Gaza Survivor Mahmoud Khalla: A Solitary Search for Family Amidst Devastation

Mahmoud Khalla makes daily visits to the cemetery to mourn his family, who perished in an Israeli airstrike that obliterated their home in Jabalia. This somber ritual has become his anchor since he laid them to rest, a way to maintain a semblance of their presence in his life.

For the 40-year-old Mahmoud, the cemetery now holds the remains of his most beloved. His wife, three children, parents, two brothers and their families, his sister and her children, and numerous other relatives were gathered at their family residence in Jabalia, northern Gaza, on December 21, 2023. An Israeli strike subsequently hit the five-story building, causing its complete destruction and claiming the lives of all 39 individuals inside. Mahmoud had departed his home only shortly before the strike and is now the sole survivor of his immediate family.

The memory of that day is etched in Mahmoud's heart with profound grief. Israeli tanks had encircled the area near the family home in Jabalia, making movement perilous. Food scarcity was already a critical issue due to the ongoing Israeli siege. In the evening, Mahmoud ventured out to find provisions for his family. "I told them I would go and see what was available," he recounted to Al Jazeera. "As soon as I had been out for about 15 minutes, I heard a huge explosion."

"I ran back and discovered that the targeted house was ours. I was in complete shock. But I pulled myself together. With the help of a few neighbours who were still in the area, we tried to rescue anyone who might be under the rubble."

Israeli aerial attacks, including quadcopters and surveillance aircraft, continued to bombard the area, hindering Mahmoud and his neighbors' efforts to search for survivors. "A surveillance aircraft dropped a bomb on us, so we immediately ran away," he stated. "We came back the next morning." Ambulances and civil defense teams were also unable to access the site that night. Overwhelmed by helplessness, he clung to the hope that some family members might still be alive beneath the debris, awaiting rescue. He described feeling as though he had died a thousand times that night.

The following morning, he returned to the devastated site and called out for any surviving family members beneath the ruined home. Receiving no response, the devastating realization struck him: he had lost nearly everyone he held dear. "There were five floors of rubble. It was impossible for us to pull anyone out," he said.

That catastrophic event marked the onset of an overwhelming emptiness for Mahmoud. With his home destroyed and the vast majority of his relatives either killed or displaced to the south, he found himself utterly without refuge. "Even my uncles had been killed," he shared. "Their house, opposite ours, was targeted nine days before our family home. Eighteen people were killed in that attack. The rest of the family had gone south."

Mahmoud spent the subsequent months displaced and utterly alone. He navigated the streets, seeking a place to sleep each night. Finding shelter among displaced families proved difficult, as he had no familial connections to them. "I was sleeping in the streets, or in cars or vehicles whenever I found one that was open," he recalled. "I was totally lonely and homeless." Without any shelter, Mahmoud was exposed to Israeli attacks. The quest for food became as critical as finding a safe place to sleep. "You don’t know whether a bullet will hit you, whether a rocket will come, whether you will find food or where you will sleep," he said.

Following an announced "ceasefire" in Gaza in October 2025, families began the arduous task of searching for their missing loved ones. Nearly a year later, an estimated 8,000 individuals remain unaccounted for, their bodies presumed to be beneath the rubble of their homes or elsewhere. Months after the "ceasefire" commenced and the intensity of bombing decreased, Mahmoud began the painstaking process of recovering the remains of his family members himself. They had been entombed within the ruins of their home for the preceding 29 months. "The feeling that my family was still under the rubble, without being buried, was very difficult," he expressed. "It never left me."

He sought assistance from the civil defense, the Red Cross, and other authorities. However, he noted a severe lack of equipment and an overwhelming number of families requiring aid meant their support was limited. Ultimately, with the help of friends and neighbors who volunteered their time, he undertook the heartbreaking labor of recovering his loved ones by hand. This recovery process began around May of this year and spanned three months. "Sometimes, we managed to recover one person in a day. Sometimes, it took two days," he said. The first individuals he found were two relatives who had been sheltering with the family. The last were his sister and her children, who had been buried together. He laid his family members to rest in a cemetery near Jabalia an-Nazla, in northern Gaza. "I felt a great sense of relief when I finally buried them," he stated. "It took me three months to recover all of their remains, working day by day."