Khan Yunis, a devastated town of destroyed homes and martyrs among the rubble

There are dozens of martyrs among the rubble of destroyed homes and street alleys in the city of Khan Yunis, south of the Gaza Strip. The Israeli occupation’s bombing turned most of its residential neighborhoods into piles of debris. Residents returning to the city after the occupation forces withdrew from Khan Yunis have been searching in vain for the remnants of their memories. No homes have been left or clearly marked streets for the arriving-back Palestinian residents of Khan Yunis to recognize the features of their now devastated city. This is how Ahmad Morgan describes the state of the city six months after the Israeli aggression.

Morjan tells a SANA reporter about his tragedy and says: “My house, which is located in the Al-Amal neighborhood, was demolished, and I could not recognize the neighborhood’s landmarks, as if an earthquake had struck it due to the American-manufactured rockets and shells used by the Israeli occupation army to wipe out Khan Yunis and tear the neighborhoods upside down. Devastation due to the Israeli bombing has caused deep holes that swallowed everything.Dozens of martyrs are still under the rubble of homes, and civil defense teams have been unable to recover the bodies of victims.

Experts in tracking destruction via satellite images confirm that 45,000 buildings in the city of Khan Yunis have been destroyed or damaged, that is, more than 55 percent of the total buildings in the city, while the Palestinian Ministry of Health indicates that the medical teams have recovered the bodies of 84 martyrs since the occupation withdrew from the city. The majority of victim bodies were recovered from crossroads and from sites located around hospitals. The towns of Bani Suhaila, Khuza’a, Ma’an, Al-Qarara, and Al-Zana, east of Khan Yunis have suffered the heaviest losses and amounts of damage.

Palestinian Red Crescent spokesman Raed Nims confirmed that the health situation in Khan Yunis is catastrophic, as Al-Amal Hospital, Nasser Medical Complex, and most of the city’s medical centers are out of service as a result of the siege and the destruction by the occupation. This is in addition to the decomposition of the bodies of the martyrs and the serious repercussions of this on public health. The Red Crescent spokesman indicated that the Palestinian RC suffers from a deep shortage in capabilities that are necessary to extract the bodies of martyrs from underneath the rubble of homes, as the number of martyrs is estimated to be in hundreds. This is in addition to the occupation’s bulldozing of the streets while preventing the ambulance and civil defense teams from carrying out their duties.

Mahmoud Abu Jazar, a Khan Yunis resident, pointed out that the people found in the Al-Zinna and Bani Suhaila area, east of Khan Yunis, the bodies of a number of martyrs dumped in the streets, including members of their own families. Mahmoud indicated that only skeletons remained of some of the martyrs, while entire families had dropped dead in their homes due to the Israeli massive bombing.

Mahmoud explained that the occupation completely demolished more than 3,000 homes in the towns of Bani Suhaila, Al-Qarara, Ma’an, and Al-Zinna. He said: “Most of us no longer have homes, as the occupation blew up and burned the homes, burying with them the memories and dreams of entire families, while the international community continues to remain silent about our tragedy, which has exceeded limits.” .

NR