“We are enjoying the smell of freedom for the first time in almost 50 days,” says Karim, a resident of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, where there have been no explosions or gunshots this Friday – the first of the four days of the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel hear. The scene he describes on the phone is that of thousands of people taking to the streets with the certainty that they will not be bombed. “They walk like birds learning to fly without fear. The first thing that many people think of is visiting family and friends or checking on their status. For me, it’s the first thing I did at the start of the day. […]. “How nice to feel free!” says Karim, an NGO worker who prefers that no further data about him be published for security reasons.
It has been 49 days since Israel began bombing Gaza in response to the Hamas attack on October 7 that killed about 1,200 people. Since then, says Karim, Gazans, especially children, have experienced “indescribable moments when they heard bombs and gunshots… No one felt safe.” “We all thought we could be the next target, and today we are enjoying the moment and rejoice in this temporary ceasefire. For us, everything is good, even if we go to the store to shop when there is hardly anything left,” he adds. Of the 2.3 million residents crammed into this small Palestinian territory covering 365 square kilometers – just over half the area of the city of Madrid – more than 14,800 are no longer alive today to enjoy this lull in the war . , according to figures from local Hamas authorities.
A girl reads the Koran, this Friday in Khan Yunis.Anadolu (Anadolu via Getty Images)
Karim cannot be fooled. He knows that this ceasefire represents a temporary cessation of hostilities. This was reiterated by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said there would be no permanent ceasefire. But for now he is content to take to the streets without bombings. “I used to pedal my bike and was constantly afraid. “We didn’t go out on the streets after six o’clock in the afternoon, that was very dangerous, but now people can do whatever they want, at least during these four days of ceasefire.” Now, with the optimism that the absence of the bombings, he talks again about his dream of traveling to Barcelona to watch a football match in the stadium there.
Israel and Hamas have agreed on the possibility of extending the pause in war by another day for every ten more hostages released from Gaza, in addition to the 50 expected to be returned to Israel during these four days of cessation of bombing for the freedom of 150 Palestinians in Israeli prisons.
Several Gaza residents watch as Hamas members remove ammunition that failed to explode in the bombings from a truck in Yan Junis on November 24, the first day of the ceasefire. MAHMUD HAMS (AFP)
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There is calm in Rafah, but this Gazan says his neighbors are keeping an eye on what’s happening a few kilometers further north. According to the report, several people trying to return to their homes in the north of the Gaza Strip were shot this Friday by Israeli soldiers near the checkpoint that Israel has set up in the center of Gaza and that divides the area in half, the report said Journalist Mahmoud Assad. Israel has warned that the north, from which the population was expelled on October 12, is a “war zone” where entry is prohibited. The Israeli military only allows movement from north to south, into the so-called “security zone”, where the bombing had not stopped until this Friday.
flour and bread
Doaa Ulyan, 33, is one of the 1.7 million Gazans seeking refuge in the southern region of the Palestinian enclave. She does it with her children, ages eight and ten, and her husband. They have tried to find shelter in the city of Khan Yunis and feel that after so many days and especially so many nightmarish nights they can “finally get some rest”. “My husband went to the UN center to get flour so he could bake bread for my children,” she explains. If the ceasefire “holds,” she says, her husband will try to “get winter clothes for the children as it’s starting to get colder.”
As short-lived as it may be, this ceasefire is a reprieve for Gazans. Some even went to the beach to walk on the sand or swim in the sea, according to images posted on social networks. This relief particularly benefits the little ones. According to the local Hamas government, at least 6,150 minors have died in the war. “My children are very, very happy,” says Ulyan. The children “think the war is over and have asked me when we can go home.” “We haven’t told them yet that we no longer have a home to return to,” says this mother. The woman explained to them that the ceasefire would only last four days. And he concludes: “We told them to pray so that it would be final.”
A woman sifting flour, this Friday in Khan Yunis. Anadolu (Anadolu via Getty Images)
Azmi Keshawi, who was also expelled with his family from the capital to Khan Yunis, says that he has “no place left in the north to return to,” but that this ceasefire will allow many Gazans to “understand “What happens to their families”. “It’s almost impossible from a distance and with interrupted communication,” he says. The pause in the war, he assures us, not only enables them to go out without fear of food. They also borrow money from each other to survive, which eventually “became important in the South because food is scarce.” “There are very few things and they are very expensive,” he adds.
The people of Gaza are “missing everything,” confirms Jalil Abu Shammaleh, former director of the NGO Addameer from the same city. The 53-year-old humanitarian worker doesn’t trust the Israelis, “who can break the ceasefire at any time.” He is also not confident that the infusion of further humanitarian aid during the four-day ceasefire provided for in the agreement between Israel and Hamas will be enough to meet “the enormous needs” created after 48 days of bombing. Between October 21 and November 23, the day before the pause in fighting began, only 1,723 trucks carrying basic supplies entered the Gaza Strip via the Egyptian border. Before the day of the Hamas attack and the start of hostilities, an average of 10,000 trucks carrying humanitarian aid and basic supplies arrived each month.
Trucks with supplies are already arriving through the border crossing with Egypt in Rafah. Cairo said the convoy would carry, among other things, 130,000 liters of diesel per day and four trucks of cooking gas. According to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), 150,000 liters of fuel are needed per day just for basic humanitarian operations such as the distribution of aid supplies. A total of 137 trucks carrying relief supplies entered the Gaza Strip this Friday.
Trucks carrying humanitarian aid wait to cross the border to enter Gaza in Rafah on November 24. IBRAHEEM ABU MUSTAFA (Portal)
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