Awaiting ID, the bodies of Hamas’s victims are stacked on racks in outdoor containers
Most of the Israeli civilian bodies transferred to the Military Rabbinate for processing await ID, complicated by condition of the remains and availability of fingerprint records
RAMLE — Bodies are hauled in via refrigerated trucks, shrouded in thin white sheets or sealed in plastic bags, and unloaded in a quiet corner of the Military Rabbinate’s main base.
Overwhelming the permanent mortuary facilities, they are racked and loaded into a series of refrigerated containers, so they can be stored for processing and burial.
These are the unidentified bodies among the 1,300 Israelis, the vast majority of whom civilians, who were killed by Hamas during a devastating Saturday terror attack.
“We take the bodies of the murdered from the war,” explained A., a military officer responsible for overseeing the identification and processing operation. “Not everyone comes with identification, so we identify them with DNA, fingerprints, teeth records,” he said.
When asked if the facility processes the deceased through in-person family identifications, A. said a resolute “no.”
“It’s impossible to identify them after a while,” he added, declining to elaborate.
“Some bodies are so mutilated,” said Josh Wander, a spokesperson for burial organization Zaka, who was on site alongside several Zaka volunteers helping the military to process the corpses.
Devastatingly numerous among the Hamas victims, children, Wander said, pose a specific identification challenge.
Most of the Israeli civilian bodies transferred to the Military Rabbinate for processing await ID, complicated by condition of the remains and availability of fingerprint records
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