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Incident Date
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Airwars Assessment
In the evening of July 15th 2024, an alleged Israeli military bombardment killed two men from the same family, 56-year-old Kamel Ahmed Siam and 47-year-old Darwish Sharif Siam. The incident occurred in the Al-Zahour neighbourhood, north of Rafah City, the Gaza Strip, and was reported by multiple sources. Among these sources was the Safa Press Agency, which reported the killings at 18:15 on July 15.
Sources blamed either Israeli shelling or airstrikes as killing Kamel and Darwish. The Qatar News Agency reported that voluntary first aid teams recovered the bodies of Kamel and Darwish Siam and transferred them to Nasser Hospital in neighbouring Khan Younis. Al-Ayyam News also reported the deaths of Kamel and Darwish, adding that they were killed by shelling in the Al-Zahour neighborhood.
Family members of Kamel and Darwish confirmed their deaths and posted a number of condolence messages online expressing their grief. Facebook user, Ola K. Siam, confirmed that Kamel, her uncle, and Darwish, her cousin, had been killed and offered her condolences to her family, the wife of Darwish, and her cousins. She prayed for patience and solace in the aftermath of their deaths.
Likewise, Umm Saleh expressed her sorrow for the loss of her uncle Kamel and her cousin, Darwish. On Facebook, Mostafa Fayez also confirmed the deaths of his “cousin, Darwish Siam and…cousin, Kamel Siam” in a condolence post via Facebook. He shared the pictures of the dead bodies of the two deceased men in the white shrouds.
Darwish’s name has been matched with the Palestinian Ministry of Health list of fatalities in Gaza released September 16, 2024.
The age of Kamel has been found by cross-checking names against lists of fatalities shared online by Shireen Monitor, an organisation which has a list of “Martyrs of Palestine” from 2023 onward.
Where sources identified a belligerent, all sources attributed the bombing to Israeli forces.
This incident was updated on April 10, 2025 to reflect information about the location found in local source al-Ayyam News and a match to Shireen Monitor.
Victims
Family members (2)
Geolocation Notes
Reports of the incident mention the neighbourhood of Al-Zahour (حي الزهور) to the north of Rafah City (رفح). Due to limited satellite imagery and information available to Airwars, we were unable to find boundaries for the neighbourhood and to verify the location further. The generic coordinates for Al-Zahour are: 31.294222, 34.259896.