Everyone in my family was either killed or injured: Nuseirat massacre
6 Min Read
Israeli Special Forces exit the truck, exchange greetings with civilians outside a house before entering, and once inside, they commence killing everyone present at the scene in Nuseirat.
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Palestinians walk on the rubble of destroyed buildings following the Israeli massacre at the Nuseirat camp, in the central Gaza Strip on June 8, 2024. (AFP)
The shock and grief have suffocated the streets of the Nuseirat refugee camp after 274 Palestinians of all ages, yet mainly children, were massacred in cold blood on Saturday, as per Gaza's Health Ministry.
The harrowing images emerging from the recent massacre have reverberated across the globe, igniting a wave of widespread protests and demonstrations. From bustling city streets in Chicago to remote villages in Pakistan, people everywhere are united in their condemnation of the Israeli atrocities witnessed in Gaza.
‘Like the horrors of judgment day’
Two eyewitnesses, Asia al-Nemer, searching for a pharmacy with remaining stock of her sister's medication, and Ansam Haroun, aiming to purchase new clothes for her daughters to lift their spirits ahead of the upcoming Eid al-Adha holiday, recounted the horrors of the Israeli massacre, The Guardian reported.
Earlier in the year, this area of central Gaza had become deserted when Israeli troops passed through, demolishing Haroun's home in an airstrike. However, the area experienced since May a surge in population as over a million people were forcibly displaced northward to escape another Israeli aggression on the Nuseirat refugee camp.
"The Nuseirat market is always crowded, but now more than usual because of the many displaced people," said Haroun, 29, who is currently residing with an uncle.
She recounted as cited by The Guardian that she was browsing outfits for her daughters when the initial Israeli airstrikes commenced. Almost instinctively, she dashed out of the door to reach them.
Outside, she encountered a scene reminiscent of "the horrors of judgment day" with panicked crowds attempting to flee the impending onslaught. Soon, helicopters and quadcopter drones would join the assault, resulting in hundreds of casualties and bodies strewn across the streets, as depicted in images from the area.
“Everyone was screaming, terrified,” she said, as quoted by The Guardian.
“The street I was on was only 50 meters long, but it was packed with hundreds of people, all running. A woman next to me fainted from terror, and I saw vendors abandoning their goods on the roadside to flee,” she stressed.
El-Nemer, a 37-year-old software engineer originally from the northern part of Gaza, was also among the crowd of people witnessing the Israeli carnage.
“I was jogging along the street with other women. We were terrified,” she said.
They hurried past health clinics and schools, places where they might have sought refuge in the past but now avoided due to deliberate Israeli attacks on such facilities.
The harrowing aftermath
As an Israeli helicopter appeared ahead and began firing at people in the street and an Israeli quadcopter joined the attack, the crowd panicked. El-Nemer sought refuge in a nearby house, where she pulled in another woman experiencing a panic attack.
It would take hours before they learned that the brutal attack was launched so that Israeli special forces would retrieve four Israeli captives. Gaza's Health Ministry reported that over 270 Palestinians were killed and more than 600 were injured in the Israeli massacre on Saturday.
Israeli forces arrived in aid truck, greeted people, and started killing everyone
Israeli special forces arrived in central Nuseirat in a truck disguised as humanitarian aid. Raed Tawfiq Abu Youssef, who was keeping watch at the hospital over his critically injured son, stated that his cousin observed the Israeli team arriving in the truck along with a car. It is worth noting that many reports have lately said that US forces were present on the ground and actively involved, alongside intelligence forces who had reportedly been planning the attack for at least a month.
"Some men got out of the truck, greeted people in front of the house, went in, and started killing everyone,” he said, as quoted by The Guardian.
'All kinds of wounds'
The majority of civilian casualties were transported to the nearby Al-Aqsa Hospital. Ali Ibrahim Tawil, 31, previously assigned to the cardiology wards before the Israeli aggression, now primarily works as an emergency doctor, tirelessly attempting to treat a continuous influx of war-related injuries with limited resources.
🚨🚨The Zionists have killed more than 150 civilians so far. They committed a massacre in the Nuseirat camp. The number is increasing, and the bodies of the martyrs are still arriving at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital continuously. pic.twitter.com/79eB5MW7BP
— Dr. Abdallah Mohammed (@jjjjwza) June 8, 2024
“It was a terribly difficult sight,” he said, before adding, "The injured we received were of all ages: children, women, men, elderly people, and there were all kinds of wounds."
“Many were on the floor, beds were put in the courtyard, in a big tent outdoors, literally every place in the hospital was filled with the injured, the dead or their relatives. The emergency room was so full, you couldn’t squeeze through your body from the sheer volume of people,” he stressed.
Teen paralyzed, Family ravaged by Israeli carnage
Ghazal al-Ghussein, aged 16, was with her family in a camp of iron-roofed refugee shacks in al-Hasayneh, situated west of Nuseirat and approximately half a mile inland when the Israeli bombing started.
According to her aunt Iman Abu Ras, who accompanied her to the hospital, an Israeli missile struck nearby, resulting in the killing of one brother and injuries to her father, mother, and another brother. Al-Ghussein herself sustained head injuries from shrapnel, causing bleeding in the brain and paralysis in her hand and foot.
“No one helped them. Her injured father dragged her, her mother and her injured brother on a mattress away from danger, but then he collapsed unconscious,” Abu Ras said, as quoted by The Guardian. “The area was besieged, and the ambulance was only able to come to evacuate them after a long time.”
'All kinds of attacks in the area to cover up their cowardly operation'
Abu Youssef, aged 42, expressed that despite residing near the hospital, his family was not shielded from an airstrike that struck directly beside their home. Tragically, he had already lost his three other children earlier in the Israeli massacre, and doctors conveyed that his last surviving son had minimal chances of survival.
“Everyone in my family and my brothers’ families was either killed or injured. Three of my nieces died so far; my sister is still fighting for her life,” he said as quoted by The Guardian.
“My house is near Al-Awda Hospital,” he stressed. “Although it is hundreds of meters away from the building they targeted, there were a lot of airstrikes and all kinds of attacks in the area to cover up their cowardly operation.”
Unfortunately, this massacre is one of many since October 7, resulting in more than 37,000 fatalities to date. Meanwhile, the Israeli carnage seems to continue unabated.
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