Palestinians declared dead turn out to be alive

For two weeks, Palestinian mother Basma Aweidat mourned after receiving news that her son had been shot dead by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank.

He then received a phone call, telling him that while Thayer, 28, had been shot, he was alive and receiving treatment at a hospital in Israel.

“I couldn’t believe what they were telling me,” he said.

As violence escalates in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the West Bank, where Israeli forces killed more than 200 Palestinians last year, these stories of confused identities are rare but not unique.

In the case of Thayer Aweidat, the Israeli army launched a raid on February 6 at the entrance to the Aqabet Jaber refugee camp near Jericho looking for suspects accused of carrying out an attack on Israelis.

The army said it had killed five “terrorists”, and an Israeli security official told the Agence France-Presse news agency that the army had the bodies of the dead Palestinians.

The Palestinian Authority, which said it had been informed by the Israeli authorities, announced that Thayer Aweidat, a member of the armed wing of the Palestinian movement Hamas, was among the dead.

His photograph was printed on posters pasted to the walls of the refugee camp, joining other Palestinian “martyrs”, and messages of condolence flooded in.

Shock

Then Basma Aweidat’s phone rang.

It came from a cousin of his, the mother of Alaa Aweidat, a young man reportedly injured in the same attack and taken to Hadassah hospital in Jerusalem.

Except that when she visited the hospital, she realized with a shock that the injured man was not her son. It was Thayer Aweidat. He was in serious condition and in a coma.

“I couldn’t believe he was still alive,” said Basma, who applied for an Israeli permit to visit him.

“I saw him, with his head bandaged and his body with various injuries,” he said. “I tried to talk to him, but he didn’t respond.”

Back at his home in Aqabet Jaber, the same neighbors returned who had offered their condolences days before.

“The women from the camp started coming to congratulate me because my son is alive, a few days after I came to cry,” Basma Aweidat said.

Her husband, Khaled Aweidat, has not received permission to visit their son.

“From what my wife tells me, he is serious and his death could be announced at any time,” he said.

As for Alaa Aweidat, her fate is unknown.

A relative told the family that he saw him aboard an Israeli ambulance and alive on February 6 after fighting in the camp. But they haven’t heard from him since.

The army only confirmed that they had five bodies from the February 6 raid.

When asked about a possible mistake, neither the army, the police nor the body of the Israeli defense ministry responsible for civil affairs in the Palestinian territories clarified the reason for the confusion.

The Palestinian Authority did not specify who in Israel is sending the names of the Palestinians killed during the army’s operations.

‘I like numbers’

But this is not the only case like that of the Aweidat.

In October, a similar story unfolded in the Jalazone refugee camp near Ramallah, also in the West Bank.

The Basbous family mourned the death of their son Basel for two days after Palestinian officials told them he had been shot dead by the israeli army near Ramallah while driving with two other people, who also died.

But he was not dead.

“I was unconscious and I woke up two days later in the hospital with my legs and hands handcuffed,” Basel Basbous said.

The family received a call from a friend, who had a relative who worked at the Israeli Shaare Tzedek hospital in Jerusalem.

“She called me to tell me… Basel was still alive,” said her mother, Ataf Basbous.

The hospital said in a statement: “Due to the nature of his condition, it appears that some confusion regarding his identity occurred prior to admission for treatment.”

Ataf Basbous said: “The Israelis treat us as numbers. They don’t care about families. My son is shot and stays in the hospital for 18 days before being released, but no one cares when he hasn’t done anything.”

Basel Basbous continues to receive treatment for injuries to his leg and hand at the Ramallah hospital.

First called the “heroic martyr”, like all Palestinians killed by Israeli forces, he has since been known as “the living martyr”.