- Ceasefire suspends 15-month-old war
- Gaza residents return to devastated neighborhoods, assess damage
- Hamas and Israel exchange hostages and prisoners amid truce
GAZA/CAIRO/JERUSALEM – Hamas released three Israeli hostages and Israel released 90 Palestinian prisoners on Sunday, the first day of a ceasefire suspending a 15-month-old war that has devastated the Gaza Strip and inflamed the Middle East.
The truce allowed Palestinians to return to bombed-out neighborhoods to begin rebuilding their lives, while relief trucks delivered much-needed aid. Elsewhere in Gaza, crowds cheered Hamas fighters who emerged from hiding.
Fireworks were launched in celebration as buses carrying the Palestinian prisoners arrived in Ramallah on the West Bank, where thousands of people waited to welcome them. Those freed from Israeli prisons included 69 women and 21 teenage boys from the West Bank and Jerusalem, according to Hamas.
In Tel Aviv, hundreds of Israelis cheered and wept in a square outside the defense headquarters as a live broadcast from Gaza showed three female hostages getting into a Red Cross vehicle surrounded by Hamas fighters.
The Israeli military said Romi Gonen, Doron Steinbrecher and Emily Damari had been reunited with their mothers and released a video showing them in apparent good health. Damari, who lost two fingers when she was shot the day she was abducted, smiled and embraced her mother as she held up a bandaged hand.
“I would like you to tell them: Romi, Doron and Emily – an entire nation embraces you. Welcome home,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a commander by phone.
That last-minute blitz killed 13 people, Palestinian health authorities said. Israel blamed Hamas for being late to deliver the names of hostages it would free, and said it had struck terrorists. Hamas said the holdup in providing the list was technical.
“Today the guns in Gaza have gone silent,” U.S. President Joe Biden said on his last full day in office, welcoming a truce that had eluded U.S. diplomacy for more than a year. “We’ve reached this point today because of the pressure Israel built on Hamas, backed by the United States.”
For Hamas, the truce provided an opportunity to emerge from the shadows after 15 months in hiding. Hamas policemen dressed in blue police uniforms swiftly deployed in some areas, and armed fighters drove through the southern city of Khan Younis, where a crowd cheered, “Greetings to Al-Qassam Brigades,” the group’s armed wing.
“All the resistance factions are staying in spite of Netanyahu,” one fighter told Reuters.
TRUMP AIDE: ‘HAMAS WILL NEVER GOVERN GAZA’
There is no detailed plan in place to govern Gaza after the war, much less rebuild it. Any return of Hamas will test the patience of Israel, which has said it will resume fighting unless the militant group is fully dismantled.
Hardline National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir quit the cabinet over the ceasefire, though his party said it would not try to bring down Netanyahu’s government. The other most prominent hardliner, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, stayed in the government but said he would quit if the war ends without Hamas completely destroyed.
The truce took effect on the eve of Monday’s inauguration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump. Trump’s national security adviser-designate, Mike Waltz, said that if Hamas reneges on the agreement, the United States would support Israel “in doing what it has to do.”
“Hamas will never govern Gaza. That is completely unacceptable,” he said.
The streets in shattered Gaza City were already busy with groups of people waving the Palestinian flag and filming the scenes on their mobile phones. Several carts loaded with household possessions travelled down a thoroughfare scattered with rubble and debris.
Ahmed Abu Ayham, 40, of Gaza City said that while the ceasefire may have spared lives, the losses and destruction made it no time for celebration.
“We are in pain, deep pain and it is time to hug one another and cry,” he said.
Reporting by James Mackenzie, Maayan Lubell, Emily Rose, Yomna Ehab, Andrew Mills, Menna Alaa al-Din, Nidal al-Mughrabi, Michelle Nichols, Alexander Cornwell; Writing by Andy Sullivan, Peter Graff, Nidal al-Mughrabi, John Davison; editing by Philippa Fletcher, Sharon Singleton and Howard Goller
Reuters