By Mohammed Salem, Nidal al-Mughrabi and James Mackenzie
GAZA/CAIRO/JERUSALEM (Reuters) -Palestinians poured into the streets to celebrate and headed back to the rubble of their bombed-out homes on Sunday as the Red Cross went to collect the first hostages to be freed in a ceasefire deal that halted fighting in Gaza after a rocky start.
The 42-day first phase of a truce in the 15-month-old war between Israel and Hamas took effect following a three-hour delay during which Israeli forces pounded the Gaza Strip, killing 13 people, according to Palestinian health authorities.
A team from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was on its way to collect from Hamas the first hostages to go free under the ceasefire agreement, an official involved in the operation told Reuters.
The militants identified three women as the first hostages it would release on Sunday under the agreement, which calls for 33 of the 98 Israeli and foreign hostages held in Gaza to go free over a six-week first phase in return for thousands of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.
When the shooting stopped, Palestinians burst into the streets, some in celebration, others to visit the graves of relatives.
“I feel like at last I found some water to drink after getting lost in the desert for 15 months. I feel alive again,” Aya, a displaced woman from Gaza City who has been sheltering in Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip for over a year, told Reuters via a chat app.
In the north of the territory, where some of the most intense Israeli airstrikes and battles with the militants took place, people picked their way on narrow roads through a devastated landscape of rubble and twisted metal.
Armed Hamas fighters drove through the southern city of Khan Younis with crowds cheering and chanting. Hamas policemen, dressed in blue police uniform, deployed in some areas after months of trying to keep out of sight to avoid Israeli strikes.
People who had gathered to cheer the fighters chanted “Greetings to Al-Qassam Brigades” – the armed wing of Hamas.
“All the resistance factions are staying in spite of (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu,” one fighter told Reuters. “This is a ceasefire, a full and comprehensive one God willing, and there will be no return to war in spite of him.”
The ceasefire agreement follows months of on-off negotiations brokered by Egypt, Qatar and the United States, and comes into effect on the eve of the inauguration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who had said there would be “hell to pay” unless hostages were freed before he took office.
Once the first three hostages are returned on Sunday, Israel is expected to release the first Palestinian detainees under the deal. According to Hamas, the 90 Palestinians to go free on Sunday include 69 women and 21 teenage boys.
There is no detailed plan in place to govern Gaza after the war, much less rebuild it. Any return of Hamas to control in Gaza will test the commitment to the truce of Israel, which has said it will resume the war unless the militant group which has run the enclave since 2007 is fully dismantled.
Hardline National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir quit the cabinet on Sunday over the ceasefire, though his party said it would not try to bring down Netanyahu’s government. The other most prominent hardliner, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, remained in the government for now but said he would quit if the war ends without Hamas completely destroyed.
Trump’s national security adviser-designate, Mike Waltz, said that if Hamas reneges on the agreement, the United States will support Israel “in doing what it has to do.”
“Hamas will never govern Gaza. That is completely unacceptable.”
SHATTERED STREETS
The streets in shattered Gaza City in the north of the territory were already busy with groups of people waving the Palestinian flag and filming the scenes on their mobile phones. Several carts loaded with household possessions travelled down a thoroughfare scattered with rubble and debris.
Gaza City resident Ahmed Abu Ayham, 40, sheltering with his family in Khan Younis, said the scene of destruction in his home city was “dreadful”, adding that while the ceasefire may have spared lives it was no time for celebrations.
“We are in pain, deep pain and it is time that we hug one another and cry.”
Long lines of trucks carrying fuel and aid supplies queued up at border crossings in the hours before the ceasefire was due to take effect. The World Food Programme said they began to cross on Sunday morning.
The deal requires 600 truckloads of aid to be allowed into Gaza every day of the initial six-week ceasefire, including 50 carrying fuel. Half of the 600 aid trucks would be delivered to Gaza’s north, where experts have warned famine is imminent.
The war between Israel and Hamas began after the militants stormed Israeli towns and villages on Oct. 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and capturing more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
More than 47,000 Palestinians have since been killed in Israeli attacks that reduced the Gaza strip to a wasteland, according to medical officials in the enclave. Nearly the entire 2.3 million population of the enclave is homeless. Around 400 Israeli soldiers have also died.
Hamas identified the first three Israeli hostages who would go free on Sunday in exchange for 90 Palestinians as Romi Gonen, Doron Steinbrecher and Emily Damari. Israel did not immediately confirm the names.
(Reporting by James Mackenzie, Maayan Lubell, Emily Rose, Andrew Mills, Menna Alaa al-Din, Nidal al-Mughrabi, Alexander Cornwell; Writing by Peter Graff, Nidal al-Mughrabi, John Davison; editing by Philippa Fletcher)
