In the heart of Khan Yunis, surrounded by the relative calm of the Gaza Strip under the ceasefire, Sherine Talaba removes the bloc from about a grave. It stands back when men start drilling, and their anxiety is clear. In the end, she takes a shovel and begins to dig itself.
For the fifteen months of the Israel-Husass war, the 37-year-old girl was buried her brother, Khaled, and her cousin, Khalil and Ibrahim, in this temporary land of the land in the city’s ruins.
After the war began on October 7, 2023, Sherine and her brother were displaced from their home in Gaza City and ended up in Khan Yunis. She says that Khaled insisted that if he was killed during the war, he wanted to be buried near their deceased mother in Gaza City. I pledged that when the war ended, she would take the three men and buried them near their home.
“We have come (south) eight people, but unfortunately, we will return to five people,” said CBC Freelance’s video photographer. “They were the most precious things in my life. My brother and both my cousins.”
Senior Assistants to US President Donald Trump defend the acquisition plan in Gaza because critics – including world leaders, United Nations and Palestinians themselves – are condemning the idea.
According to the Ministry of Health in Gaza, more than 47,000 Palestinians were killed during the war in the Gaza Strip. However, in a January study Researchers were published in the Medical Journal the Lancet that during the period between October 7, 2023, until June 30, 2024, the death toll in Gaza was 41 percent of what the ministry was.
Sherine is not alone in her efforts to move the bodies of her loved ones. As the ceasefire continues, many families are seizing the opportunity to recover the bodies burning in the war and give them the appropriate burial in favorite sites.
Bring them home
Khaled was shot by Kwadkopter in Khan Yunis in June 2024, says Sherine, and he was transferred to the European Hospital in central Gaza. A Russian delegation of doctors performed a leg on his leg, but he died of his wounds a few days later on June 26.
Ibrahim was with friends in Khan Yunis when the house where they were in July 2024 was bombed, and Khalil was killed in mid -October near the Karim Shalom border crossing near his Rafah in southern Gaza, where he was looking for a job, says Sherine. Both died immediately.
The three in this field were buried in Khan Yunis, which was donated to use it as a temporary burial land.
While she was preparing to leave her tent in Khan Yunis, Sherine says she has remained in the region until now, pending the end of the war so that her people could return to Gaza City.
“We wanted to bring them home with us,” she said. “Even if they were martyred and dead, they could be close to us if we want to visit.”
It helps in placing the bodies, now in new white bags, on the flat of the cart that will carry Khaled, Khalil and Ibrahim to the final resting place. It covers them with a brown blanket while the driver is heading to Gaza City, which is about 25 kilometers north.
Sherine says that many told her that digging the bodies was not logical because they had died for a long time. But she was determined to meet Khaled’s request and keep children near their families.
Farewell final
As the convoy arrives in Gaza City, a woman graduated from a building. She is here to say goodbye to her children.
Mona Talaba Khalil or Ibrahim did not see more than a year ago – they went south during the war, but she remained behind her in Gaza City to wait for her in her original city.
The 58 -year -old Matriarch puts his hand on the bodies and Sherine points to who he is. The mourning mother wears every body bag with her hand and says a prayer for children through tears.
Other family members gather, making their way to Sheikh Radwan’s cemetery in Gaza City.
Sherine said of their plans to bring the bodies to the house: “We were on a mission that we almost waited for the entire war.” “I am happy that I wanted to be comfortable.”
Amid the destroyed ruins and buildings, Sherine helps carry three bags of body to the grave. This is where their mother was buried and where the three men will also be buried. They were placed to rest along while Sherine and her family look at crying.
After a moment, Sherine jumps to help, add water to the sand to make a paste that would close the grave and sweep some sand itself.
When the job is carried out, she is thinking about how things turned to her family and say she hopes to return to Gaza City the way they left – together.
“But the fate will not make you come back in the same way,” she said. “I felt in peace when I moved them to Gaza.”
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