‘Back from the dead’: The continuing agony over Gaza’s 9,500 missing people

Hamada al-Banna's unexpected return to Gaza has drawn attention to the broader crisis of missing persons across the Palestinian enclave. Al-Banna's ordeal began when he was separated from his brother during a search for aid supplies near the Zikim crossing in northern Gaza. His brother was fatally shot by Israeli forces, and al-Banna himself was severely wounded in a subsequent explosion while searching for his sibling. He lost consciousness and remained hospitalized at Soroka Medical Center in Beersheba for six months before being transferred to an Israeli prison, where he spent four additional months in solitary confinement. Throughout his year-long captivity, his family received no official information about his whereabouts. His fiancée, Reem Jadallah, exhausted her resources attempting to locate him, eventually selling her jewelry to hire a lawyer. After six months of searching, the lawyer informed the family that al-Banna had been killed, prompting them to hold a three-day funeral ceremony approximately two months before his actual release. Upon his liberation two weeks ago, al-Banna's initial phone call to his father was met with disbelief, as his father struggled to reconcile the news of his son's survival with the mourning ceremony they had already conducted. The case underscores the suffering experienced by thousands of families in Gaza who remain without answers regarding their missing relatives. According to Gaza's Ministry of Health, nearly 3,500 cases of missing persons have been officially reported, though rights organizations such as Gaza-based Al-Dameer estimate the actual number to be substantially higher, at approximately 9,500 individuals.