Airwars assessment
Shortly before 8:56 AM on Friday, October 13th 2023, three houses, among them a house of the Al-Khayyat family, located in the Al-Jeneina neighborhood of Rafah, Gaza Strip, were destroyed in an alleged Israeli airstrike, killing at least 16 civilians, including four women, eight children, and an infant boy, and injuring a number of others.
Shehab Agency was the first to report the incident at 8:56 AM on its Twitter/X account, noting that injured civilians were brought to Abu Youssef Al-Najjar Hospital. @PalinfoAr reported that four civilians had been killed and 30 others injured after the alleged Israeli airstrikes on Rafah, but there were no details about the exact location of those strikes. At 10:28 AM Safa News wrote about the civilians killed in the attack on the house of the Al-Khayyat family.
Hazem Alrekhawi reported on Facebook that more than 17 members of the Al-Khayyat family were killed in the deadly strike, including his sister, Dr. Razan Al-Rakhawi, her daughter Rose whom he called “the soul of my heart”, Razan’s husband, and his lifelong friend, Dr. Tamer Al-Khayyat, his father, Dr. Mahmoud Al-Khayyat, his mother and brother, the engineer Basil Al-Khayyat, and his wife and children, and his sister and her children.
Moaz Al-Hams wrote in a Facebook post “A family deleted from the civil registry💔Al Khayyat”, suggesting that the entire family was killed. He shared several images of the white shrouds with the bodies of the family members killed.
Alaraby News wrote that after the killed members of the Al-Khayyat family were transferred to the Abu Youssef al-Najjar hospital, its director, Doctor Marwan Al-Hams, lined up with a number of doctors and nurses, the martyr’s colleagues, and a few citizens, to pray for Doctor Al-Khayyat and his family members inside the hospital’s corridors, then they were transported for burial in the cemetery.
This tribute and social media posts by other relatives and friends helped to identify the names of 16 victims within the family.
69-year-old anesthesiologist Dr. Mahmoud Deeb Saleem al-Khayyat Abu Tamer was killed alongside his wife, 68-year-old Raja Fakhri al-Khayyat and their son, 34-year-old doctor Tamer (Tamar) Mahmoud Deeb al-Khayyat. Tamer was killed alongside his 33-year-old wife Dr. Rizan Awni Shahada al-Khayyat (Al-Rakhawi), and their five-year-old daughter Rouz Tamer Mahmoud al-Khayyat. According to Alaraby news, Tamer used to work at Abu Youssef Al-Najjar Hospital.
Several injured civilians were taken to the Abu Youssef al-Najjar Hospital, including Tamer’s daughter Mira Tamer al-Khayyat, the only member of the al-Khayyat family who survived but sustained burn injuries. The fate of Mira is however unclear as Wisam Rekhawi wrote that she miraculously survived and sustained burns, while Jumana Khayyat mentioned her among the killed family members. Fatima Khaled shared an image of a small injured girl lying on a hospital bed, writing that “this child from the Al-Khayyat family in Rafah, south of the Gaza Strip, is the only survivor of her family, as she lost her father, mother, family members, grandfather, and grandmother.” This was likely a picture of the only surviving child, Mira.
Hedaya Shamun wrote a post about Dr. Mahmoud al-Khayyat, “a friend before he became a relative”. She shared images of the smiling doctor with his wife and sons, one of them wearing a graduation mantle, and the images of his smiling grandchildren, sons and daughters of Basil and Hadeel. She also attached an image where corpses wrapped in white clothes with their names written on them can be seen.
The youngest son of Mahmoud and Raja and Tamer’s brother, 32-year-old engineer Basil Mahmoud Deeb al-Khayyat was killed alongside his 31-year-old wife, a public school teacher of physics, Hadeel Nasse Fakhri al-Khayyat, and their four small children: a two-month-old infant Muhammad Basil al-Khayyat, one-year-old son Mahmoud Basil al-Khayyat, eight-year-old daughter Eileen Basil al-Khayyat, and five-year-old daughter Celine Basil al-Khayyat.
Alsharq News Facebook account and Abdullah Al-Attar shared images of the two-month-old infant Muhammad Basil al-Khayyat who died at the Al-Najjar Hospital after attempts to resuscitate him failed.
Marwa Fahd wrote a post about the small girls Eileen and Celine, adding a picture of two of them in fancy dress as well as an image of a smiling Eileen in a burgundy jacket and grey beret. She wrote:
“Her name is Eline, how cute she looks in her Victorian dress with her sister Celine, she can be a little fashionista one day, can’t she? She can’t, Eline was killed with her sister Celine and her dad, her mom, her 2 brothers, her grandmother, her grandfather, her uncle, her aunt, and 5 of her cousins.“
The late Hadeel’s brother, 27-year-old Karim Abualroos, Palestinian writer, researcher, and human rights activist living in Belgium, spoke about the loss of his family members to Time magazine. “They were safe in their home. Israel bombed their home without warning and without guilt,” he said. Karim added: “Since hearing the news of their death, I checked the videos I have of my sister’s daughters. In all the videos, my nieces were dancing. They loved dancing.“
Washington Post also mentioned the family of Basil al-Khayyat in its post, writing that Basil had dreamed of attending a live soccer match.
The 40-year-old woman, tailor by profession Heba Mahmoud al-Darbi who was a cousin of Jumana al-Khayyat and a part of al-Khayyat’s extended family was also killed alongside her children – 16-year-old son Omar Mahmoud al-Darbi, 9-year-old daughter Jinan Mahmoud al-Darbi, 13-year-old daughter Banan Mahmoud al-Darbi, and Elia Mahmoud al-Darbi whose age is unknown.
Where possible, names have been matched with the Palestinian Ministry of Health list of fatalities in Gaza released on October 26th, 2023.
Where sources identified the belligerent, all sources attributed the strike to the Israeli military.
The incident occured at approximately 8:56 am local time.
The victims were named as:
Family members (17)
Summary
Sources (25) [ collapse]
Media
from sources (35) [ collapse]
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Source: Biqa news facebook -
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Source: Biqa news facebook -
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Source: Biqa news facebook -
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Source: Hazem Alrekhawi facebook -
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Source: Abdullah Al-Attar facebook -
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Source: Alsharq NEws Facebook -
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Source: Alsharq NEws Facebook -
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Source: Alsharq NEws Facebook -
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Source: Hedaya Shamun facebook -
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Source: Hedaya Shamun facebook -
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Source: Hedaya Shamun facebook -
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Source: Nedal Abdullah facebook -
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Source: Nedal Abdullah facebook -
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Source: Nedal Abdullah facebook -
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Source: Nedal Abdullah facebook -
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Source: Nedal Abdullah facebook -
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Source: Nedal Abdullah facebook -
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Source: Nedal Abdullah facebook -
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Source: Nedal Abdullah facebook -
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Source: Nedal Abdullah facebook -
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Source: Moaz Al-Hams facebook -
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Source: Moaz Al-Hams facebook -
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Source: Moaz Al-Hams facebook -
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Source: Jumana Khayyat facebook -
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Source: Wisam Rekhawi facebook -
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Source: Wisam Rekhawi facebook -
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Source: Fatima Khaled facebook -
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Source: @PalinfoAr -
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Source: @PalinfoAr -
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Source: Marwa Fahd -
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Source: Marwa Fahd -
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Source: Marwa Fahd -
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Source: Marwa Fahd -
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Source: TIME News -
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