Gaza funeral held for 112 bodies retrieved from rubble of destroyed homes

Palestinians in Gaza held funeral prayers on Tuesday for 112 people whose remains were recovered from the rubble of homes destroyed during the war between Israel and Hamas.

Thousands of mourners gathered for the funeral in Gaza City’s Sabra neighborhood, where the bodies, draped in Palestinian flags, were laid out near the ruins of the destroyed homes before the procession began. The victims are set to be buried afterward at the Baptist Cemetery in the Zeitoun neighborhood, south of Gaza City.

The dead belonged to the Al Hasayneh and Abu Sharia families, who were killed when their homes were bombed while they were sheltering inside on November 23, 2023. Given the scale of the casualties, the funeral ranks among the largest recorded in Palestinian history. Civil defense teams recovered the bodies from the rubble on Saturday.

A Civil Defence statement said the victims included 40 children, 38 women and seven people with disabilities. Civil Defence official Mohammad Abu Dan said search teams have so far been unable to locate 157 additional bodies still believed to be buried under the rubble.

More than 73,000 people have been killed and over 174,000 injured in Gaza since the war began in October 2023, according to local health authorities. Despite a ceasefire agreement that took effect on October 10, 2025, Israeli forces have continued carrying out attacks across the territory, killing 1,250 Palestinians and injuring 4,110 others since the truce began, Gaza’s Health Ministry said. Palestinian authorities estimate that around 9,500 people remain missing under the rubble of buildings destroyed across the territory.

A day earlier, at least 19 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire over a 24 hour period, pushing the overall death toll since October 2023 to 73,375, according to the Health Ministry. Officials said the toll included 18 people killed directly by Israeli forces and one person who died from wounds sustained in an earlier attack. The ministry reported that 35 additional injured people were taken to hospitals during the same period, bringing the total number of injuries to 174,220.

The ministry said Saturday that 152 people were killed in Gaza during July, the highest monthly death toll recorded since the start of the year, despite the ceasefire that took effect in October 2025.

The truce followed nearly two years of war that began on October 8, 2023, and caused widespread destruction across the territory, affecting an estimated 90 percent of civilian infrastructure. The United Nations has put the cost of reconstruction at approximately 70 billion dollars, underscoring the scale of rebuilding that lies ahead even as sporadic violence continues despite the formal end of large scale hostilities.