‘We want permanent ceasefire,’ Palestinians in Gaza say as truce extended

Deir el-Balah, Gaza Strip – Ayman Harb, a father of three children, stuck it out with his family in the Gaza City neighbourhood of Shujayea for more than a month of the war, even as Israeli bombs and tanks destroyed the besieged enclave’s largest urban centre.

Last week, just before a four-day humanitarian pause came into effect, he decided the family had to flee. One of his sons has cerebral palsy and requires an oxygen tank, and the Israeli soldiers threatened to shoot Harb if he did not throw away the oxygen.

Now in central Gaza, Harb has but one dream — for the truce to turn into a full-fledged ceasefire that allows him and his family to return home.

On Monday evening as the four-day truce was coming to an end, Qatar, which has played a central role in mediating talks that enabled the pause in fighting, announced that the halt in the war had been extended by another two days.

For families across Gaza, that brief respite also serves to underscore the suffering and humiliation of the enclave’s 2.3 million people, who have been under attack since October 7. Palestinians are calling for a permanent ceasefire, stressing that their priority is to return to their homes even if they were destroyed in the heavy bombardment over the past month and a half.

The truce, which began on Friday, has seen the release of Israeli civilian captives held by Hamas in exchange for the release of Palestinian women and children imprisoned by Israel.

It has quietened the skies over the Gaza Strip from the incessant sound of Israeli drones and warplanes. But it has done little to ease the collective trauma of the people of Gaza. According to the United Nations, 1.6 million people have been displaced from their homes, many forced to flee to the south of the strip. Some families who have tried to return to the north during the truce have been fired upon by Israeli snipers.

Others have been forced to live in what they describe as “shame”.

“I’ve been here staying in a tent on the grounds of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital for a week, right next to the ambulances,” 41-year-old Harb said. “We are about 20 people in one tent, but I had to send my wife and my other two children to stay with a relative after the rain soaked our tent this morning.”