Gazans return to massive destruction in old neighborhoods

Gazans realized the extent of the devastation inflicted on their old neighborhoods, while the Israelis awaited news of the release of three new hostages as their release date approached. A one-day ceasefire Talks between Hamas and Israel continued on Monday.

As the 15-month war ended, Palestinians returned to the parts of the Gaza Strip they had fled, making their way through vast swaths of rubble and trying to salvage what they could — a sofa, a mattress, a chair, a box. From the ruins of their former homes.

““People can barely recognize the destroyed places where they used to live,” Montaser Bahja, an English teacher, said a day after visiting his old neighborhood in the northern city of Jabalia.

In a video shared with The New York Times, Mr. Bahja, 50, can be seen speeding through the streets with his son, Hassan, 21, trying to reconcile the looming piles of rubble on either side with their memories.

“This is Fahmi Abu Wardeh’s house; This is Abu Shaaban’s house, Al-Hassan is heard saying.

In Israel, which celebrated the return of the first group of hostages released by Hamas as part of the truce, the authorities provided only a broader description of their conditions. The Israeli Ministry of Health and Sheba Medical Center, where the three women are staying in a closed ward with family members, said their primary commitment is to protect the privacy of the former prisoners while they receive medical and psychological care.

“I am happy to report that their condition is stable,” said one of their doctors, Professor Itai Pesach. “This allows us and them to focus on what is most important right now: uniting with their families.”

But the Israelis heard from one of the women on Monday.

Emily Damari (28 years old) said on social media: “I have come back to life,” describing herself as “the happiest person in the world.”

Ms. Al-Damari was one of about 250 people taken hostage in the Hamas-led attack on October 7, 2023. About a hundred of them are believed to remain in Gaza, and about a third of them are believed to be dead. Israel says the militants also killed about 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 1,000 Palestinians from Israeli prisons. The return of the three hostages was followed by the release of 90 prisoners, and exchanges are scheduled to take place once a week during the 42-day truce.

The Palestinians in Gaza rejoiced that the fighting had stopped. Gaza health officials say more than 47,000 people were killed during the Israeli offensive that began after the Hamas attack in 2023; They do not differentiate between civilians and combatants.

But the scenes that took place in the Strip and in Israel on Monday embodied the bittersweet feelings felt by both sides of the border.

As the truce took effect on Sunday, celebrations replaced explosions, and hundreds of trucks loaded with aid began flowing into Gaza, where residents have endured a harsh year of hunger and deprivation. In Israel, the returning hostages received a cheerful welcome from relatives and friends. Fireworks and cheering crowds greeted newly released Palestinian prisoners in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

But the joy was overshadowed by uncertainty. The next round of negotiations between Hamas and Israel is expected to be more difficult than the one that led to the 42-day ceasefire.

The fate of more than sixty other hostages and thousands of other Palestinian prisoners in Israel, not to mention the prospect of a long-term end to the fighting, depends on extending the agreement.

“This is a moment of tremendous hope – fragile, but vital,” Tom Fletcher, UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, said on social media.

The jubilation has also been tempered by expectations of long hardships to come, and the knowledge that there is still no comprehensive plan for how to rebuild Gaza. Many of the two million people have been displaced at least once,

The task ahead of us is unimaginably daunting.

Gazans returning to the southern city of Rafah found that most of it had been leveled. The mayor said that 60 percent of the homes were destroyed, as well as 70 percent of the city’s sewage network.

But after 15 months of hunger and scarcity, food and other vital supplies are now flowing into Gaza. More than 630 trucks entered the enclave on the first day of the ceasefire, according to United Nations officials.

During the fighting, far fewer people made it through, and when they did, it was often too dangerous to get aid to where it was needed. The Israeli military campaign succeeded in defeating Hamas without replacing it, creating a power vacuum. As the enclave descended into chaos, desperate crowds and organized gangs crowded into trucks hoping to get a package of food or a bag of flour.

The scenes were not repeated on Sunday and Monday.

“What is very notable is that none of the trucks that entered yesterday were looted,” said Nepal Farsakh, spokeswoman for the Palestine Red Crescent, a humanitarian aid organization.

But violence erupted in the West Bank, where Israeli settlers attacked Palestinian villages amid anger over the planned release of Palestinian prisoners, some of whom were convicted of deadly attacks against Israelis, in a ceasefire agreement.

In Sinjil, a village south of Nablus, dozens of men, some carrying slingshots, threw stones and set fire to homes, according to residents and videos verified by The Times.

Ayed Jafri, 45, a resident, said: “People screamed as their homes were burning.” He added that several people were injured, including an 86-year-old man.

In the wake of the Hamas attack that sparked the war in Gaza, Israeli leaders vowed to eliminate the militants once and for all. But in the first two days of the ceasefire, Hamas made clear that it intended to remain a major force in the region.

In an interview with The Times, Hamas official Musa Abu Marzouk indicated that at least some of the movement’s senior members hoped to enter into a “dialogue” with the United States, even though the US government has since designated it a terrorist organization. 1997.

Mr. Abu Marzouk, who is based in Qatar, said that Hamas is ready to welcome an envoy from the Trump administration despite the long-standing US policy of supplying weapons to Israel and defending it in international institutions.

He said about the envoy: “He can come and see the people and try to understand their feelings and desires, so that the American position is based on the interests of all parties, not just one party.”

He contributed to the preparation of the reports Yazbek error, Nathan Odenheimer, Fatima Abdel KarimandAfif Amira.