KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip — For the first time in two years, thousands of Palestinians crossed back into Gaza this week under a historic Gaza ceasefire. But what awaited them was not the home they remembered — it was rubble.
Many of those returning were among the nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli prisons under a ceasefire deal brokered by U.S. President Donald Trump. Yet joy quickly turned to heartbreak as families discovered entire neighborhoods reduced to ruins.
“No Life Necessities”: Former Prisoners Return to Rubble
Among the released was 23-year-old Abdullah Wa’el Mohammed Farhan, who spent nearly two years imprisoned during the war. Standing outside a makeshift tent in Khan Younis, he told ABC News that he and other detainees had been “completely isolated from the world.”
“When I was told about my release, I didn’t believe it,” Farhan said. “More than once, they told us about our release, moved us from one prison to another, while being tortured and beaten.”
Farhan now lives with his family in a temporary tent, describing a Gaza that is “unrecognizable” compared to the city he left before the war.
Families Reunited Amid Destruction
His sister, 21-year-old Samaher Farhan, said she was grateful to have her brother home but devastated by what he returned to.
“When I saw Abdullah, it was mixed feelings of happiness and sadness,” she told ABC News. “Our neighborhood used to be safe — now it’s rubble. It was barely one percent destroyed when he was taken. Now it’s completely gone.”
The family’s home remains intact but inaccessible in a “no-go zone” declared by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). For now, they remain displaced.
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United Nations Reports 83% of Gaza City Damaged
According to the U.N. Satellite Centre, 83% of all structures in Gaza City are damaged, with 17,734 buildings destroyed and over 43% of total structures impacted. The U.N. estimates reconstruction costs will exceed $70 billion.
The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has declared that “there is no safe place in Gaza,” as most of the 25-mile-long enclave remains under evacuation orders.
Death Toll Nears 68,000 as War’s Toll Mounts
The Palestinian Ministry of Health reported on Wednesday that nearly 68,000 Palestinians were killed during the conflict, which began after Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, killing more than 1,200 Israelis and taking around 250 hostages.
The final 20 living Israeli hostages were released Monday as part of the ceasefire deal, marking a potential end to one of the deadliest conflicts in recent memory.
“Judgment Day”: Photojournalist Describes His Return
Freed Palestinian journalist Shadi Abu Sido said he was stunned by the scale of destruction upon returning to Gaza.
“I entered Gaza and found it to be like a scene of Judgment Day,” he said in a video testimony. “This is not Gaza. Where is the world?”
Sido, who had been detained since March 2024, told Reuters that prison officials falsely informed him that his wife and children had died — only for him to find them alive when he returned home.
“I heard her voice, I heard my children,” he said. “It cannot be explained. They were alive.”
Grief Amid Freedom
For another unnamed Palestinian prisoner, freedom brought only grief. In a video circulating online, he is seen collapsing to his knees after learning that his three children — ages two, five, and eight — were killed in the war.
Clutching a small bracelet, he said, “I made this for my daughter, whose birthday was supposed to be in five days.”
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