Gaza fire kills 21 from one family during birthday party
Published:Friday | November 18, 2022 | 5:06 PM
JABALIYA REFUGEE CAMP, Gaza Strip (AP) — Twenty-one victims of a fire that tore through a top-floor apartment in the Gaza Strip during a birthday party were members of the same family, two of their relatives said Friday.
Thousands later joined a funeral procession for the victims.
Officials in Hamas-run Gaza have said Thursday night's blaze in a three-story residential building in the Jabaliya refugee camp was apparently fuelled by stored gasoline. They said it was not clear how the gasoline ignited, and that an investigation is underway.
It was one of the deadliest incidents in Gaza in recent years outside the violence stemming from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The blaze destroyed the top-floor apartment in the building, home to the Abu Raya family.
Mohammed Abu Raya, a family spokesman, told The Associated Press that the extended family had gathered for twin celebrations — the birthday of one of the children and the return of one of the adults from a trip to Egypt.
Abu Raya spoke at the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza, where the bodies had been taken and where sobbing relatives were waiting for funeral processions to begin.
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