The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor called for the formation of an independent international investigation committee into the Israeli occupation army’s detention of the bodies of dozens of Palestinian dead during its aggression against the Gaza Strip since last October 7, and suspicions of the theft of organs from them.

The Euro-Mediterranean Observatory documented the occupation’s detention of the bodies of dead from the Shifa Medical Complex in Gaza, the Indonesian Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip, and others from the vicinity of the displacement corridor to the center and south of the Gaza Strip, which it allocated on the main Salah al-Din Road.

Euro-Med reported that the occupation army also exhumed a mass grave that had been established more than ten days ago in one of the courtyards of the Shifa Medical Complex, and extracted the bodies of the dead from it and detained them.

He pointed out that while dozens of bodies were released by handing them over to the International Committee of the Red Cross, which in turn transported them to the southern Gaza Strip to complete the burial process, the Israeli occupation army is still detaining the bodies of dozens of other dead.

The Euro-Mediterranean Observatory raised suspicions of the theft of organs from the bodies of dead, including observations made by doctors in Gaza who conducted a quick examination of some of the bodies after their release and noticed the theft of organs such as the cornea of the eye and the cochlea, and other vital organs such as the liver, kidneys, and heart.

Doctors working in several hospitals told the Euro-Mediterranean team that the forensic medical examination is not sufficient to prove or deny the theft of organs, especially in light of the presence of previous surgical interventions on several bodies.

The Euro-Mediterranean Observatory transmitted observations from doctors in Gaza who conducted a quick examination of some bodies. The observations indicate that the occupation has stolen organs such as the cornea of the eye, the cochlea, and vital organs such as the liver, kidneys, and heart.

They stated that it was impossible for them to conduct an accurate analytical examination of the bodies of the dead that were being held by the occupation army under intense air and artillery attacks and the continued influx of wounded, but they detected several signs of possible organ theft.

The Euro-Mediterranean Observatory said that “Israel” has a long history of detaining the bodies of dead Palestinians, as it detains the bodies of at least 145 Palestinians in private refrigerators, in addition to about 255 in the Numbers Cemetery and 75 missing persons, and refuses to acknowledge the detention of their bodies.

The organ trade empire...Israel is behind all this!

He pointed out that Israel relies on detaining the bodies of dead Palestinians by burying them in what it calls “enemy fighters’ graves,” which are secret mass graves located in specific areas, such as closed military zones, in which burials take place anonymously, with numbers engraved on metal plates attached to the bodies or remains.

Euro-Med reported that it had previously been observed that the Israeli authorities deliberately released the bodies of dead to their families from West Bank residents after a period of detention, and they were frozen at a temperature that could reach minus forty, with the stipulation that the bodies not be dissected, which may hide the theft of some organs.

It highlighted that "Israel" has resorted in recent years to legalization that allows for the development of justifications for detaining the bodies of Palestinian dead and stealing their organs, including the decision of the Supreme Court in "Israel" issued in 2019, which allows the military ruler to detain the bodies and bury them temporarily in what is known as the number cemeteries. At the end of 2021, the Knesset enacted legal legislation authorizing the police and army to keep the remains of “dead Palestinians.”

In recent years, there have been reports of illegal exploitation of the bodies of Palestinian dead held by Israel, including stealing organs from them and using them in the laboratories of medical colleges at Israeli universities.

In her book (On Their Dead Bodies), Israeli doctor Meir Weiss revealed that organs were stolen from the bodies of Palestinian dead to be transplanted into the bodies of Jewish patients, and used in medical faculties at Israeli universities to conduct research on them.

But what is more dangerous than that is what Yehuda Hess, the former director of the Abu Kabir Institute for Forensic Medicine in Israel, admitted regarding the theft of human organs, tissues, and skin from Palestinian dead in different periods of time, without the knowledge or consent of their families.

In 2008, the American CNN network published an investigation showing that “Israel” is considered the largest global center for the illegal trade in human organs, and that it was involved in stealing internal organs from Palestinian dead for the purpose of illegally benefiting from them.

The Euro-Mediterranean Observatory confirmed that “Israel”, which is the only country that detains the bodies of the dead and practices this as a systematic policy, and is classified as the largest global center for the illegal trade in human organs, is content with justifying the policy of detaining dead bodies as “an attempt at security deterrence,” ignoring international charters and agreements that prohibit this. .

It stressed the necessity of binding the Israeli occupation to the rules of international law, which stipulate the necessity of respecting and protecting the bodies of the dead during armed conflicts, while the Fourth Geneva Convention stresses the need for the parties to the conflict to take all possible measures to prevent the plundering of the dead and the mutilation of their bodies.

The Euro-Mediterranean Observatory also confirmed that refusing to hand over the bodies of dead to their families to bury them with dignity and in accordance with their religious beliefs may amount to collective punishment prohibited in Article 50 of the Hague Regulations and Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.