WATCH: Gaza children mark themselves for identification in case of gruesome death amid war

Trigger Warning

WEB DESK: Amid the relentless Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Gaza, children are resorting to a haunting measure to ensure they can be identified if they are harmed in Israeli attacks. They’re writing their names on their bodies. This is a growing practice, especially when Palestinian civilians who are injured or killed arrive at Gaza’s hospitals.

According to media reports, the practice began during the war, but it became more common when many bodies couldn’t be recognised because of their severe injuries. Some were terribly mutilated or even decapitated. A heartbreaking instance is the nearly 800 Palestinians who lost their lives at Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital on October 17.

Inside Shifa Hospital, the biggest medical centre in Gaza,  a group of children from the Abu Sab’h family could be seen  writing their names on different parts of their bodies. They do this grim precaution with the hope that it will help them receive proper burials if they become victims of Israeli airstrikes.

Children in Palestine’s besieged Gaza enclave are having their names written on their hands to facilitate the identification of their bodies in case they are killed in an Israeli attack pic.twitter.com/C33bhoT16N

— TRT World (@trtworld) October 20, 2023

The reports indicate that Ahmed Abu Sab’h, the father of these children, explained their reasoning, saying, “We write our names and the names of our children on our wrists, so that our corpses may be identified if Israeli warplanes hit us.”

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After the attack on Al-Ahli Hospital, hundreds of children at Al-Shifa Hospital opted for this practice. Meanwhile, Israel had threatened to bomb Al-Shifa and other medical facilities if they didn’t evacuate everyone inside.

However, Palestinian hospitals couldn’t evacuate patients because there were no other places to take them, and disconnecting them from life-saving machines would lead to many more deaths. The dire situation has left displaced Palestinians with the grim realisation that “life is the exception, death is the norm.”

Since October 7, the ongoing conflict has resulted in the deaths of over 3,800 Palestinians, with more than 13,000 sustaining injuries. According to United Nations reports, about 70 per cent of those who are injured or killed are women and children, underscoring the disproportionate impact of the violence on the most vulnerable members of the population.