Israel allows tens of thousands of Gazans to return to Strip’s north
Crowds walk toward hometowns carrying their belongings as US monitors from private security firm move into Netzarim Corridor to inspect vehicles at checkpoint
Tens of thousands of Palestinians began moving along a main road leading north in Gaza on Monday morning as Israel opened roadblocks after terror groups agreed to release six hostages in two batches this week, including civilian woman Arbel Yehoud and female soldier Agam Berger.
Starting at 7 a.m., Palestinians were allowed to cross on foot without inspection through part of the so-called Netzarim Corridor, a military zone bisecting the territory just south of Gaza City that Israel carved out early in the war.
Massive crowds of people carrying their belongings on foot stretched along a coastal highway in a stunning reversal of the mass exodus from the north at the start of the war.
Palestinians who have been sheltering in squalid tent camps and schools-turned-shelters for over a year are eager to return to their homes — even knowing that they have likely been damaged or destroyed in the fighting.
“It’s a great feeling when you go back home, back to your family, relatives and loved ones, and inspect your house — if it is still a house,” said displaced Gazan Ibrahim Abu Hassera.
The IDF began bringing in US monitors who are to take over policing a checkpoint on the Netzarim Corridor to prevent the movement of terror group fighters and weapons north.
צהל מתחיל להכניס את פקחי החברה האמריקנית לציר נצרים למה שאמור להיות פיקוח על מניעת עלייה צפונה של מחבלים ונשק pic.twitter.com/faJX7Rmydr
— Or Heller אור הלר (@OrHeller) January 27, 2025
In line with the terms of the deal, armed US personnel from a private security company began checking vehicles traveling north on the key route.
גורם ישראלי בכיר: המעבר לכלי רכב בציר נצרים החל לעבוד ולבדוק עזתים שעוברים צפונה. הוא נועד למנוע העברת אמצעי לחימה כבדים לצפון הרצועה, והוא מופעל על-ידי איגוד חברות רב-לאומי שכולל חברת אבטחה אמריקנית שמבצעת את הבידוק pic.twitter.com/RzcspcMtbN
— כאן חדשות (@kann_news) January 27, 2025
Meanwhile, Hamas deployed armed fighters in some areas to marshal the crowds, the movement of which it declared as a strategic achievement and “victory” over Israel.
According to Palestinian reports, some 650,000 people are expected to return to their homes in north Gaza.
Agreement on Sunday over the release of hostages this week and return of Gazans to the north resolved a snag that had rattled the complex ceasefire between Israel and Hamas that came into effect on January 19.
During the 15 months of fighting, Israel was wary about allowing the movement of Gazans from the south to the north fearing Hamas would use the opportunity to reposition its fighters.
The Israel Defense Forces warned returning Palestinians against approaching the positions of Israeli forces still in the area, with the IDF’s Arabic-language spokesperson tweeting instructions to Gazan civilians.
Spokesman Avichay Adraee issued a series of warnings to Gazans, including not to transport terror operatives or weapons to northern Gaza; not to approach IDF positions and troops in Gaza or Israeli territory; not to approach the Rafah Crossing and Philadelphi Corridor area in southern Gaza; and not to swim, dive or fish in the Mediterranean Sea in the coming days.
Palestinian media outlets reported Monday morning that the IDF started to pull out of part of the Netzarim Corridor in central Gaza, ahead of the reopening of the area to displaced Palestinians.
“The passage of displaced Palestinians has begun along the Al-Rashid Road via the western part of the Netzarim checkpoint towards Gaza City and the northern part” of the Gaza Strip, an official in the Hamas-run interior ministry in the enclave told AFP.
The truce has brought a surge of food, fuel, medicines, and other aid into rubble-strewn Gaza, but the UN says “the humanitarian situation remains dire.”
Under the terms of the ceasefire agreement, residents of northern Gaza were initially due to return over the weekend but Israel said that Hamas had broken the deal by failing to release civilian hostage Yehoud and kept the crossings closed.
Late on Sunday, Qatari mediators said Hamas had agreed to release Yehoud and two other hostages — one of them Berger — before Friday and that Israel would in return allow displaced Palestinians to return to northern Gaza starting Monday morning. Three men were to be released on Saturday.
Jerusalem also said Hamas had finally sent a list detailing the conditions of the remaining hostages set to be released in the ongoing, 42-day first phase of the ceasefire, which began on January 19. Both the failure to send this list by Saturday and Hamas’s failure to free Yehoud before releasing four IDF servicewomen had been regarded by Israel as violations of the truce deal.
Hamas called the return of Gazans to the north of the Strip “a victory” for Palestinians that “signals the failure and defeat of the plans for occupation and displacement.”
Its Iran-backed ally Islamic Jihad, meanwhile, called it a “response to all those who dream of displacing our people.”
The comments came after US President Donald Trump floated an idea to “clean out” Gaza and resettle Palestinians in Jordan and Egypt during reconstruction and rehabilitation of the Strip, drawing a rejection from Egypt and Jordan, along with condemnation from regional leaders.
War erupted on October 7, 2023, when Hamas led thousands of terrorists in an invasion of southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.
Hundreds of thousands of Gazans fled south in the opening weeks of the war. Israel later ordered the evacuation of Gazan civilians from the north of the Strip as fighting intensified and the IDF worked to thwart attempts by the Hamas terror group to reassert control there.
