WARNING: The story contains details of a man burning to death.
Muhammad Ahmad Al-Dalu was sleeping in a tent by himself outside of Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip early Monday when he heard the sound of an airstrike right next to him.
He stepped out of his tent and was immediately surrounded by thick, billowing smoke.
In a matter of minutes, the 17-year-old’s older brother and mother were both killed, and his three siblings and father were all rushed to different hospitals in serious condition.
“I went out to see what happened, and I found my brother burning in the fire and my father was trying to get my younger siblings out,” Al-Dalu told CBC News Tuesday.
“My brother had both his hands up to the sky.”
His brother, 20-year-old Shaaban Al-Dalu, burned alive in the fire. Video of his death widely circulated social media platforms on Monday, showing Shaaban with his hands up under falling rubble and cables, as tents were set ablaze by the missile strikes. CBC News has seen the footage and has chosen not to show it due to its graphic nature.
Shaaban and his mother Alaa Al-Dalu were among the four Palestinians killed in the Israeli airstrike that struck a makeshift tent camp housing forcibly displaced people on Al-Aqsa Hospital grounds at around 1:30 a.m. Dozens more were injured in the attack.
“I saw my brother on fire, in front of my eyes, and my father was on fire, and all of my siblings were on fire right in front of me,” Muhammad Ahmad Al-Dalu said.
“People were holding me, refusing to release me to help my father. I was screaming and shouting for nothing. Everything inside me, I got out.”
His brother screamed for help as he was consumed by the flames, video showed.
“Put yourself in my shoes: You see your brother getting burned alive and people are holding you back, what do you do?”
IDF says the fire was likely due to ‘secondary explosions’
In a statement, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said it conducted a “precise strike” on a Hamas command and control centre in the area of a parking lot adjacent to the hospital overnight Sunday, it said, though it did not provide evidence of the centre’s existence.
“Shortly after the strike, a fire ignited in the hospital’s parking lot, most likely due to secondary explosions.”
It said the incident is under review.
Israel launched its ground offensive against Hamas after Oct. 7, 2023, when the militant group led an attack on Israel, killing around 1,200 and taking about 250 hostage to Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.
The ensuing war has killed more than 42,000 Palestinians since then, by Palestinian counts.
Most of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been displaced, and much of the enclave has been laid to waste as the ongoing war has led to severe shortages of food, clean water and medicine.
Children screamed as fire consumed displaced Palestinians: witness
Shaaban had miraculously survived a previous Israeli strike, Al-Dalu said, on Oct. 6 at Al-Aqsa Mosque. He had fallen asleep at the mosque while reciting the Quran, and escaped the attack with just minor injuries — unaware that just over a week later, he would be killed in a different one.
When the fire erupted following the Monday strike, Al-Dalu said his father was the only one awake out of the family, and quickly rescued his younger brother before trying to pull out the rest of the family.
Israel is facing renewed criticism after airstrikes in Gaza killed multiple civilians, including people at a UN-run school distributing polio vaccines. Meanwhile, there is anger in Lebanon after a deadly air attack in the north. Israel vowed to continue striking at Hezbollah throughout the country.
Footage captured by CBC’s freelance videographer Mohamed El Saife shows rescuers scrambling to save people in the fire, struggling to keep it contained.
“We tried to enter and rescue them, but the fire had a hold on them,” said Al-Dalu’s uncle, Mahmoud Al-Dalu.
Mahmoud Wadi says he watched Shaaban, his friend, die in the fire.
“We couldn’t do anything for him,” Wadi told CBC News on Monday. “He was charred right in front of us, and we couldn’t do anything for him.”
He said he witnessed neighbours on fire as children screamed.
“People get treated at hospitals — here, we get burned at hospitals.”
Most of the tents, vehicles and supplies in the area, including food, were destroyed in the fire.
Attack comes as northern Gaza sees Israeli troops close in
Monday’s attack comes as UN Secretary General António Guterres condemned the level of civilian casualties in northern Gaza. The UN estimates roughly 400,000 civilians remain trapped following evacuation orders, which the IDF repeatedly issued as its troops closed in on the region. Palestinians and UN agencies are increasingly concerned that the Israeli military wants to clear residents from the north of the crowded enclave.
The northern part of Gaza, home to well over half the territory’s population, was heavily bombed in the first phase of Israel’s assault on the territory.
That same day, the White House National Security Council’s spokesperson said Israel has a responsibility to do more to ensure Palestinian civilians were not harmed by its attacks against Hamas in relation to the tent attacks.
“The images and video of what appear to be displaced civilians burning alive following an Israeli airstrike are deeply disturbing and we have made our concerns clear to the Israeli government,” the spokesperson said Monday.
“Israel has a responsibility to do more to avoid civilian casualties — and what happened here is horrifying, even if Hamas was operating near the hospital in an attempt to use civilians as human shields.”
Shaaban was the ‘rose of the family’
Al-Dalu’s remaining siblings and his father are now scattered, recovering in different hospitals across Gaza. In an interview Tuesday, he said he is praying for their recovery.
His older brother Shaaban was the “rose of the family,” he said, a software engineering student who had the Quran memorized.
In their last conversation, just a few hours before the strike, Shaaban told him he was going to sleep after praying Isha, one of the five mandatory daily Islamic prayers. Shaaban told him to pray, as well, before he went to sleep.
“That is the last time I saw my brother.”
