Nine months after Hamas and Israel agreed to cease fighting in Gaza, the term has become a laughing stock for the two million Palestinians trapped inside the enclave.
The situation has become what one commentator described as a permanent state of “humanitarian purgatory” amid ongoing violence.
The war is not over; it just slows down.
“It is difficult to say that the agreement has brought peace in any way,” said Amjad Iraqi, a senior analyst at the Crisis Group think-tank in London.
“You still see a lot of airstrikes, drone strikes and other ongoing military operations, so you find that the Palestinians on the ground are still very much stuck in this limbo or this humanitarian purgatory.”
The ceasefire was meant to be the start of a three-phase plan to end the fighting, restore life-support infrastructure and transform Gaza into a non-Hamas-led government. But the United States, the main power broker in the Peace Council established to oversee the Gaza transition, has been distracted by other conflicts and international issues.
In a statement posted on social media last week, the Peace Council “underscored the importance of the demilitarization of Gaza” and “reaffirmed” support for US President Donald Trump’s peace plan.
What does the future of Gaza look like?
Right-wing members of the Israeli government have also taken advantage of Gaza’s declining global reputation to advance their agenda of seizing more Palestinian land in order to establish Jewish settlements in Gaza.
Meanwhile, Hamas, the militant group responsible for the Oct. 7 attack. 2023 which left 1,200 people dead and around 250 hostages, still firmly in military and political control of the area.
For lower-class citizens, this political paralysis is seen as a direct, everyday threat to physical survival.
Hayat Al-Maquois, a 58-year-old mother of seven who lives in the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, told a CBC News videographer that when she hangs her family’s belongings out to dry, she has to escape gunfire.
“We live near the yellow line and we wash our clothes, but when we hang the bullets, they just go through,” she said.
“When my sons wear their clothes, there are holes in them.”
The yellow line is a physical representation of the new borders of Gaza, often defined by physical blocks painted yellow by the IDF. With Israeli soldiers and Hamas militants in the area, it is impossible to know who is shooting.
Israel’s push for more control in Gaza
After ending the fighting, the Israeli army withdrew to the areas north and east of Gaza on the Israeli border. It also occupied a large area in the south of the area, including Rafah. The main city was destroyed by Israeli airstrikes or recent demolitions, which the IDF said were necessary to destroy Hamas tunnels.
The Israeli army has slowly but steadily expanded the territory of Gaza under its control.
It took about 53 percent of the territory at the start of the ceasefire, according to the agreement, and international aid agencies say the territory controlled by Israel has grown to more than 60 percent. Last month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to expand the area to 70 percent.
In a statement sent to CBC News, the Israeli military said, “all IDF operations are directed at military objectives, with the aim of eliminating terrorists and protecting Israeli citizens, not harming civilians.”
The actions of the IDF have left little room for more than two million Palestinians who are crammed into filthy conditions.
Suffering is ‘far from over’
In a statement earlier this week, a key UN panel called on the Israeli government to halt its progress, saying crowding so many people together made recovery impossible and created a dangerous situation.
“Some partners have had to reduce or temporarily suspend life-saving operations, especially following the killing of service providers in those areas,” said the UN country’s humanitarian team coordinating the aid response in Gaza.
Separately, the head of the International Red Cross, who visited Gaza this week, wrote on social media that “the suffering is far from over.”
Nicolas von Arx said he was overwhelmed by the horrific situation he saw in Gaza City, they say that since many tents are packed together, families are facing “suffocating overcrowding.”
Public infrastructure is virtually non-existent and the local water grid is completely collapsed, international aid agencies say. Muhammad Al-Ayoubi, 46, who lives in a tent west of Gaza City, says his family spends their days running water trucks – the only source of drinking water.
“Every time we see a water tank, we run,” he said. “We have to wait and see if the water from the tanks is drinkable or not. If not, we use it for washing.”
The Mediterranean Sea offers only modest relief from the heat and dirty conditions, because the sea is heavily polluted. because of the war, said Umm Sharif Jabr, a mother from Gaza City.
“Children bathe in sea water, but when they come back, they need to wash quickly with little water because … they get bruises all over their bodies,” she said.
How much aid is going into Gaza?
In response to a request from CBC News about claims that living conditions remain dire, COGAT, the Israeli government agency tasked with coordinating the delivery of aid to Gaza, denied that Gaza is facing a humanitarian crisis.
“These are biased claims promoted by interest groups seeking to create a false impression … as part of an attempt to discredit Israel,” the organization said in an email Thursday.
“COGAT works in accordance with the cease-fire agreement and allows and participates in the entry of 600 humanitarian trucks into the Gaza Strip every day, carrying food, water, shelter, medical equipment, medicine, fuel and cooking gas.”
Critics inside Gaza point out, however, that often, that aid is not distributed quickly due to operational challenges and looting. UNWRA says these challenges are compounded by the poor condition of many vehicles that transport people in the country and the lack of fuel.
How to take out Hamas
Among the major obstacles to progress is the continued refusal of Hamas to disarm, said Iraqi, an analyst with the Crisis Group.
“Israel has made it clear that it expects Hamas and other armed groups to give up all their weapons,” he said.
Hamas’s position, as conveyed in talks in Egypt last month, is that it is willing to give up its heavy weapons but only under the condition of a larger plan to end Israel’s attack on Gaza.
Israel’s efforts to disarm the terrorists without assurances that they will move on to other issues will not succeed, Hamas spokesman Hazem Qasim told a CBC Independent videographer earlier this week.
“There are some people who are trying to choose certain things for the peace plan,” he said.
“We want its full implementation – the full reconstruction of Gaza, the withdrawal of the occupation in the agreed area, the opening of the borders – all these signs will lead to true peace, stability, relief and reconstruction.”
Israel is pursuing an immigration program
Israeli media reported this week that the Trump-led Peace Council is preparing to move ahead with a plan to relocate Palestinians from Gaza to Israeli-controlled areas south of the territory.
Supporters say the aim is to “cut off” the number of Palestinians in Hamas, while critics, including human rights lawyer Zaha Hassan, have denounced the move as the first step in establishing “torture centers.”
Under the proposal, which was floated by Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz last July, Palestinians in the Israeli-controlled south would be able to leave Gaza but be barred from returning.
“The plan will be made [Gaza] it’s uninhabitable for the Palestinian people and it’s attracted Palestinian aviation,” Hassan, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, DC, told CBC News earlier this week.
“The idea of ​​rebuilding Gaza is not intended to be a Palestinian settlement in Gaza.”
The UN has condemned any move involving the relocation of Palestinians, and the Peace Council shared a statement on its social media account last week saying “no one will be forced to leave Gaza, and those who wish to leave will be free to return.”
‘God helped Gazans to live’
Despite the dire conditions in Gaza, however, the ceasefire has allowed for a few rare moments of celebration.
At the Jabalia camp last week, more than 50 young couples gathered for a grand wedding ceremony.
“Israel wanted to evict Gaza, but God helped the Gazans to stay. This is the message we want to send with our celebrations,” said the son-in-law Mohammed Al-Salawi, 26.
Tamer Abu Al-Aba, who coordinated this grand wedding, said that events like this should show the world that despite daily battles for survival, people find ways to hold on to hope.
“People can build happiness and rebuild life despite destruction.”
