Thousands of families took to the streets across the occupied West Bank, demanding the Israeli occupation’s military hand over the remains of their dead relatives. This was ahead of the Palestinian National Day for the Retrieval of the Bodies of Martyrs, marked every year on 27 August.
‘Israel’ claims it is withholding 1700 Palestinian martyrs’ bodies
The Israeli occupation has revealed it is holding around 1700 Palestinian bodies. Some are buried in unmarked plots in secret military sites known as “cemeteries of numbers”. Palestinians are buried here with numbers, and not their names, while others are kept refrigerated. Bodies of those arrested in Gaza are kept in the notorious Sde Teiman torture camp.
The National Campaign for the Recovery of the Bodies of Martyrs, and prisoner advocacy groups, know the identities of 799 martyrs whose bodies are being withheld by the occupation.
256 of these are buried in the cemeteries of numbers, 99 were prisoners of war, 81 were children under 18, and 10 were women.
The most recent case is that of a retired colonel in the Palestinian National Security Forces, known as Fathi Khazem. Israeli occupation forces (IOF) fatally shot him inside his home in Jenin, and then confiscated his body.
Khazem had endured years of Israeli harassment before soldiers targeted and killed him. He had survived several assassination attempts, but his sons were not so lucky. In 2022, the IOF killed two of them on separate occasions. Four of Khazem’sa homes had also been demolished by the IOF.
Israeli occupation punishes Palestinians in both life and death
The practice of withholding bodies, or burying them in unmarked graves, has severely escalated since October 2023. The Palestinian Prisoners Society says it has been happening for more than five decades. And it denies families the right to know the fate of their loved ones. This leaves them stuck insuspended grief. They are denied a body to identify, or a grave in which to bury the body. The right to hold a traditional funeral according to religious beliefs is also not upheld.
Even when the handover of bodies does happen, it very often comes with certain conditions attached. The occupation can demand burials take place at midnight, or that funeral numbers are limited. Families can also be forced to bury their loved ones miles from where they live.
This is a further attempt by the occupation, to control Palestinians — even the dead, and relies directly on the British Mandate’s 1945 Emergency Regulations. These were adopted by ‘Israel’ after 1967 to bury thousands in unmarked graves without telling their families.
State-sanctioned repression
According to the National Campaign for the Recovery of Martyrs’ Bodies:
The body after martyrdom is used as a means of domination and repression. Families are deprived of the opportunity to publicly mourn, and they are left waiting for prolonged periods to recover the remains of their loved ones.
The occupation’s Supreme Court found, in 2017, that the policy of withholding the bodies of deceased Palestinians lacked any legal basis. But by 2018, the Knesset amended the Counter-Terrorism Law to give police the power to keep remains, so they could be used as bargaining chips in negotiating a potential prisoner swap.
. A year later, after the Jerusalem Legal Aid Centre (JLAC) had launched a legal challenge, the Supreme Court ruled that the state can legally withhold Palestinian bodies to use as bargaining chips for potential future prisoner or hostage exchange deals. This continues today.
Withholding bodies and collective punishment are war crimes under international law. But if world leaders continue refusing to take action and look the other way, ‘Israel’s’ weaponisation of human remains will continue.
Featured image provided via author
By Charlie Jaay
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