UN: Investigation on Mass Graves in Hospitals Is Needed

April 23, 2024 Hour: 3:08 pm

The United Nations Human Rights Office on Tuesday called for an international investigation into the mass graves found in the Al-Shifa Complex and the Nasser Complex in the Gaza Strip, describing them as a “war crime” and stressing the need to take independent measures to confront the “climate of impunity.”

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The High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, described the damage to the Al-Shifa Complex, the largest hospital in Gaza, and to the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis, the second-largest hospital center in the Strip, as “horrific,” stressing in a statement the need for “independent, effective and transparent investigations” into these Deaths.

He said, “Given the prevailing climate of impunity, international investigators must be involved in this process,” recalling that “international humanitarian law stipulates very special protection for hospitals.”

Volker Türk stated that “killing civilians, detainees and other individuals ‘off the battlefield’ is a war crime.”

“I came here for the fifth day looking for the body of my son Jamal. But unfortunately I did not find my son’s body.”

Search for mass graves continues at Nasser Hospital.

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— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish)
April 23, 2024

On Monday, the Civil Defense in Gaza revealed that it had recovered, within three days, about two hundred bodies of people killed by Israeli forces and buried their bodies in mass graves inside the Nasser complex in Khan Yunis.

Hospitals in Gaza were severely damaged by the military operation launched by Israel on the Strip following an unprecedented attack by Hamas on Israeli territory on October 7.

Israel claims that the Islamic movement uses hospitals to launch attacks, dig tunnels and hide weapons, which Hamas denies.

Officials in Gaza reported that 283 bodies were recovered from the rubble of Nasser Hospital, and the United Nations High Commissioner is seeking to verify the number.

UNHCR spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani said during a press conference that the bodies of “the victims were buried deep in the ground and covered with waste,” noting that the bodies of elderly people, women, and injured people were found, and some of the victims were “handcuffed and without clothes.”

She stated, “We are not yet able to confirm the exact numbers” of those killed in the two compounds, “so we stress the need to conduct international investigations.”