Gaza Herald_ In the heart of Gaza’s ruins, where grief has become a daily companion, rescue workers say the world’s conscience seems selective. The Palestinian Civil Defense has accused international organizations of showing blatant double standards, bringing in powerful machinery to search for Israeli captives while leaving thousands of Palestinian bodies buried beneath the rubble.
“It breaks our hearts that some agencies and organizations have brought in the necessary heavy powerful equipment and bulldozers only to search for the bodies of Israeli hostages while no equipment is available for 10,000 bodies of Palestinian citizens to be recovered from under the rubble,” said Mahmoud Basal, spokesperson for the Palestinian Civil Defense.
Basal noted that nearly 10,000 bodies remain trapped under collapsed buildings across Gaza. He stressed that without a fleet of heavy machinery, there is no way to recover them. “It is unclear whether the equipment that entered Gaza will be used for Palestinians at all,” he added, “or if it will only serve to recover Israeli bodies before being withdrawn again.”
“This represents a double standard that in no way reflects humanity. True humanity requires the same care to be given to Palestinian bodies as is given to Israeli bodies,” Basal said.
He explained that recovering a single body can take up to 12 hours, given the scale of destruction. “We would need 10,000 days to recover 10,000 martyrs. This means we need an enormous amount of heavy machinery,” he said. “The trucks, bulldozers, and excavators that have entered the Strip are nowhere near enough to accomplish our mission.”
Basal also pointed out that even if the machinery were sufficient, another problem remains, where to move the massive piles of rubble. “If the rubble is removed, where will we take it and where will we put it? Is the issue just about recovering the bodies, or also about managing the ruins and finding places to put them?” he asked.
“The issue requires full cooperation and coordination among all sides so that we can start working immediately to recover the bodies of our martyrs,” he concluded.
In Gaza, everybody retrieved from the rubble carries more than a name; it carries a story, a life interrupted, and a truth that refuses to stay buried.
