Muhammad Anza from Rafah, a city near the Gaza Strip's border with Egypt, has been searching for weeks for his uncle, Ibrahim Al-Shaer, who disappeared at the beginning of May.

"Since that day, he has never returned, and we haven't heard from him," Anza, 19, told DW from Gaza via phone. "We are in a state of great concern. We want to know where he is, we want to know if he is dead, so we can bury him and have mercy on him, or whether he was detained [by the Israeli military]."

When Israel's military launched an offensive in eastern Rafah on May 6 to root out Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that led the October 7 terror attacks in southern Israel, Al-Shaer and his family were ordered to leave their home in the area. Anza said his uncle tried to go back a few days later to check on their house and retrieve some items the family hadn't had time to take with them during the bombing.

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The family, Anza said, had searched hospitals and asked neighbors who had returned around the same time to check on their houses. There were bombings and air strikes nearby, but those killed were named by emergency services.

"We have contacted the police, the Red Cross and the local committees, but we don't know where he is, and nobody knows anything," Anza said.

The family, like many others, has now posted a photo and a description of the circumstances of Al-Shaer's disappearance on social media, not knowing where else to turn.

With the war between Israel and Hamas, which runs Gaza, in its ninth month, thousands of people appear to be missing in the Palestinian enclave. Many have disappeared under the rubble after airstrikes. Entire blocks of flats and houses have been destroyed by bombardments, burying........

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