‘We sleep in the street’: Gaza families return to ruins after ceasefire

Dubai: As a fragile ceasefire continues to hold, thousands of displaced Palestinians are returning to Gaza City—only to find their homes reduced to rubble and their lives shattered.

In the city’s northwest, streets once filled with families and shops now lie in silence, lined with the crumbled remains of apartment blocks destroyed during months of fighting. Among the debris, 31-year-old Hossam Majed searches for what little he can salvage — a piece of furniture, a water tank, anything to help him survive.

“There’s no electricity, no water, no internet,” he said. “Even food is scarce and more expensive than ever. I walk over a kilometre to fill two containers of water.”

Umm Rami Lubbad, who fled to Khan Yunis with her three children when the fighting intensified, returned to find her home gone. “My heart nearly stopped when I saw the rubble,” she said softly. “We sleep in the street — I don’t even have a tent.”

Across the city, survivors have set up makeshift shelters beside what used to be their homes. Ahmad al-Abbasi, whose five-storey building was flattened, now lives under a sheet held up by iron rods. “We came back to rebuild our lives,” he said. “But Gaza has turned into a ghost town.”

For Mustafa Mahram, whose three-storey home lies in ruins, hope is slipping away. “Everything’s gone, turned to ashes,” he said. “No water, no food — nothing left but rubble.”

As Gaza’s residents sift through the wreckage of their past lives, many cling to one fragile wish — that the ceasefire will hold long enough for them to rebuild even a single room, a single corner, of what once was home.

Video by AFP