As a ceasefire reached Gaza on Sunday, potentially ending the longest and deadliest war in a century of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, two men used the same metaphor to describe how they felt. Was doing.
“A burden has been lifted off my chest,” said Ziad Obeid, a Gazan civil servant who was displaced several times during the war. “We are saved.”
Former Israeli politician Dov Weissglass said, “The rock on my heart has been removed.” “We want to see the hostages home.”
Both men also had a “but”.
Mr Obeid has not seen his damaged home in northern Gaza for more than a year. He wondered, how bad is the damage? Who will rebuild destroyed Gaza? And will Hamas still run it?
Mr Weissglass was concerned about the conditions of the hostages who are to be gradually freed from the region’s dank quarters over the next few weeks. And he expressed outrage at the exchange of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, many of whom are serving life sentences for attacks on Israelis. “There is relief from caution, fear and anxiety,” he said.
It was an apt summary of the mood on both sides of the divide on Sunday, when Israelis and Palestinians expressed feelings of jubilation tempered with skepticism.
For Palestinians, a ceasefire means at least six weeks without attacks on Gaza. It provides an opportunity for Gazans to take tentative first steps toward reconstruction; searching for relatives still buried under the debris; and coming to terms with the killing of more than 45,000 people, both civilians and combatants, whose bodies have already been counted by Gazan health officials. Scenes of joy were broadcast across the region on Sunday, as rescue workers threw confetti; The crowd danced and chanted amid the debris; And journalists symbolically took off their flak jackets.
For the Israelis, the agreement allows for the gradual release of at least 33 hostages captured during a Hamas raid on Israel on October 7, 2023 – an attack that killed 1,200 people and sparked Israel’s devastating 15-month response . For the hostages who were released alive, it meant freedom after 470 days of captivity. For Israelis at large, many of them plagued by survivor’s guilt, it provides well-deserved catharsis. In an embodiment of that mood, friends of one of the first three hostages freed on Sunday were filmed jumping for joy after hearing news of his freedom.
But the details of the agreement between Israel and Hamas mean both sides still face considerable uncertainty about how the next six weeks will play out, let alone whether the temporary arrangement will later become permanent . Even the first phase on Sunday morning began hours behind schedule, amid a dispute over which hostages would be released in the afternoon. At the time, according to Gazan officials, even more people were killed and injured in Israeli strikes.
Currently, Israel still controls vast swaths of Gaza and has not yet agreed to a full withdrawal, preventing thousands of Palestinians like Mr Obeid from returning to homes in northern Gaza. It remains to be seen whether Israeli troops will ever completely withdraw.
“What will happen after 42 days?” Mr. Weisglass said. “Nobody knows.”
Palestinians are also unclear about the fate of several thousand Gazans detained during the war and who may not be released during the upcoming exchange. Rima Diab, a housewife in central Gaza, still has no way of locating her husband, a horse trainer, whom she says was taken for questioning to Israel in December 2023 and then He was never heard from.
“I am relieved that the bloodshed is ending, but my heart is hurting,” Ms Diab said. “His absence is unimaginable.”
Across the border, Israeli columnists said in a somber tone, Ben Caspit described a mixture of joy and sadness, which are “inextricably linked to each other.” He wrote that Sunday was a day of reckoning, not celebration, and emphasized that Israel must now come to terms with the scale of its failure on October 7, 2023.
“Let us be silent for a moment, let us study our conscience, let us endure disaster, let us think of those who were killed, murdered, burnt, raped and kidnapped, ” Mr. Caspit wrote in Maariv, which is right-wing. daily newspaper.
The Israelis already feared for the fate of about 65 hostages who would not be released from Gaza if the deal collapsed after six weeks. Similarly, there were widespread fears that the initial 33 hostages to be released over the next 42 days could be emotionally or physically hurt, or even die. And Israelis generally expressed regret that the hostages’ freedom would be secured in exchange for Palestinian detainees, including some convicted of major terrorist attacks as well as teenagers who have never been charged.
Palestinians view the soon-to-be-released detainees as freedom fighters and political prisoners. For Israelis, “seeing this stream of murderers released” would be a psychological blow, Mr. Weisglass said.
Videos of Hamas fighters emerging victorious from their hiding places were also a blow to the Israelis, who had expected the war to completely destroy the group’s military capabilities. For many Gazans, it was a scene worth celebrating, but for others, it was a reminder of the uncertainty about Gaza’s future governance.
Mr Obeid works for the Palestinian Authority, which lost power in Gaza to Hamas 18 years ago but still employs some Gazan civil servants, including Mr Obeid, and now plays a bigger role in post-war Gaza. Let’s hope for. Mr Obeid said he had been liaising with authority leaders in the West Bank in recent days to plan possible clean-up and reconstruction operations in Gaza. It is unclear whether these efforts will be possible while Hamas remains in power over the next six weeks, and perhaps beyond, he said.
It is also unclear when Israel will allow Mr Obeid, who fled to Egypt last year after being displaced three times in Gaza, to return home.
But all of these can be addressed in time, Mr. Obeid said.
For now, he said, “I can breathe oxygen again.”
Bilal Shabair Contributed reporting from Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip and aaron boxerman From Jerusalem.
