![\"Albert](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/418.jpg\")
Albert Kemp. Photograph: supplied\/Australian War Memorial<\/p>\n
But her father\u2019s grave, she learned this week<\/a>, has almost certainly been destroyed along with the graves of hundreds of other Commonwealth war dead, bulldozed by the Israel Defense Forces.<\/p>\n Wilma has had no official word, but she knows exactly where his grave was, in a corner of the cemetery that houses the graves of Australians who died during the second world war, where satellite imagery shows the worst of the damage has been sustained.<\/p>\n An IDF spokesperson claimed the military destroyed the graves to deal with \u201cunderground terrorist infrastructure \u2026 identified within the cemetery and in its surrounding area\u201d, a claim that has been met with deep scepticism by families of the Anzac dead.<\/p>\n Wilma and her family now have no idea where Albert\u2019s remains are.<\/p>\n They have been left gripped by grief and anger.<\/p>\n Sign up: AU Breaking News email<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cThey have no respect for the living, so why would they respect the dead?\u201d Wilma says of the Israeli government.<\/p>\n Wilma was too young to know her father. He enlisted in Dandenong, in south-eastern Melbourne, in October 1939, joining the 2\/7 Battalion of the Australian Imperial Force and fighting across several theatres in Europe and the Middle East. He earned the Africa Star and the 1939-45 Star, among other campaign medals, and was promoted to acting corporal in 1941 before his death in Palestine<\/a> the next year, aged 27.<\/p>\n What she knew, she had learned secondhand through relatives. She has travelled across Crete and the Middle East, tracing the path of her father\u2019s Anzac service. But it was at his grave where she felt closest to him.<\/p>\n Albert Kemp\u2019s grave at the Gaza War Cemetery in 1995. Photograph: Wilma Spence<\/p>\n Wilma visited the Gaza War Cemetery in 1995, braving a two-hour Mossad interrogation and armed checkpoints by herself.<\/p>\n She brought with her a wreath, a photo of her father and an Australian flag.<\/p>\n Wilma was alone in the cemetery, save for the Palestinian caretakers, when she finally found her father\u2019s tombstone. Grave 3, Row A, of Section B, was where he lay.<\/p>\n \u201cI just broke down, started crying,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was very emotional. I suppose, in some way, I\u2019d like to go back, and take somebody else with me.\u201d<\/p>\n But the site appears to have now been obliterated by IDF bulldozers. Military earthmoving has occurred within the last year to the southern corner of the cemetery. Satellite photographs show rows of gravestones removed and soil significantly disturbed across sections A and B of the cemetery, which hold the graves of second world war soldiers, the vast majority Australian. A substantial earth berm can be seen in the images, running through the middle of the disturbed area.<\/p>\n After being shown satellite images of the cemetery, the IDF said that it had been forced to take defensive measures during military operations.<\/p>\n \u201cDuring IDF operations in the area, terrorists attempted to attack IDF troops and took cover in structures close to the cemetery. In response to ensure the safety of IDF troops operating on the ground, operational measures were taken in the area to neutralize identified threats.\u201d<\/p>\n Wilma has been writing to the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, since October 2023, urging him to protect the sites and investigate and remediate any damage. She has been fobbed off, referred to the foreign affairs department or the Office of Australian War Graves.<\/p>\n Wilma wants the Albanese government to raise the issue of the damaged graves with the Israeli president, Isaac Herzog, who will visit Australia this week. Photograph: Rohan Thomson\/The Guardian<\/p>\n \u201cYour response referred me to the Dept.Foreign Affairs,\u201d she wrote to the prime minister\u2019s office in October 2023. \u201cI consider this an abrogation of the responsibility of our national spokesperson, our PM. And to his responsibilities to those Australian Citizens so totally concerned at the genocide of Palestinians.<\/p>\n \u201cMy father, a World War 2 soldier is buried in the Gaza War Cemetery along with some 200 other Australian soldiers. Perhaps the Prime Minister could find out whether the cemetery has been obliterated by nearby bombing and explain whether action will be taken to restore their gravesites or alternatively return their remains to Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n