For hours on end, Fatima Shahin, aged 36, fervently hoped that the efforts of the civil defense teams would bear fruit by rescuing her family members from beneath the rubble of their home.
Israeli aircraft had razed their residence to the ground in the vicinity of the Gaza neighborhood of Tel Al-Zaatar.
This latest attack extended the suffering of the neighborhood, where most of its inhabitants had been killed or displaced due to the unrelenting airstrikes that had persisted for the past six days.
Shahin was completely shattered when rescuers retrieved eight bodies from beneath the rubble of her home. She was immediately rushed to a hospital in the town of Beit Lahia, northern Gaza.
Unable to utter a word as she watched her loved ones being recovered, she found herself awakening from a nightmare she had wished were the worst in her life, only to realize it wasn't the case.
It took Shahin a minute before comprehending that her youngest brother was still alive beneath the debris. She returned to the scene, waiting for another 12 hours until he was found, severely injured, only to later succumb to his injuries.
Shahin lost her entire family on the sixth day of Israel’s relentless war on Gaza, following a ground, sea, and air attack initiated by the Hamas movement the previous Saturday. This assault claimed the lives of at least 1,300 Israelis.
“They targeted them without any prior warning. It's a clear revenge on civilians,” Shahin’s husband, Mohammed Shahin, told Asharq Al-Awsat.
“Children, women, and the elderly are dying here every hour. Fifty members of a family in Jabalia camp perished in a single strike,” he added.
Several photographs from hospitals depict victims piled on the ground and in mortuary refrigerators.
Shahin and others, who spoke to Asharq Al-Awsat, recount how they participated in burying their families, relatives, and loved ones in small groups.
Families and Palestinian organizations refrain from organizing large funeral ceremonies involving hundreds or thousands of people, as was customary in the past, due to the intense Israeli bombardment affecting every area in Gaza.
While preparing this report, an Asharq Al-Awsat correspondent observed the destruction and bombardment of eight towering structures in northwest Gaza.
These towers were constructed at the expense of the Palestinian Authority in 1997 and consist of approximately 352 residential apartments, housing employees working in the security apparatuses affiliated with the Palestinian Authority.
