Nine children belonging to a doctor and his wife who is also a doctor were killed by an Israeli strike in southern city of Khan Younis Gaza on Saturday.
According to Gaza’s civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal civil defence crews retrieved “the bodies of nine child martyrs, some of them charred, from the home of Dr Hamdi al-Najjar and his wife, Dr Alaa al-Najjar, all of whom were their children”.
He added that Hamdi al-Najjar and another son, Adam, were also seriously wounded in the strike on Friday.
A medical source at Nasser Hospital, where Alaa al-Najjar works, gave Adam’s age as 10 years old.
Footage of the aftermath released by the civil defence agency showed rescuers recovering badly burned remains from the damaged home.
Asked about the incident, the Israeli military said “the Khan Yunis area is a dangerous warzone”.
The children’s funeral took place at Nasser Hospital, AFP footage showed.
Muneer Alboursh, director general of the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza, said on X that the strike happened shortly after Hamdi Al-Najjar drove his wife to work.
“Just minutes after returning home, a missile struck their house,” he said, adding the father was “in intensive care”.
“This is the reality our medical staff in Gaza endure. Words fall short in describing the pain,” he said.
“In Gaza, it is not only healthcare workers who are targeted — Israel’s aggression goes further, wiping out entire families.”
Meanwhile, the death toll from the ongoing Israeli onslaught on the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, 2023, has hit 53,901 with 122,593 injured.
Hospitals across the enclave received 79 martyrs, and 211 wounded individuals over the past 24 hours, Ministry of Health in Gaza reported in a statement day.
The statement noted that the figures do not account for the hospitals in the northern Gaza governorate, as access remains impossible due to the unrelenting Israeli offensive.
It further indicated that since March 18, a total of 3,747 martyrs and 10,552 wounded have been documented, with several victims still trapped under bombed-out buildings and lying in the streets, beyond the reach of paramedics and civil defense rescuers.