37,300 residents of the Gaza Strip have been killed in the war between Israel and Hamas. The number cannot be independently verified. What is certain, however, is that the civilian population in the sealed-off Palestinian enclave is paying a high price in blood for the Hamas attack on October 7. According to Israeli sources, Islamist attackers murdered 1,194 people and abducted 251. According to the Associated Press (AP) news agency, an unusually high number of families have also been almost completely wiped out in the military clashes.
Between October and December alone, the deadliest and most destructive period of the war, at least 25 people in at least 60 Palestinian families were killed in bombings – sometimes even four generations of the same bloodline, reports AP, citing its own research. Almost a quarter of these families lost more than 50 members during that period. In some families there is almost no one left to document the losses.
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The news agency says it analyzed several different sources for its investigation: Gaza Health Ministry records of the victims, online obituaries, social media pages and tables from families and neighborhoods, reports from witnesses and survivors, and casualty data from Airwars, a London-based conflict monitoring organization.
According to the report, more than 70 members of the Mughrabi family were killed in a single Israeli airstrike in December. The Abu Najas family lost more than 50 members in October, including at least two pregnant women. At least 44 members of the large Doghmush clan fell victim to an attack on a mosque and more than 100 family members were killed in the following weeks. By spring, according to AP, almost 100 members of the al-Agha family and more than 80 members of the Abu al-Qumssan family had died in Israeli attacks.
Youssef Salem, who has been living in Istanbul with his wife and daughter since the 2021 war, lost 173 relatives within a few days in December, according to AP. By spring, their number had risen to 270. Salem is one of the very last survivors of his family in Gaza.
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Ramy Abdu, chairman of the Geneva-based EuroMed Human Rights Monitor, which monitors the Gaza war, told the news agency that dozens of his staff in the Gaza Strip had identified more than 2,500 families with at least three deaths by March. Then they stopped documenting the deaths. “We can barely keep up with the total number of deaths,” Abdu said.
South Africa accuses Israel of genocide
The annihilation of several generations of families is an essential part of the genocide case against Israel before the International Court of Justice (ICJ). South Africa filed a lawsuit there at the end of 2023, accusing Israel of violating the Genocide Convention. In an emergency ruling, the UN court imposed protective measures on Israel to prevent genocide. The country must also allow more humanitarian aid for the people in the Gaza Strip. At the end of May, the ICJ ordered Israel to immediately end the controversial military operation in Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip.
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Israel denies the genocide allegations. The country invokes its right to self-defense following the attack by Hamas and other extremist groups on October 7.
Sources: Associated Press