Massacre at Shadia Abu Ghazala School: Eyewitnesses describe horrific Israeli assault
Israeli soldiers entered classroom we were in and fired directly at those present without uttering a word, says a father of one of victims at Shadia Abu Ghazala School
Displaced families were sheltering in the United Nations-run Shadia Abu Ghazala School west of the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza when Israeli soldiers entered the building. What followed was a massacre, according to witnesses and families of those who were killed in the early Dec. assault.
Videos and images obtained by Al Jazeera showed bodies discovered on Dec. 13 piled up inside the school. Witnesses describe a gruesome scene, asserting that women, children, and even babies were killed execution-style while seeking shelter inside the school.
A father of one of the victims said he was asleep with his wife and six children when Israeli soldiers “suddenly stormed” the school.
“They entered the classroom we were in and fired directly at those present without uttering a word,” he said.
“They prevented me from speaking, asking questions, or commenting on anything, and every time I tried to talk to them, they silenced me,” he recalled.
The man believes he was ordered to then leave the school because of his “old age”.
“They expelled about 20 people from the school, stripped them of their clothes, and interrogated them,” he said.
‘SHOT AT DIRECTLY’
The footage shows traces of blood and remnants of the victims’ belongings that were with them before they were killed, while bullets had pierced the classroom walls where bodies were found.
Saeed Jumaa’s sister was among those killed along with her husband and children. Jumaa said he was able to return to check on his relatives in the school several days later when Israeli forces left but was “shocked to find that everyone in it had been executed in a brutal manner”.
“In the room were my sister’s husband and next to him, their sons Maysara and Ahmed. My sister in the corner was hugging her remaining children,” Jumaa said.
Israeli forces killed them by “firing at them point-blank”, he said. Their bodies were “swollen and filled with worms”, he added.
According to Jumaa, Israeli soldiers had “written something in Hebrew” on his nephew’s face.
“We did not understand the meaning, and we were in a hurry to bury them days later as their bodies had decomposed,” he said.
Another witness who found the bodies in the classrooms said there were no signs of a missile strike or any shells inside the classrooms, adding that the victims were “shot at directly” by ground troops. In total, at least seven bodies were found inside three different classrooms. Four were in one room, two in the second room, and one in the third. Dozens of displaced Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks on schools in Gaza, including at least three in Jabalia.
Israel has pounded the Gaza Strip since a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7, killing at least 20,700 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injuring 54,536 others, according to local health authorities.
On Nov. 10, an Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman revised the official death toll of the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks, lowering the figure to around 1,200 people, and since then, Tel Aviv has not provided any additional information about the casualties.
The Israeli onslaught has left Gaza in ruins, with half of the coastal territory's housing damaged or destroyed and nearly 2 million people displaced within the densely populated enclave amid acute shortages of food and clean water.
Source: Al Jazeera & Anadolu Agency & Newsroom
