A Palestinian child looks at the graves of people killed in the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip and buried inside the Shifa Hospital grounds in Gaza City. (File photo by AP)
New York, June 19 (RHC)-- Israel’s air and ground offensive in Gaza has killed hundreds of Palestinian family members from the same bloodline, an unprecedented toll on the small community mostly made up of refugees and their descendants, a recent report has revealed.
An investigation by the Associated Press revealed that at least 60 Palestinian families experienced the loss of at least 25 members, spanning four generations from the same bloodline, during the bombings that took place between October and December.
This period marked the deadliest and most devastating phase of the conflict.
In just a matter of weeks, nearly a quarter of those families lost more than 50 members, with the difficulty of documenting and sharing information due to internet and telephone services being collapsed and some families left with almost no one to record the devastating toll.
The AP review analyzed casualty data from Gaza's health ministry until March, online death notices, family and neighborhood social media pages, witness testimonies, and information from Airwars, a conflict monitor based in London.
AP also geolocated and analyzed 10 Israeli strike, among the deadliest in the war, between October 7 and December 24. Together the strikes killed more than 500 people.
Gaza’s Government Media Office (GMO) says the Israeli regime has committed over 3,300 massacres in the coastal sliver since October.
Among the hardest hit are the Mughrabi family which lost more than 70 members in a single attack. The Abu Najas family mourns over 50 killed, including at least 2 pregnant women, while the Doghmush clan lost at least 44 in a strike on a mosque and the total soared over 100 weeks later. By spring, over 80 members of the Abu al-Qumssan family had been killed.
In one attack in the crowded Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza, Israeli bombs erased an entire block of buildings. Nearly 40 members of the Abu al-Qumssan family were killed, while the exact number of casualties is still uncertain as numerous individuals are trapped beneath the rubble.
Ramy Abdu, chairman for the Geneva-based EuroMed Human Rights Monitor, which monitors the Gaza war, expressed concern over the overwhelming challenge of keeping up with the continuously rising death toll.
Dozens of his researchers in Gaza stopped documenting family deaths in March after identifying over 2,500 with at least three deaths, he added.
In the 51-day war of 2014, the number of families that lost three or more members was less than 150.
But during the initial month of Israel's recent offensive in Gaza, the health ministry in Gaza reported that 300 Palestinian families suffered the loss of more than 10 members each and by January nearly 1,900 families have suffered multiple deaths.
This comes as Israel is facing a significant genocide case at the International Court of Justice, with the "killing of families across generations" being cited as a crucial piece of evidence.
Separately, the International Criminal Court prosecutor is seeking arrest warrants for two Israeli leaders for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including for the intentional killing of civilians.
Since the start of the offensive, the Tel Aviv regime has killed at least 37, 347 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured 85, 372 more. More than 1.7 million people have been internally displaced during the war as well.
