Over 10,000 people under rubble in Gaza, years to retrieve bodies: UN
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The UN Aid Coordination Office warns that it might require up to three years to recover the bodies with the current "primitive" tools available in the Strip.
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Palestinians check for survivors and martyrs under the rubble of buildings destroyed in the Israeli bombing of the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on November 2, 2023. (AFP)
The Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza said that over 10,000 people remain buried under the rubble in the Strip, seven months into the ongoing genocidal war launched by the Israeli occupation last October.
The UN Aid Coordination Office, OCHA, stated that "with the current primitive tools available, it might require up to three years to recover the bodies," warning that rising temperatures are expected to accelerate the decomposition of bodies, heightening the risk of disease transmission and increasing concerns about public health.
Entire residential neighborhoods and areas have been completely destroyed by "Israel" since October, the UN aid office said, noting that Gaza was bombed "from the air, land, and sea."
The Palestinian Civil Defense said that many martyrs are trapped under rubble and on roads inaccessible to ambulances and civil defense crews due to lack of means and equipment, in addition to the occupation preventing rescue teams from reaching victims' positions.
The Civil Defense urged in a statement earlier this week that UN agencies and all relevant stakeholders urgently intervene to allow the entry of needed equipment, including bulldozers and excavators, to avert a public health catastrophe, facilitate dignified burials, and save the lives of injured people.
At least 5% of Gazans killed, injured
The health ministry revealed in its latest report on Friday that the number of Palestinians killed in the ongoing Israeli genocide in the Strip since October 7 has now reached 34,622, with 77,867 injured.
Read more: 1,000 Palestinian workers from Gaza missing: NGOs
A report by the United Nations Development Program on the socioeconomic situation in the Gaza Strip showed that due to the ongoing Israeli genocidal war, at least 5% of the population has either been killed or injured as of mid-April.
UNDP Administrator, Achim Steiner, underscored that "Unprecedented levels of human losses, capital destruction, and the steep rise in poverty in such a short period of time will precipitate a serious development crisis that jeopardizes the future of generations to come."
Then the system collapsed
Palestinian health authorities were cited by The Wall Street Journal last month as saying that they no longer have the capacity to count all the dead bodies in Gaza, especially with hospitals, emergency services, and communications barely functioning.
Given the difficulty in gathering data, the numbers of the dead are becoming less accurate, with numbers almost always underreported, as thousands remain unaccounted for.
Read more: Palestinian children, women killed in Israeli massacre in Gaza's Rafah
Medhat Abbas, a spokesperson for the health ministry in Gaza, said, “At the beginning we had systems, we had hospitals,” adding, “The Civil Defense teams were able to get people who were stuck under the rubble. Then the whole system collapsed.”
The ministry is now depending on other sources of information, such as testimonies from martyrs' relatives, video of the aftermath of strikes, and reports by media organizations, Abbas stated.
The true picture of the human casualties due to "Israel's" ongoing genocide, accompanied by the total collapse of hospitals and rescue services, will take a long time to emerge.
