Long procession from Palestinians back to North Gaza: ‘Now I will never leave here’

In a kilometer -long procession, twenty men wide, tens of thousands of Palestinians who had fled to the south of Gaza due to the war returned to the north for the first time on Monday. On images you can see that some of them walk on crutches. Others push their belongings in prams.

AP news agency said Yasmin Abu Amshah, mother of three children, that she had walked six kilometers to reach her house in Gaza city. The house turned out to be damaged, but still habitable. She also saw her younger sister for the first time in more than a year. “It was a long but happy journey,” she said. “The most important thing is that we are back.”

Reuters news agency quotes UMM Mohammed Ali, a woman who was part of the procession on Monday morning who slowly moved on the coastal road: “It is as if I was born again and we are victors again.”

Corridor

Many people who now return have been displaced since the start of the Gaza War, in October 2023, when Israel instructed the inhabitants of the North to leave the area. The Israeli armed forces then shared the Gaza Strip in two with the so-called Netzarim corridor, named after an illegal settlement. Palestinians who fled from north to the south of Gaza have not been able to return to their houses since. An estimated 90 percent of the 2.3 million inhabitants of Gaza have become displaced as a result of the war.

In October last year, Israel started a new invasion of North Gaza. At that time, an estimated 300,000 of the 1.1 million inhabitants of the north of Gaza were left behind. With the invasion, Israel wanted to eliminate Hamas militants.

Due to the new invasion, assistance to North Gaza fell considerably. Hospitals were shot at. With the split of Gaza in two parts, Israel seemed to implement a plan of former general Giora island for the military occupation of the entire area north of the corridor. According to this plan, the population would be instructed to leave, or to starve through a complete blockade of the area.

Nakba

This General Plan sparked prolonged Palestinian fears about permanent expulsion. Six out of ten inhabitants of Gaza are (descendants of) people who, during what Palestinians call the Nakba (catastrophe) in 1948, were driven out of the area that is now Israel. According to some, recent events in Gaza came down to a second Nakba.

Last weekend the US President Donald Trump suggested that Jordan and Egypt should take up Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, which, according to critics, would amount to ethnic cleansing. Egypt and Jordan have rejected the suggestion: the Arab world traditionally focuses on a Palestinian state, which would not be speeded up if neighboring countries recorded refugees.

According to the United Nations, 92 percent of the houses in Gaza have been damaged or completely destroyed

Millions of Palestinians already live in Jordan, most of them also descends of those who driven Israel in 1948. Egypt has always welcomed Palestinian refugees; The Gaza Strip was partly formed in 1949 because Egypt kept its limits closed for those who had been driven out of the middle and south of the newly established state of Israel. Also during the recent war, Egypt kept the border with the Gaza Strip as good as tight.

Arbel Yehud

In spite of all these calamities, the ceasefire brought hope for the inhabitants of the Gaza Strip. In that file, Israel agreed with Hamas last week that the displaced persons from the North were allowed to return to their houses. This agreement was at stake, because of a disagreement about the release of a female hostage. The 28-year-old Arbel Yehud would be released on Friday, but that didn’t happen. That is why Israel did not comply with the agreement to open the corridor on Saturday.

Aerial photo of an endless stream of displaced Palestinians who walk to Gaza City on Monday, after they have crossed the Netzarim corridor from the southern Gaza Strip.

On Sunday, a huge crowd had gathered on the south side of the Netzarim corridor. After Israel and Hamas had reached an agreement on the release of Yehud on Sunday evening, the Israeli army opened the corridor on Monday morning. First, only a passage along the coast was opened. A few hours later a second passage opened, through which cars could pass.

According to the agreements made, only unarmed people can return to the north. The Israeli army warned the inhabitants of Gaza not to carry weapons or to get to Israeli soldiers. Eye witnesses said Egyptian security personnel supervised the return of Palestinians in vehicles along the Salah al-Din-road, the main road that runs from north to south through the Gaza Strip, with Hamas police officers nearby. According to an Israeli government spokesperson, a private American security company will also participate in the checks.

For example, the first displaced persons returned to their houses – or what is left of it. According to the United Nations 92 percent of the houses in Gaza damaged or completely destroyed. After his return, the fifty-year-old official Osama, father of five children, said to Reuters that he would never leave Gaza City and the North. “Not even if Israel would send a tank for each of us.”

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