Gazans scaled the destruction to their old neighborhood, and Israelis awaited word on the three new hostages. a one-day truce The spat between Hamas and Israel continued on Monday.
With the end of the 15-month war, Palestinians are returning to the parts of the Gaza Strip they fled, picking their way through the massive rubble and scrambling to salvage what they can – a couch, a mattress, a chair or a chest. from the ruins of their former homes.
“People can barely recognize the crushed places they used to live in,” English teacher Montaser Bahja said a day after visiting his old neighborhood in the northern city of Jabaliya.
In a video shared with The New York Times, Mr Bahja, 50, can be seen hurrying through the streets with his son Alhasan, 21, trying to match the piles of rubble piled up on either side with their memories.
“This is the house of Fahmi Abu Varda; This is Abu Shaba's house,” Alhassan is heard saying.
Officials in Israel, marking the return of the first group of hostages freed by Hamas as part of the ceasefire, have provided the most comprehensive description yet of their conditions. Israel's health ministry and the Sheba Medical Center, where the three women are staying in a closed wing with family members, said their primary responsibility is to protect the privacy of former POWs while receiving medical and psychological care.
“I am pleased to report that their condition is stable,” said one of their doctors, Professor Itai Pessach. “This allows us and them to focus on what's most important right now: being reunited with their families.”
But the Israelis heard from one of the women on Monday.
“I'm back to life,” Emily Damari, 28, said on social media, describing herself as the “happiest person in the world.”
Ms. Damari was one of about 250 people taken hostage in a Hamas-led attack on October 7, 2023. About a hundred are still in Gaza, and a third of them are believed to have died. Israel says that militants killed 1,200 people that day.
Under the terms of the ceasefire, Hamas agreed to release 33 hostages in exchange for the release of more than a thousand Palestinians from Israeli prisons. After the return of three hostages, 90 prisoners were released and exchanges are to take place once a week during the 42-day ceasefire.
Palestinians in Gaza are happy that the fighting has stopped. Gazan health officials say more than 47,000 people were killed in the 2023 Israeli offensive that followed a Hamas attack; they do not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
But Monday's scenes in the enclave and in Israel epitomized the bittersweet emotions felt on both sides of the border.
As the ceasefire took effect on Sunday, celebrations replaced explosions and hundreds of trucks carrying aid began rolling into Gaza, where residents have endured a year of severe hunger and deprivation. The hostages who were returned in Israel were joyfully embraced by their relatives and friends. Fireworks and cheering crowds greeted newly freed Palestinian prisoners in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
But the joy was overshadowed by uncertainty. The next phase of negotiations between Hamas and Israel is expected to be more difficult than the negotiations that led to the 42-day ceasefire.
The fate of more than 60 other hostages and thousands of Palestinian prisoners in Israel hinges on extending the deal, to say nothing of the prospect of a long-term end to the fighting.
“This is a moment of great hope – fragile but vital,” Tom Fletcher, the UN's humanitarian adviser, said on social media.
The joy was also tempered by the prospect of protracted hardship and the knowledge that there is still no comprehensive plan for how to rebuild Gaza. Most of the two million residents there have been internally displaced at least once.
The task ahead is unimaginably daunting.
Returning to the southern city of Rafah, Gazans found it mostly flat. The mayor said that 60 percent of the houses were destroyed, as well as 70 percent of the city's sewage system.
But after 15 months of hunger and famine, food and other vital supplies are now pouring into Gaza. According to UN officials, more than 630 trucks entered the enclave on the first day of the ceasefire.
Very few people took part during the fighting – and when they did, it was too dangerous to get help where it was needed. Israel's military campaign drove Hamas back without replacing them and created a power vacuum. As the enclave descended into lawlessness, desperate mobs and organized gangs crowded the trucks in the hope of securing a packet of food or a bag of flour.
Sunday and Monday scenes were not repeated.
“The most remarkable thing is that none of the trucks that came in yesterday were robbed,” said Nebal Farsakh, a spokesman for the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, a humanitarian aid organization.
But violence erupted in the West Bank, where Israeli settlers have settled into Palestinian villages, angered by the planned release of Palestinian prisoners in the ceasefire agreement, some of whom are accused of deadly attacks on Israelis.
Dozens of men threw stones and set fire to houses in the village of Sinjil, south of Nablus, according to residents and videos confirmed by The Times.
“People were screaming as their houses burned,” said Ayed Jafry, 45, a resident. Several people were injured, including an 86-year-old man.
After the Hamas attack that triggered the war in Gaza, Israeli leaders vowed to destroy the militants once and for all. However, in the first two days of the ceasefire, Hamas made it clear that it intended to remain the main force in the area.
In an interview with The Times, Hamas official Musa Abu Marzouk suggested that at least some senior members of the group hoped to engage in “dialogue” with the United States, despite the American government's designation of it as a terrorist organization. 1997.
Qatar-based Mr. Abu Marzouk said that despite America's longstanding policy of arming Israel and defending it in international institutions, Hamas is ready to receive a representative of the Trump administration.
“He can come and see people and try to understand their feelings and wishes,” he said about the ambassador, “so that America's position is based on the interests of all parties, not just one side.”
Participated in the report Wrong Yazbek, Nathan Odenheimer, Fatima Abdul KarimandAfif Amireh.