A mass funeral was held in Gaza City on Sunday for about 100 Palestinians whose bodies were recently recovered from the rubble of residential buildings destroyed by Israeli airstrikes, a painstaking process as the US and Israel continue to block construction equipment from entering the Palestinian territory.
Hundreds of Palestinians attended the funeral, and family members carried remains to the al-Ma’madani cemetery in central Gaza City for burial, Al Jazeera reported. According to Middle East Eye, 62 of the Palestinians whose remains were buried on Sunday were children.
Fifty-five of the dead belonged to the Malka family and were killed by November 2023 Israeli airstrikes that collapsed high-rise residential buildings. Just over a month ago, a similar funeral was held in Gaza City for 112 members of the Abu Sharia al-Hassaina family, who were also killed by Israeli airstrikes on apartment buildings in November 2023.
Raed al-Dahshan, head of Gaza’s civil defense, told Al Jazeera that he estimated there are about 8,000 bodies that remain buried under the rubble. He said that with the proper equipment, it would take about 90 days to recover all the bodies, but “if that equipment is barred from entering Gaza … this work will continue for years.”
Gaza’s civil defense also doesn’t have access to the IDF-occupied side of the Gaza Strip, which accounts for at least 60% of the Palestinian territory. Israeli forces have continued demolitions in Gaza and have been removing rubble, raising questions about whether human remains are also being removed.
The US and Israel have agreed that reconstruction won’t be allowed to begin in the civilian-populated side of Gaza until Hamas is disarmed. But despite Hamas agreeing to a deal that would see the group give up its weapons, Israel has rejected the US-backed proposal, and the US continues to back Israel’s constant attacks and other military operations, which violate the October 2025 ceasefire deal.
