After 15 Months of War, Gazans Dream of Returning Home

It was almost over, the end was so close, he could almost feel the key he had held for months slipping into the lock of his old home, the doorknob turning in his hand, the bed sinking into the rest. -rest in peace on the first night. over 15 months – their own bed. Two days to go.

Two nights before the first phase of the Gaza ceasefire was announced, 15-year-old Layan al-Mohtaseb dreamed of returning to his room in Gaza City, cleaning it as he did before fleeing. his family during the war.

“This time it felt like we were really going home,” he said.

Suitable for those whose houses are still standing after months of demolition. And there is always the possibility of a return to war after the first six-month ceasefire if talks on a permanent conflict break down. But across Gaza, people daydreamed about the first moments of peace, the people they would hug once the negotiations were over, the graves they would visit. They already know that they will shed tears, tears that they almost don’t know whether they are happy or sad.

While Wednesday night was used to celebrate the news that there was a cease-fire agreement, the following day was used for preparation. As Israel’s defense cabinet met to vote on a ceasefire and hostage release deal on Friday, Palestinians called for trucks they could rent to move their belongings back to northern Gaza, or vans. , even donkey carts; they packed their tents and wondered where they would stay if their home was gone.

Fedaa al-Rayyes, 40, has already bought ingredients to make small festive sweets to celebrate the end of the war. The first thing he plans to do when the bombs and drones are silent is to find relatives he hasn’t seen for months, to see who is still alive and to mourn those who are not alive today.

“It’s impossible to describe this mixture of relief and sadness,” he said. “I’m glad we survived and I’m grateful to the kind people who helped us. However, I am very sad — I miss the relatives and friends I lost and the neighborhood we will be returning to without them.”

There was also something to think about. He reminds his children to “get away from anything that might still be dangerous or explosive,” he said — from all the unexploded ordnance littering Gaza that could keep the war’s death toll high. , an accidental explosion once, for months or months. next year.

Most of Gaza’s population of more than two million have been forced to hunker down in tents, schools and other people’s homes for much of the war, driven by Israeli airstrikes and orders from eviction from their homes or shelters they have tried. Now they couldn’t think of anything else but to go home. Although these buildings are damaged. Although they are now nothing more than rubble and ashes.

Manal Silmi, 34, a psychologist for the international aid group, first planned to go hug her mother and siblings and “cry, let out all the pain we’ve been carrying for 15 months,” she said.

Then the journey home could begin. According to the agreement, people displaced from northern Gaza to the south will be allowed to return on the seventh day after the cease-fire on Sunday. His family was already looking for a large van to take all their tents and bedding up north. He had called the few friends and relatives he had left in Gaza City, planning to meet them at the crossing point that separates northern and southern Gaza.

“We will hug each other, we will cry and we will thank God again and again for surviving this war,” he said.

Al-Hassan al-Harazeen, 23, a senior majoring in computer science, knew his family’s home in eastern Gaza had been destroyed, he said. But he will still go there once the ceasefire has started.

He imagined painting his family’s name on every brick that was still in one piece, and imagined himself sitting on the rubble for a while, saying he, “to embrace the stones and broken bricks as if they were part of me. “

Then he will visit the grave where they buried his grandfather at the beginning of the war to recite the opening verses of the Qur’an for him.

Although negotiators announced the deal on Wednesday, Israel continued to bomb Gaza heavily. Two of Jamal Mortaja’s employees from his pre-war solar panel business had been killed the day before. They will be on his mind, said Mr. Mortaja, 65, as he returned to Gaza City to visit the remains of his home before checking out his shop in al-Ansar roundabout.

Raed al-Gharabli also wanted to return to Gaza City, despite the destruction of his home, just to say goodbye before the rubble is removed. He wanted to go to his neighborhood, Shuja’iyya, to greet the neighbors who had been blocking it for months. He removed his tent from the city of Deir al Bala, in the center of Gaza City, where he fled with his family, and pitched it next to a destroyed building.

“I can’t wait to see this opportunity come true,” said Mr al-Gharabli, 48, a tailor. “If I could, I would fly straight north and land on the ruins of my house.”

To speed things up, he said he would leave his family’s property to neighbors in Deir al Balah, where they and other displaced people had come to trust and rely on unknown people at the start of the war. war.

There was even a part of them that was already conscious of it, the love between them and their temporary neighbors.

After his home in the southern town of Khan Younis was destroyed, Ismail al-Sheikh, 39, a university professor, moved into a nearby tent, where he recognized two men in a nearby tent. The new friends spend their evenings reminiscing about life before October 7, 2023, when the war began, and pondering what will happen when the nightmare ends. What will he do. Where are they going?

For Mr. al-Sheikh, who teaches at al-Aqsa University, daydreaming is nothing short of stupid. He just wanted to go back to his normal life, teaching his classes, meeting his friends at night at the Titanic restaurant in Khan Younis. The Titanic, which he had heard, was falling apart.

Now, as war is imminent, his new friends are preparing to return to Gaza City, where they came from.

“I will miss these meetings very much,” said Mr. al-Sheikh. “It’s a real mix of emotions — happiness to be back, sadness to say goodbye and hope for the future.”