As part of its ongoing efforts to document cases of missing persons and enforced disappearances in the Gaza Strip, the Palestinian Center for the Missing and Forcibly Disappeared (PCMFD) has documented the case of Bassam Younis Abu Khoussa. This case carries strong indicators that he was detained and subjected to enforced disappearance by Israeli forces in the northern Gaza Strip.
Incident Details According to information documented by the Center through testimonies from the missing person’s family, Bassam Younis Abu Khoussa, who was 54 years old at the time of the incident and a resident of Beit Lahia (Al-Amrikiya Street), went missing on Saturday, May 17, 2025.
According to his family’s statement, Bassam was staying at a temporary residence near the Finance Roundabout (Dawar Al-Maliya) in Gaza City. At approximately 6:00 AM on the aforementioned day, he left the location heading to his home in Beit Lahia. His departure coincided with an Israeli military ground incursion into the Al-Atatra area in Beit Lahia. Since that exact moment, all contact with him has been completely severed, he has not returned, and all means of reaching him or determining his precise destination have failed. His fate and whereabouts remain unknown.
Indicators of Enforced Disappearance The disappearance of Bassam Abu Khoussa in an area experiencing an active Israeli military incursion and under operational military control—combined with the authorities’ persistent denial of his whereabouts and the withholding of any information regarding his fate—places this case under the classification of systematic enforced disappearance. This deliberate ambiguity constitutes a blatant violation of International Humanitarian Law (IHL), which obligates the detaining power to disclose the whereabouts of civilian detainees and facilitate their communication with their families and legal entities.
Search and Follow-up Efforts Following Bassam’s disappearance, his family pursued all available legal avenues and channels, contacting HaMoked (Center for the Defence of the Individual). However, these efforts were met with a response stating that there are no official records or indications within Israeli authority databases indicating his place of detention or disclosing his fate.
For its part, and based on the mandate granted by the victim’s family to the Center’s representatives, the Palestinian Center for the Missing and Forcibly Disappeared (PCMFD) has officially documented the case and submitted an Urgent Appeal to the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID). This submission demands that the international community pressure the occupation authorities to immediately disclose the fate of Bassam Abu Khoussa and end the policy of institutional denial regarding his case.
Unknown Fate To this day, the fate of Bassam Younis Abu Khoussa remains officially unknown. His family and the Center appeal to all human rights organizations and international bodies to intervene urgently to reveal his fate, end his family’s suffering, and ensure his legal protection. This case reflects the ongoing policy of unacknowledged detention practiced against civilians, which necessitates international action to hold those responsible for these crimes accountable and ensure the return of the disappeared to their loved ones.
