(27 Jan 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Northern Wadi Gaza, Gaza Strip – 27 January 2025
1. Various of Palestinians carrying their belongings on their way to northern Gaza
2. Wide of ambulances, people walking past
3. Two men hugging
4. People walking
5. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Okbah Rahma, displaced from northern Gaza:
“I stayed at the checkpoint for more than six days in this cold weather, without a blanket or a mattress. I waited for this moment to see my family in the northern Gaza Strip.”
6. Various of Palestinians walking
7. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Okbah Rahma, displaced from northern Gaza:
“My feeling, thank God, is that I am strong in the struggle and I will continue in our struggle, regardless of the destruction. We will continue.”
8. Various of Palestinians walking
STORYLINE:
Israel is allowing Palestinians to return to the heavily destroyed north of the Gaza Strip for the first time since the early weeks of the 15-month war with Hamas, in accordance with a fragile ceasefire.
Thousands of Palestinians headed north Monday after waiting for days to cross.
The opening was delayed for two days over a dispute between Hamas and Israel, which said the militant group had changed the order of the hostages it released in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners.
Mediators resolved the dispute overnight.
Palestinians who have been sheltering in squalid tent camps and schools-turned-shelters for over a year are eager to return to their homes — even knowing that they have likely been damaged or destroyed.
Many had feared Israel would make their exodus permanent, and expressed similar concerns about an idea floated by President Donald Trump to resettle large numbers of Palestinians in Egypt and Jordan.
“I stayed at the checkpoint for more than six days in this cold weather, without a blanket or a mattress," Okbah Rahma, a displaced resident from northern Gaza said as he made the crossing from Wadi Gaza on Monday.
"I waited for this moment to see my family in the northern Gaza Strip.”
The ceasefire is aimed at winding down the deadliest and most destructive war ever fought between Israel and Hamas and securing the release of dozens of hostages captured in the militants’ October 7, 2023, attack, which triggered the fighting.
Israel ordered the wholescale evacuation of the north in the opening days of the war and sealed it off shortly after ground troops moved in.
Around a million people fled to the south in October 2023, while hundreds of thousands remained in the north, which had some of the heaviest fighting and the worst destruction of the war.
===========================================================
Clients are reminded to adhere to all listed restrictions and to check the terms of their licence agreements. For further assistance, please contact the AP Archive on: Tel +44(0)2074827482 Email: info@aparchive.com.
Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AP_Archive
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/APArchives
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/APNews/
You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/9b2fed8a1c95404aae0b7194ec1d2913
Author: AP Archive
Go to Source
News post in February 1, 2025, 9:04 am.
Visit Our Sponsor’s:
News Post In – News
