After Israeli forces withdrew from the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza on Sunday, thousands of Gazans returned to find that “everything is destroyed.”
Malak, 13, was among the thousands of Palestinians who came back to search through the rubble of their homes, hoping to find any belongings that might have survived. She found nothing left.
“Everything is destroyed. There is no life here anymore,” she told CBS News. “Our dreams are gone and so is our childhood… I wished to go back home and study, but all is gone.”
Small towns around Khan Younis, as well as the city itself, were destroyed as the Israel Defense Forces spent weeks battling Hamas, with houses, factories and schools all reduced to rubble. Israel launched its war on the Gaza Strip’s Hamas rulers in response to the Palestinian group’s Oct. 7 terror attack, which Israeli officials say left some 1,200 people dead and more than 200 others captive in Gaza.
More than 33,000 Palestinians have been killed in the territory since Israel launched its offensive, according to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health, which does not distinguish between civilian and combatant deaths.
Read more at CBSnews.com
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