Palestinians took to the streets across Gaza as they celebrated the much-anticipated ceasefire deal between Hamas and Israel, which came into effect on Sunday at 11:15 am local time after a three-hour delay. Thousands of people, who were forced to go into hiding during 15 months of devastation, rushed back to see what remained of their homes while others visited the graves of relatives.
In the southern city of Khan Younis, Armed Hamas fighters drove through streets as crowds cheered for them and chanted "Greetings to Al-Qassam Brigades" - the armed wing of Hamas. Dressed in blue uniforms, several Hamas policemen were also seen deployed in some areas after months of trying to keep out of sight to avoid Israeli airstrikes.
"All the resistance factions are staying in spite of (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu," one fighter told news agency Reuters, referring to the armed wing.
"This is a ceasefire, a full and comprehensive one God willing, and there will be no return to war in spite of him," he added.
Palestinians Return Home
In Gaza City, where some of the most intense Israeli airstrikes and battles with the militants took place, hundreds of people picked their way through a devastated landscape of rubble and twisted metal. People waved the Palestinian flag and filmed the scenes on their mobile phones as several carts loaded with household possessions travelled down a thoroughfare scattered with rubble and debris.
People who had to leave their homes to save their lives welcomed the ceasefire as another shot at life.
"We are in pain, deep pain and it is time that we hug one another and cry, "Gaza City resident Ahmed Abu Ayham, 40, old Reuters via a chat app.
Ayham had been sheltering with his family in Khan Younis for months. He said the scene of destruction in his home city was "dreadful", adding that while the ceasefire may have spared lives it was no time for celebrations.
According to Aya, a displaced woman from Gaza City, who has been sheltering in Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip for over a year, the ceasefire came as another shot at life.
"I feel like at last I found some water to drink after getting lost in the desert for 15 months. I feel alive again," Aya said.
She added, "The war ended, but life isn't going to be better because of the destruction and the losses we suffered. But at least there will be no more bloodshed of women and children, I hope."
Aide Enters Gaza After Months
Long lines of trucks carrying fuel and aid supplies entered Gaza on Sunday after a truce between Israel and Hamas went into effect, the United Nations said.
The deal requires 600 truckloads of aid to be allowed into Gaza every day of the initial six-week ceasefire, including 50 carrying fuel. Half of the 600 aid trucks would be delivered to Gaza's north, where experts have warned famine is imminent.
"First trucks of supplies started entering" minutes after the ceasefire took effect on Sunday morning, UN aid official Jonathan Whittall, interim chief of the UN's OCHA aid agency for the Palestinian territories, said on X.
"A massive effort has been underway over the past days from humanitarian partners to load and prepare to distribute a surge of aid across all of Gaza."
The UN did not give details on where the shipments entered Gaza, but an Egyptian source news agency AFP that "197 trucks of aid and five of fuel entered through the crossing of Kerem Shalom between Israel and Gaza and that of al-Oga" and Nitzana between Egypt and Israel.
Israel-Hamas Ceasefire
The ceasefire deal took effect after a nearly three-hour delay, pausing a war that has brought seismic political change to the Middle East and giving hope to Gaza's 2.3 million people, many of whom have been displaced several times.
The highly anticipated ceasefire deal could help usher in an end to the Gaza war, which began after Hamas, which controls the tiny coastal territory, attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, according to Israeli authorities. Israel's response has reduced much of Gaza to rubble and killed nearly 47,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza-based health officials.
