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28-01-2025
GAZA STRIP: Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are streaming into devastated northern Gaza many for the first time since the early weeks of the 15-month war allowing them to reunite with loved ones and see what has become of their homes.
A column of people, some holding infants in their arms or carrying bundles of belongings on their shoulders, headed north on foot, along a road running by the Mediterranean Sea shore. More than 200,000 displaced people returned to north Gaza on foot in the two hours after the crossing opened, according a Gaza security official speaking to media.
Many will return home to find their homes flattened by intense Israeli bombardment, but that did not extinguish the sense of joy at finally being allowed to return.
“It’s like I was born again,” said Palestinian mother, Umm Mohammed Ali, part of the miles-long crowd that moved slowly along the coastal road.
“My heart is beating, I thought I would never come back,” Osama, 50 a public servant and father of five told Reuters as he arrived in Gaza City, the largest city in the north. “Whether the ceasefire succeeds or not, we will never leave Gaza City and the north again, even if Israel would sent a tank for each one of us, no more displacement.”
The opening of the Netzarim corridor that separates northern Gaza from the rest of the enclave, which was due under the terms of the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas, was delayed for two days after Israel said that Hamas had broken the deal by failing to release civilian female hostage Arbel Yehud. Late on Sunday, mediator Qatar said Hamas agreed to hand over three Israeli hostages before Friday and Israel started to withdraw its forces from the corridor. Having been repeatedly displaced over 15 months of war, cheers erupted at shelters and tent encampments when families heard news that the crossings would be opened.
Yasmin Abu Amshah, a mother of three, said she walked around four miles (six kilometres) to reach her home in Gaza City, where she found it damaged but still habitable. She also saw her younger sister for the first time in over a year.
“It was a long trip, but a happy one,” she said. “The most important thing is that we returned.”
The ceasefire is aimed at winding down the deadliest and most destructive war ever fought between Israel and Hamas and securing the release of dozens of hostages captured in the Hamas attack inside Israel on 7 October 2023 that triggered the conflict. Some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, were killed in that attack, with another 250 taken hostage. Israel responded with an air and ground war that has killed more 47,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza health officials.
In the opening days of the war, Israel ordered the wholescale evacuation of the north and sealed it off shortly after ground troops moved in.
Around a million people fled to the south in October 2023, while hundreds of thousands remained in the north, which had some of the heaviest fighting and the worst destruction of the war. In all, around 90 per cent of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been displaced.
Starting at 7am local time, Palestinians were allowed to cross on foot. A checkpoint for vehicles opened a few hours later. Under the ceasefire agreement, vehicles are to be inspected for weapons before entering the north, it could take days to clear the queue of thousands of cars that has formed.
Israeli defense minister Israel Katz said Israel would continue to enforce the ceasefire, and that anyone violating it or threatening Israeli forces “will bear the full cost.” (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
