Gaza Authorities Say More Bodies Were Discovered in Mass Grave
Palestinian officials in Gaza on Thursday increased the tally of bodies discovered in a mass grave on the grounds of a hospital to 392 from 283, amid conflicting accounts between Israel and the Gazan authorities over how and when some of the bodies were buried.
“This is the biggest mass grave since the beginning of the war,” Mahmoud Basal, spokesman for Gaza’s Civil Defense, a search and rescue department within the Hamas-controlled territory, said Thursday before calling for an international investigation.
A New York Times analysis of social media videos and satellite imagery found that Palestinians had dug at least two of the three burial sites weeks before Israeli troops raided the complex.
Gazan authorities say that mass graves had been dug on the hospital grounds before an Israeli raid there in February but accuse Israel of later opening the site to add bodies.
It was not clear how those who were buried at the Nasser Medical Complex in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, had died or exactly when.
While The Times could not determine the cause of death for individual people, the initial burials took place amid a weekslong Israeli offensive in the city that began in mid-February.