After more than two years of Israel‘s genocidal war on Gaza, a fragile ceasefire was announced on 9 October 2025.
Despite Israel’s continued violations, the brief pauses in bombardment have allowed Palestinians to start limited recovery efforts and hold long-overdue discussions on what must follow beyond emergency relief.
Within the first week of the ceasefire, 436 bodies were retrieved from under the rubble by Gaza’s Civil Defence teams, and 195 bodies were returned by Israel, of which only 57 were identified. With no functioning forensic equipment, many will be buried unnamed, leaving families trapped in uncertainty and suspended grief.
At first glance, this might appear to be a logistical issue, but the challenge has revealed a deeper moral and psychological crisis. The destruction of Gaza’s forensic capacity means the estimated 10,000 bodies still trapped beneath the rubble may never be identified or properly counted.
International teams have entered Gaza to search for the remains of Israeli captives, yet no comparable urgency exists to recover or identify Palestinian victims. ….,more
