Save the Children, in a new statement, said thousands of missing Palestinian children are believed to be trapped beneath the rubble of destroyed homes, detained by Israeli forces, buried in unmarked graves, or lost from their families.
“It is nearly impossible to collect and verify information under the current conditions in Gaza,” the British aid group said, “but at least 17,000 children are believed to be unaccompanied and separated and approximately 4,000 children are likely missing under the rubble, with an unknown number also in mass graves”.
The group added, “Others have been forcibly disappeared, including an unknown number detained and forcibly transferred out of Gaza, their whereabouts unknown to their families amidst reports of ill-treatment and torture.”
Israel waged its brutal war on besieged Gaza on October 7 after Hamas carried out an unprecedented operation against the occupying entity in retaliation for its intensified atrocities against the Palestinian people.
Israel has imposed a complete siege on the densely populated territory, cutting off fuel, electricity, food, and water to the more than two million Palestinians living there.
MNA