When 20-year-old Omar al-Sawhi tried to bury his father in Gaza City, he found no affordable space. The cemetery was crowded with fresh graves, many identified only by stones and torn pieces of paper. Unable to pay for a new plot, the family eventually buried Mohammed in his own father’s grave.
This is what Israel’s brutal genocide has done to burial in Gaza. Palestinians are being killed faster than graves can be prepared. Cemeteries have been completely bulldozed, bodies remain beneath ruins, and families bury relatives beside tents and hospitals. In fact, Israel has denied Palestinians safety in life and dignity in death.
More Deaths and Fewer Places to Bury Them
Israel has killed more than 73,000 Palestinians in Gaza since October 2023. Thousands more are missing beneath destroyed buildings. Even after the October 2025 ceasefire announcement, at least 1,200 Palestinians have been killed.
Each body requires recovery, identification, and burial. Yet Gaza had only about 60 cemeteries before the genocide, and many were already close to capacity. Israeli attacks and movement restrictions have made much of the remaining land unusable.
Consequently, families must search for a grave while mourning relatives killed by the same military that destroyed the places meant to receive them.
Israel Has Erased Gaza’s Cemetery Map
Gaza’s Ministry of Endowments says more than 40 cemeteries have been destroyed by Israel. A wider assessment by Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor examined 62 official burial grounds and found the following:
- 39 cemeteries destroyed
- 19 partially damaged
- Only four largely intact
- 93.5% damaged or destroyed overall
Every official cemetery in Rafah was destroyed. Moreover, all 24 cemeteries in Khan Younis were targeted, as were all 10 in North Gaza.
This scale cannot be dismissed as scattered genocidal damage. Cemeteries preserve names, family histories, and generations of Palestinian connection to the land. Their destruction attacks the dead and Palestinians’ historical connection to the land.
Gardens, Schools and Hospitals Became Graveyards
With established cemeteries full, destroyed or behind Israeli-controlled lines, Palestinians have buried relatives wherever earth remains available. Graves have appeared in gardens, hospital courtyards, school grounds, displacement camps and beside tents.
Many have no proper headstones. Families use masonry from destroyed homes, corrugated metal, or handwritten paper to preserve a name. Another Israeli strike, heavy rain, or exposure can remove the only marker.
Even one Khan Younis cemetery contained about 60 graves when the genocide began. It now holds approximately 6,000. At the height of the killing, a gravedigger prepared as many as 35 graves in one day. Whole families, including babies and children, sometimes arrived together.
Even a Grave Has Become Unaffordable
A prepared grave can now cost between 700 and 1,000 shekels, approximately $235 to $335. Families stripped of homes, work, and savings cannot afford it.
Some reopen an older relative’s grave, while others share burial spaces or leave graves unfinished because cement and stone are scarce. Israel has impoverished Gaza and made burial another ordeal.
The Dead Are Returning Years Later
Some funerals held in 2026 are for Palestinians killed in 2023. In August, Gaza buried 112 members of the al-Hasayna and Abu Sharia families, whose remains had been trapped beneath destroyed residential buildings in the Sabra neighbourhood.
Moreover, Palestinian authorities said the November 2023 Israeli attack killed 308 people. Of the dead, 153 remained under the ruins. Gaza’s Civil Defence workers with limited machinery spent 17 days searching before recovering 112 remains. Their families waited nearly three years for a grave.
Another funeral was held on August 20 for 50 recently recovered Palestinians from three families. Authorities have also recovered 529 remains from seven mass graves created in hospital grounds.
Thousands Remain Beneath the Rubble
Gaza Civil Defence estimates that approximately 8,500 people remain missing beneath destroyed buildings. Recovery teams lack excavators, fuel, forensic laboratories and safe access to Israeli-controlled areas.
Evidently, around 68 million tonnes of rubble cover Gaza. It contains unexploded weapons, possessions, human remains and evidence of how people were killed. Crushing or removing debris without forensic care can fragment bodies, erase identities and destroy evidence needed for future prosecutions.
Families may know where someone disappeared but wait years for a body. Without remains, there can be no final funeral, confirmed grave, or certainty that the missing person has been found.
Destroying Graves Is Another Form of Erasure
In January 2026, Israeli forces bulldozed al-Batsh Cemetery east of Gaza City. Exhumation of more than 700 bodies was also documented. Remains were mixed, and the landscape was altered so severely that families could no longer locate previously marked graves.
Cemetery destruction also obstructs the process of justice. When bodies are moved, mixed, or crushed, investigators lose information about identity and cause of death. The state responsible for the genocide is damaging the physical record of its crimes.
The Graves Will Testify
Israel has turned homes into tombs and hospitals into mass burial grounds. Yet every recovered name and makeshift marker resists its attempt to erase Palestinian identity.
Gaza may be running out of graves, but Israel cannot bury the truth. The dead remain evidence, and their families continue demanding the dignity and justice that were denied to them.
