On October 7, 2023, seven members of the al-Najjar family, including two children and three women, were killed and four others were wounded in their three-storey house in Khuza’a, east of Khan Yunis, south of the Gaza Strip, by an alleged Israeli airstrike. One member of the family appears to have been a militant.
The airstrike took the life of 56-year-old Hajj Hamdan al-Najjar “Abu Zaki”, a director of the Tribal (Clans) Office at the Ministry of Interior, his wife 52-year-old Zahira al-Najjar “Um Zaki”, their son 16-year-old Mohammed Hamdan al-Najjar and their daughter 33-year-old Ehtiram Hamdan al-Najjar.
Other members of the al-Najjar family, namely, the wife of their son Salah, 33-year-old Afnan al-Najjar, her son three-year-old Sanad Salah al-Najjar and her daughter four-year-old Ayah Salah al-Najjar, are also among the victims of the tragic incident.
On Facebook, the al-Najjar family page listed the members of the family who had been killed, including Ayah Salah Hamdan al-Najjar, the young granddaughter of Hajj Hamdan al-Najjar. The same Facebook page also provided the names of four people who were reportedly wounded as a result of the airstrike: Zakaria Hamdan al-Najjar, Mrs.Yasmine Tariq Ibrahim al-Najjar, Yahya Ahmed Ghazi al-Najjar (a child) and Saif Sabry Muhammad al-Najjar (a child).
Two sources, namely Shebab Agency and Oud News Agency published information on social media on the strike on October 7, in the evening. Based on the time of publication of these sources, Airwars concluded that the attack might have been conducted between 7pm and 8.30pm local time.
Other sources, such as Palsawa news, reported on the incident the morning of October 8th, at around 9 am. However, it seems that sources referred to when rescue efforts were taking place, and to the moment where victims were pulled from the rubble. It was initially reported by Palsawa news that three killed and three injured people who had been brought to the European Hospital. Later on, while Khuza’a Municipality crews were removing the rubble of the destroyed house, the bodies of Afnan al-Najjar and Ehtiram al-Najjar were recovered from the rubble.
A son of Hajj Hamdan al-Najjar, Zakaria H al-Najjar, mentioned in his heartfelt Facebook testimony Sanad Salah al-Najjar and Ayah Salah al-Najjar among the victims, thus confirming that the strike had killed seven members of the al-Najjar family.
Posting to Facebook, three users (Maslama An-najjar, Bana Al Khattabi, and Martyrs of Khuza’a Secondary School for Boys) remembered Mohammed as a ‘mujahed’. While the term does not necessarily mean that someone was a militant, the post shared by Bana Al Khattabi included an image in which Mohammed’s image was photoshopped onto a poster in the style of a ‘martyr’s photo’ – a kind of image often used to announce the death of someone who acted in a militant capacity. In addition, the text shared by Bana referred to Mohammed as “The martyr, revolutionary, mujahid, and defender, Muhammad Hamdan al-Najjar (Abu al-Majd)”. As such, although Mohammed was 16 at the time of his death, he has been recorded as a militant. This will be updated should additional information become available.
All 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 strikes to Israeli forces.