Gaza: UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Trk announced today that the retrieval of hundreds of bodies from beneath the rubble of buildings destroyed by Israeli strikes on Gaza during the war that erupted nearly three years ago has reignited fears that war crimes may have been committed there. He added that the remains of what appear to be entire families are being recovered from sites destroyed by Israeli attacks, and that many of the dead are women and children.
According to Oman News Agency, the discovery of further remains has revived concerns raised in a United Nations report issued in 2024, which concluded that Israeli strikes on residential buildings and other civilian sites during the first weeks of the war may have violated international humanitarian law. The Israeli offensive on the Strip, which began in October 2023, generated the accumulation of some 61 million tonnes of rubble and debris, which the United Nations says could take seven years to clear.
A ceasefire in October 2025 ended the widespread fighting but failed to halt repeated Israeli strikes. Palestinian Civil Defence said that the bodies and remains of more than 630 people had been recovered from beneath destroyed buildings in Gaza since November 2025. Palestinian authorities estimate that more than eight thousand people remain trapped beneath the rubble.
Trk expressed concern that the remains recovered so far may be "only the tip of the iceberg," noting that large parts of Gaza were completely destroyed in the Israeli bombardment or in the demolition and clearing operations that followed. He also accused Israel of continuing to destroy some areas of Gaza where its forces remain deployed, saying that bulldozers are operating "with no respect for the dead beneath the rubble."
Health authorities in the Strip said that more than 73,000 Palestinians have been killed in the military campaign Israel has waged on Gaza. Trk called for international investigators to be granted access to all parts of Gaza to help preserve evidence, noting that legal proceedings are under way to examine conduct during the war. Trk's statement said that Israel has prevented the entry of heavy machinery needed to remove the rubble.
Francesca Albanese, the UN expert on the Palestinian territories, said that evidence should be collected and the remains of victims identified before full rubble removal operations begin. Palestinian Civil Defence said this month that the bodies and remains of 96 people had been recovered from a single site in the Zeitoun area of Gaza City, among them 58 children and 23 women.
