When Najm al-Shabrawi, a civil defense man, found an almost complete skeleton, it seemed strange to him, saying that it is rare to find whole bodies after many months of lying on the roads, tampered with by stray animals.
“We often find half or a quarter of a corpse، or scattered pieces، and often in a state of decomposition، even the bones decompose due to sunlight and remain in the air for long periods،” he said.
As soon as the Israeli occupation forces withdrew from the western Netzarim axis on 27 January, the Civil Defense teams rushed to search for the bodies of the martyrs lying in the streets and in houses that were forbidden to reach.
Al-Shabrawi recounts some of his observations that they found a man on the road from the right side, consisting of a skull, two legs, and one hand, and the other is not there. A skeleton minus a hand, we tried to look for the hand but couldn’t find it.”
With the skeleton, al-Shabrawy found glasses, a ring, shoes and black clothes.
The civil defense man wrote down his notes on a piece of paper, as they had been trained, took pictures, and put the structure in the sack of the dead, before handing it over to the Ministry of Health.
The areas from which the Civil Defense teams recover the bodies are located in the Netzarim axis (south of Gaza City), in Rafah (southern Gaza Strip), and in areas near the separation fence with the occupation (east).
Despite the validity of the ceasefire, the work of the Civil Defense is not without dangers, according to Al-Salhi, adding, “The occupation shot us after the start of the ceasefire, and so far we do not enter the areas that were off-limit, except under coordination conducted by the International Committee of the Red Cross.”
As of Sunday morning, February 2, the number of bodies of martyrs recovered by civil defense teams had reached 458, according to Health Ministry spokesman Dr. Khalil al-Daqran.