Tareq S. Hajjaj
Mondoweiss / January 24, 2025
Palestinians across Gaza are returning to the rubble of their homes to search for their missing loved ones. “I’m looking through the skulls the Civil Defense collects trying to identify my sons,” Rafah resident Mahmoud al-Qatati tells Mondoweiss.
A Palestinian mother in the city of Rafah reaches the rubble of her house and finds what she believes is her son’s decomposed body. The mother runs and approaches the body, of which nothing remains but the skull and bones. She embraces the skull and holds it to her chest while crying and talking to the skull that she has in her arms. It is her son.
The mother tells her son that she came to search for him and that she found him. People gather around her and watch as she cries, taking in the intensity of the pain in her words. She tells them that he is her only son and that she is not afraid to embrace his skull.
“I felt this, my son, my soul, my heart… I felt this, and I came to you; I came to you myself, my beloved son, to find and take you; no one searched for you; I came alone looking for you.” A video of the mother has spread on social media platforms without any information about the mother, except that she says her son’s name as she cries over him.
“Hassan, Hassan, Hassan!” The mother embraces the skull and calls out to it, “I didn’t sleep all night to come look for you, my son.”
This mother embodies the suffering of thousands of families who lost members during the war, as there are still more than 10,000 people thought to be buried under the rubble in Gaza. As soon as the ceasefire began in the Gaza Strip, the families who could return to their destroyed homes rushed back to find their loved ones as decomposed bodies, many with only bones and skulls remaining. This scene is being repeated throughout all of the Gaza Strip, such as the southern city of Rafah, from which many missing people have been extracted as unidentified skeletons.
In Rafah, Civil Defense teams have been working to recover bodies from under the rubble since residents have been able to return. Many are finding similar scenes as they return home, Civil Defense teams spreading a piece of plastic on the ground and collecting bones and skulls of their neighbours and relatives.
Haitham al-Homs, Deputy Director of Ambulance Services at the Civil Defense in Rafah, told Mondoweiss they have received more than 150 reports from citizens identifying the presence of decomposed bodies under the rubble of homes.
“From the first moment the Israeli army withdrew, Civil Defense teams began dealing with the bodies and retrieving them. Some bodies have been identified based on information from their families, and others have not been identified.”
“In all areas of eastern and western Rafah, there are bodies under the rubble, and they are being dealt with,” says Al-Homs.
So far, Civil Defense teams have recovered at least than 166 bodies stuck under the rubble throughout Gaza, most of them bones and skulls and unidentified, according to a Friday report published by the Civil Defense on its Telegram channel.
Osama Saleh, a resident of Tal al-Sultan in Rafah, told Mondoweiss the scenes he found upon his return to the city were terrifying and that bodies were lying everywhere. Most were decomposed with nothing remaining of them except the bones and skulls. When he returned to his house, he found an unknown body inside and reported it to the authorities.
“The scene was a tragedy and devastation. We found people as skeletons, skulls, or bones. It was a sombre scene, a painful scene, for a people suffering from all kinds of injustice. Bodies were on the ground decomposing, in addition to those who disappeared under the soil,” Saleh describes.
“I entered my house and found a decomposed body. I did not know who he is; there were no signs to help me identify him, and nothing was clear except a skull and some bones,” Saleh recounted, indicating that the body had been in his house for at least 4 or 5 months to have decomposed to this point.
“We live in terror, and we see terror, an excruciating feeling that made me cry bitterly. We are greatly affected when we see decomposed and dismembered bodies, and nothing remains of them except the skulls. The tragedy is great, and the scenes are difficult. I was terrified when I saw the bodies, we are a stricken people.”
Mahmoud al-Qatati (53) stood next to the Civil Defense crews to search for his relatives who have been missing in Rafah for five months. He is searching for two sons and two of his sister’s sons. They came to check on each other and were bombed by the Israeli planes, but no one was able to enter the area to evacuate them.
“I waited impatiently for the ceasefire so I could return to our area and search for my sons. My two sons came here to search for their cousins, who could not flee and were besieged by the Israeli army in Tel al-Sultan. When my two sons came to search for them, the plane bombed them, and their bodies remained on the ground for days. Here I am trying to reach them and checking on anybody in case I know something that distinguishes my sons,” says Al-Qatati.
“I’m looking through the skulls the Civil Defense collects trying to identify my sons,” Al-Qatati told Mondoweiss.
He has not been able to find his sons yet because most of the bodies have not been identified. It will be a difficult task for him to identify his sons among the many skulls and skeletons that remain.
“My sons were bombed in a place I know well, and I went to look for them there, but I don’t think their bodies remained there throughout the war. Maybe the dogs and cats dragged them to different places, maybe the Israeli army removed them with bulldozers and tanks. There are dozens of scenarios that come to my head, but I’m not sure of any of them, and I haven’t found my sons yet.”
Tareq S. Hajjaj is the Mondoweiss Gaza Correspondent, and a member of the Palestinian Writers Union
