Her father’s war grave in Gaza was bulldozed by Israel. Amid the grief and anger, she wants answers | Australian military
The inscription reads, “Our beloved father died fighting for those who loved him.”
Just saying those words threatens to overwhelm Wilma Spence.
In the quiet of her living room, with tears streaming down her face, Wilma shares the inscription engraved on the now ruined tombstone of her father, Albert Kemp, an Anzac buried in the Gaza War Cemetery.
But this week he learned that his father’s grave had almost certainly been destroyed, along with the graves of hundreds of other Commonwealth war dead bulldozed by the Israel Defense Forces.
There has been no official statement from Wilma, but she knows exactly where his grave is; In a corner of the cemetery where the graves of Australians who died during the Second World War are located, where satellite images show the greatest damage.
An IDF spokesman claimed that the military destroyed the graves to deal with “the underground terrorist infrastructure detected in and around the cemetery”, a claim that was met with deep skepticism by the families of the Anzac dead.
Wilma and her family now have no idea where Albert’s remains are.
They were gripped by pain and anger.
Sign up: AÜ Breaking News email
“They have no respect for the living, so why should they respect the dead?” Wilma says about the Israeli government:
Wilma was too young to know her father. Enlisted at Dandenong in south-east Melbourne in October 1939, he joined the 2/7th Battalion of the Australian Infantry Force and fought on various fronts in Europe and the Middle East. He won the African Star and the 1939–45 Star, among other campaign medals, and was promoted to acting corporal in 1941, before dying in Palestine the following year, aged 27.
What he knew he learned secondhand through his relatives. He traveled through Crete and the Middle East, following the path of his father’s Anzac service. But the place he felt closest to her was his grave.
Wilma visited the Gaza War Cemetery in 1995, enduring two hours of Mossad interrogation and armed checkpoints alone.
He brought with him a wreath, a photo of his father and an Australian flag.
When Wilma finally found her father’s tombstone, she was alone in the cemetery, except for the Palestinian caretakers. Grave 3 in Row A in Section B was where he was buried.
“I broke down and started crying,” he says.
“It was very emotional. I think I’d like to go back somehow and take someone else with me.”
But the area now appears to have been destroyed by IDF bulldozers. Last year, military excavations were carried out in the southern corner of the cemetery. Satellite photographs show that rows of gravestones have been removed and the soil has been significantly disturbed in sections A and B of the cemetery, which contains the graves of World War II soldiers, the majority of whom are Australian. In the images, a significant earth embankment can be seen running through the middle of the disturbed area.
After being shown satellite images of the cemetery, the IDF said it had to take defensive measures during military operations.
“During IDF operations in the region, terrorists tried to attack IDF troops and took shelter in structures close to the cemetery. Operational measures were taken to neutralize the threats detected in the region in order to ensure the security of IDF troops serving on the ground.”
Wilma has been writing to prime minister Anthony Albanese since October 2023, urging him to protect the sites and investigate and fix any damage. It was referred to the external affairs department or the Australian War Graves Office.
“Your response referred me to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” he wrote to the prime minister’s office in October 2023. “I see this as an abrogation of the responsibility of our national spokesperson, the Prime Minister, and of his responsibilities to Australian citizens who are fully engaged in the genocide of Palestinians.”
“My father, a World War II soldier, is buried in the Gaza War Cemetery with 200 other Australian soldiers. Perhaps the Prime Minister can find out whether the cemetery has been destroyed by recent bombing and explain whether action will be taken to repair the cemeteries or alternatively return the remains to Australia.”
Now, with the upcoming visit of Israeli President Isaac Herzog, Wilma wants the Albanian government to show the leadership it seeks.
At the very least, he wants Israel to be pressured to allow Australian War Graves Office staff to assess the damage in Gaza.
“I want them to discuss this issue with the Israeli president,” he says.
“I think they pass the blame on to others and constantly refer it to the Australian War Graves Commission.”
The Prime Ministry was contacted to get an opinion on the issue.
Earlier this week, a spokesman for the Australian Department of Veterans Affairs told Guardian Australia there had been “significant damage” to the Gaza War Cemetery, including the graves of Australians.
“The Australian War Graves Office is very concerned about the damage to the cemetery,” they said.
“The Commonwealth War Graves Commission plans to secure and repair the cemetery as soon as it is safe, but full reconstruction is expected to take some time as immediate post-conflict priority will be directed to humanitarian efforts.”
On Friday, Acting Prime Minister Richard Marles said the government was “clearly very concerned” about the destruction of Australian war graves in Gaza.
“We have clearly expressed our concern,” he said. “As soon as the situation is such that we can safely repair these graves, we will of course do so, but it is clear that this is not the case today.”
Wilma wrote a poem about her father. His final lines point to the strength he carries in his heart from his father’s grave and the pain of losing it now.
“I stood at your grave in the Gaza sun, the scent of eucalyptus filling the air. My tears fell into the dust, it seemed unfair to lose you so young – unfair.”
“And I wished for you to have comfort at home, love and care.”
Additional reporting by Seham Tantesh in Gaza and Julian Borger in London
