Gaza's civil defense said Sunday that it recovered the bodies and remains of 17 Palestinians who had been missing beneath the rubble of homes destroyed in Israeli attacks during the genocide in the enclave.
The recoveries were made as part of the second phase of the "Recovery of Martyrs' Bodies" project, launched on July 19 to locate Palestinians buried under the rubble of buildings destroyed by Israel, despite limited equipment and machinery available to rescue teams.
The second phase includes searches beneath destroyed homes in Gaza City in the north and the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.
The civil defense said in a brief statement that its teams recovered the bodies of 16 missing Palestinians from the rubble of homes belonging to the Hajji and Al-Nadeem families in the Zeitoun and Yarmouk neighborhoods of Gaza City.
The remains of one other missing person were recovered from the rubble of a home belonging to the Al-War family in the Nuseirat refugee camp, it added.
Recovery operations are proceeding slowly because of a shortage of heavy equipment, despite the Gaza ceasefire agreement in effect since Oct. 10, 2025, which Palestinian authorities say provides for the entry of machinery to remove rubble and recover victims.
In October 2025, Gaza's government media office said around 9,500 Palestinians had been reported missing since the start of the Israeli war, including people whose bodies remain under destroyed buildings and others whose fate is unknown.
The second phase of the recovery project is scheduled to involve 800 working hours and searches beneath 147 destroyed homes in the Gaza, North Gaza and Central governorates, where 1,072 bodies are believed to remain buried, according to previous civil defense figures.
The first phase began in late November 2025 and resulted in the recovery of around 333 bodies and human remains out of 559 missing people believed to be beneath the rubble of 54 homes and buildings.
Israel's genocide in Gaza has killed more than 73,000 Palestinians and injured over 174,000 others, while causing widespread destruction to civilian infrastructure.
