Thousands of displaced Palestinians return to shattered northern Gaza
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GAZA CITY — Tens of thousands of Palestinians streamed into Gaza’s most heavily destroyed area on Monday under a fragile cease-fire after Israel opened the north for the first time since the early weeks of the 15-month war with Hamas. Israel, meanwhile, announced that eight of the hostages to be freed in the weeks ahead are dead.
Massive crowds of Palestinians, some holding babies or pushing wheelchairs, walked with their belongings along a seaside road in a dramatic reversal of the mass exodus from the north that many had feared Israel would make permanent.
Associated Press footage showed people still moving northward eight hours after the crossing opened. They were watched over by Israeli tanks on a nearby hill.
Palestinians who have been sheltering in squalid tent camps and schools-turned-shelters are eager to return to their homes — even though they are likely damaged or destroyed.
Yasmin Abu Amshah, a mother of three, said she walked nearly 4 miles to reach her home in Gaza City, where she found it damaged but 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.
Powerful forces in Middle East and, now, in Washington working against truce lasting beyond its first phase.
Many saw their return as an act of steadfastness after Israel’s military campaign, which was launched in response to the Hamas militant group’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel. The return was also seen as a repudiation of President Trump’s suggestion that large numbers of Palestinians be resettled in Egypt and Jordan, a suggestion those countries have rejected.
Families of dead hostages are informed
Whether hostages are still alive inside Gaza has been a heartbreaking question for waiting families who have pushed Israel’s government to reach a deal to free them, fearing that time was running out.
Before Monday’s announcement, Israel believed that at least 35 of the about 90 hostages taken in the Oct. 7 attack and still held in Gaza were dead.
Government spokesman David Mencer told journalists that a list received overnight from Hamas on the status of the 33 hostages being freed under the cease-fire’s first phase showed eight were dead, and 25 were alive.
The families have been informed, he said.
The cease-fire 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 Oct. 7 attack. Militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in that assault and abducted another 250.
Israel responded with an air and ground war that has killed over 47,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. It does not say how many of the dead were combatants. Israel says it has killed over 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.
Israel has prevented thousands of Palestinians from returning to northern Gaza, accusing Hamas of changing the order of hostages it has released.
‘The joy of return’
Ismail Abu Matter, a father of four who waited for three days near the crossing point before moving into northern Gaza, described scenes of jubilation on the other side, with people singing, praying and crying as they were reunited with relatives.
“It’s the joy of return,” said Abu Matter, whose relatives were among the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who fled or were driven out of what is now Israel during the 1948 war surrounding its creation. “We had thought we wouldn’t return, like our ancestors.”
The opening was delayed for two days over a dispute between Hamas and Israel, which said the militant group changed the order of the hostages it released in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. Local medical officials said Israeli forces opened fire at the waiting crowd and killed several Palestinians over the weekend. Israel’s military said it fired warning shots at approaching groups it deemed a threat.
Mediators resolved the dispute overnight.
Hamas said the return was “a victory for our people, and a declaration of failure and defeat for the [Israeli] occupation and transfer plans.”
In the opening days of the war, Israel ordered the 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% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been displaced.
Palestinians in Gaza are eager to leave miserable tent camps and return to their homes if a long-awaited cease-fire agreement halts the Israel-Hamas war.
“This is our house, four stories. You can’t see them,” one man, gesturing to a pile of rubble, said in an Associated Press video.
Hostage dispute rattled week-old cease-fire
Palestinians were crossing on foot without inspection through part of the Netzarim corridor, a military zone bisecting the territory just south of Gaza City that Israel carved out early in the war. A checkpoint for vehicles opened later on Gaza’s main north-south highway, where traffic was backed up for around 2 miles.
Under the cease-fire agreement, vehicles are to be inspected for weapons before entering the north, but the mechanism for that was not immediately clear.
Israel had delayed the opening of the crossing, which was supposed to happen over the weekend, saying it would not allow Palestinians north until a female civilian hostage, Arbel Yehoud, was released. Israel said she should have been released before four young female soldiers who were freed on Saturday.
Israel also accused Hamas of failing to provide information on hostages to be freed. Hamas in turn accused Israel of violating the agreement by not opening the crossing.
Qatar, a key mediator with Hamas, announced early Monday that an agreement had been reached to release Yehoud along with two other hostages by Friday.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the hostage release — which will include female soldier Agam Berger — will take place on Thursday. Another three hostages should be released on Saturday as previously planned. Hamas also handed over information about the hostages to be released in the first phase.
Defense Minister Israel Katz said anyone violating the cease-fire or threatening Israeli forces “will bear the full cost.” Israel’s military has warned Palestinians not to approach its forces, which have withdrawn to buffer zones inside Gaza.
Saleh, Shurafa and Magdy write for the Associated Press. Shurafa reported from Wadi Gaza, Gaza Strip, and Magdy from Cairo. Associated Press reporters Joe Krauss in Dubai and Mohammad Jahjouh and Abdel Kareem Hana in Wadi Gaza contributed to this report.
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