Extract from ABC News
Maryam Sayed Deeb and Abdullah Abu Nahl had been planning their wedding for a year before their lives in Gaza were torn apart by war.
With millions forced to flee their homes and find safe areas, the couple initially put their nuptials on hold to focus on survival.
WARNING: Some readers might find the details and images in this story distressing.
But as the months dragged on with no end in sight to the ongoing Israeli bombings, the two decided to marry.
There are few supplies left in Gaza because of a siege imposed by Israel, which controls the entry of nearly all goods into the enclave, so the couple could not hold formal celebrations.
Instead they exchanged vows surrounded by the people they loved most.
Maryam's father, Abed al Salam Sayed Deeb, says it provided the family with a small sliver of hope and joy.
"They were both deeply in love with each other. She loved him, he loved her," Abed says.
"They decided to get married during the war because you can see the situation, there is nothing to be happy about. Today, we are alive, we might die tomorrow.
"So I thought, let me give my daughter to her husband. What was the point of postponing? We wanted them to be happy."
The pair decided to marry on February 15, the day after Valentine's Day, in a small ceremony.
"We congratulated them and we accompanied them to the chalet that was lent [to them] by their friends," Abed says.
"They settled in the chalet. Then, we left back home."
But just two days after becoming husband and wife, Maryam and Abdullah were killed in an Israeli air strike on Khirbet al Adas, near the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
The air strike that tore a family apart
Nearly 30,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, according to the enclave's Ministry of Health, since the start of the war.
About 1,200 people were killed inside Israel after a Hamas-led attack on the country on October 7.
Maryam and her husband were staying in their friend's chalet when it was hit and destroyed by an Israeli air strike.
Data collated by the non-governmental and non-profit Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project shows there were eight air strikes on and around Rafah on February 17.
One of those attacks included an Israeli warplane hitting agricultural land hosting displaced people in Khirbet al Adas, which killed seven Palestinians, including a woman and three children.
Maryam's father had exchanged words with his daughter only an hour before she died, after checking in to see how she was doing.
"I asked her whether she was happy. She replied 'yes, thanks to God,'" he says.
"She asked me when I will visit, to which I answered 'tomorrow.'"
But Maryam did not see her father again. Palestinian authorities say several other civilians were also killed in the explosion, though recovering their bodies has been difficult.
The force of the blast was so intense that only debris and small bones remain.
"An hour after the call, I received the news about the chalet being bombed and all the people inside are dead," Abed says.
"I rushed to the chalet, and I could not find my daughter, nor her husband. That's all I got, body parts. We don't know who's who."
Since his daughter's death, Abed has returned to the area around the bomb site, looking for remnants of his daughter's body to lay to rest.
The couple's remains are yet to be found, which means Maryam and Abdullah can't be buried.
"My daughter has died as a martyr, that's a given. Yet, I need to see her dead corpse and hold her, kiss her goodbye," he says.
As he speaks, he picks a piece of debris up off the ground. He turns it over in his hand to reveal it is a piece of vertebrae from a spine.
"That's the biggest part of their bodies found so far," Abed says.
He put it in a bucket and takes it to an area a short distance away from the bomb site.
He then digs a small hole, and buries the bone.
"Why is this happening to us? Why are we all soul martyrs?" he says.
"We don't want war. We want nothing. We just want to live a life in dignity and be still alive."
But even in death, Abed can't find dignity for his daughter and his family doesn't understand why the couple were killed.
'She did not have time to be happy'
Maryam was the eldest of 10 children, and the family had fled to Rafah to escape fighting elsewhere in Gaza.
Her mother Ghalia Jomaa Mahmoud Deeb breaks down in tears as she clutches the only possessions she can find of her daughter.
All that is left of Maryam is a broken phone and her identification papers.
"She did not have time to be happy. She was a bride for two days and then she died," she says.
Ghalia is now haunted by what ifs about the future her daughter might have had.
"The groom and bride what did they do? They did nothing wrong," she says.
"My daughter was an A-level student at university, and she had learned the Koran by heart.
"So many innocent civilians died. We cannot stand it anymore."
Before she was married, Maryam handed her sister, Aida Salam Deep Deip, two red roses, plucked from her simple wedding bouquet.
"That's the last gift my sister bought me," Aida says.
"When she left, I hugged her [and] she was happy. She was so happy to get married."
Despite having little drinkable water, Aida changes the water of the roses every day, hoping to keep them alive as long as possible.
"Each time I look at the flowers, I remember her."
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