The cemetery contains the grave of her husband, who was killed during Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, alongside thousands of other graves belonging to families across the devastated territory.

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Fatima, a mother of three, has told Al Jazeera of the unbearable tension she felt knowing that the Israeli military’s search operations were focused on that cemetery.

“We were all on edge… we knew the operation was at al-Batsh cemetery, and everyone was scared it would be their loved one’s grave next. I imagined the machinery approaching my husband’s grave, and I said, ‘No, God.’”

Fatima’s husband, Mohammad al-Shaarawi, was killed in an Israeli drone strike on December 11, 2024. The attack targeted him with a group of friends in Tuffah. At the time, Fatima and her children were displaced in southern Gaza.

“Even the dead were not spared,” Fatima says, describing a violation of the last remnants of their right to mourn and preserve dignity.

“Corpses scattered, bones, bags thrown … they were bulldozing graves, dumping the remains as if they were nothing.”

During the search and recovery of captive Israeli policeman Ran Gvili, about 250 graves were examined in a short period using heavy military machinery and bulldozers.

The operation led to the exhumation of both old and recent graves, the destruction of many tombstones, and a significant alteration of the cemetery’s landscape, according to aerial images of the site.

“I used to always visit him. On holidays, on his birthday, with the kids. The strange thing is that my children didn’t feel they were going to a sad place; they felt they were really going to visit their father,” Fatima says.

After the forced mass evacuation of tens of thousands from Shujayea in Gaza City amid intensive Israeli attacks in June 2024, Fatima could no longer reach the cemetery, surrounded by rubble, debris and military machinery.

The risk persisted after the ceasefire was declared in October 2025 because the cemetery lies near the so-called “yellow line” under Israeli military control.

“No one knows what they took, what remains were returned … if anything at all,” Fatima says, hoping that phase two of the ceasefire will allow her to visit the cemetery to check on her husband’s grave.

“We, the people of Gaza, didn’t even have the luxury of mourning properly, and now they’ve taken away the graves of our loved ones after death,” she adds.

Israel’s history of desecrating cemeteries
The Israeli military has wantonly bombed, bulldozed and desecrated Palestinian graves in Gaza multiple times over the years, drawing condemnation from human rights organisations as a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law.

The Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor documented that the Israeli army has destroyed or severely damaged approximately 21 out of 60 cemeteries in Gaza, exhuming remains, mixing them or causing them to be lost, leaving thousands of Palestinian families with crushing uncertainty about the fate of their relatives’ bodies.

Among instances of Israeli destruction are:

Beit Hanoon cemetery in northern Gaza
Al-Faluja cemetery in Jabalia, northern Gaza
Ali Ibn Marwan cemetery, Gaza City
Sheikh Radwan cemetery, Gaza City
Al Shuhadaa Eastern cemetery, Gaza City
Tunisian cemetery, Gaza City
Cemetery of Church of St Porphyrius, Gaza City
Khan Younis cemetery in the Austrian neighbourhood
The Gaza War Cemetery, in Tuffah, housing fallen soldiers during World Wars I and II from the United Kingdom and several Commonwealth nations, has suffered significant damage from Israeli bombardment but is not yet completely destroyed, according to local assessments. Damage has also been reported to the Deir el-Balah War Cemetery.

Additionally, earlier this month, Euro-Med called for urgent international intervention “to halt the crimes of widespread destruction and land levelling being carried out by the Israeli army in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, until specialised teams and the necessary equipment are allowed to recover the bodies of victims, identify them, and ensure their dignified burial”.

Hamas also condemned the exhumation of hundreds of graves and described the act as “unethical and illegal, reflecting the international system’s failure to hold the occupation accountable for its unprecedented crimes in modern times”.

Buried without farewell
For Madeline Shuqayleh, the exhumation of al-Batsh cemetery ripped open the wound of where her sister and niece were buried.

On October 28, 2023, her sister, Maram, and her four-month-old daughter, Yumna, were killed in an Israeli strike in central Gaza. The family did not immediately know of their deaths, as they were displaced in Deir el-Balah, while her sister stayed in the north with her husband’s family.

“Imagine knowing your sister was killed and buried without knowing how, where, or what happened to her. It was a crushing shock in every way.”

Maram and her daughter were buried in al-Batsh cemetery. “After a lot of effort, we found the place. When we visited, the grave was there, the tombstone intact … the pain was immense,” she added. “But now, to this moment, they’ve deprived us … as if they killed her again.”

The family still does not know what happened to the bodies of Maram and her daughter, or whether the exhumed graves were restored.

The UN and international human rights organisations have documented multiple cases of missing bodies and the deterioration of burial sites after cemeteries were bulldozed or destroyed during Israeli military operations.

In April 2024, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk noted the discovery of mass graves at al-Shifa and Nasser hospitals, containing hundreds of corpses, including women, the elderly, and wounded. Some were found bound and naked, raising “serious concerns” over possible grave violations of international humanitarian law.

‘My father has no grave today’
Rola Abu Seedo experienced compounded grief with her family after the bulldozing of her father’s grave by the Israeli army in a temporary cemetery at al-Shifa.

Rola had been displaced to the south with her mother and four siblings, while her father refused to leave and remained in their northern home until his death.

Her father remained in Gaza City under a severe blockade and a collapsed health system, suffering from diabetes, high blood pressure and a previous stroke, relying on medications that were no longer available.

“At that time, there was famine and no medicines,” Rola told Al Jazeera. “The medical report noted respiratory problems, and his condition worsened.”

On April 28, 2024, her father died, and the family did not learn of his death immediately. “Communications were nearly cut off; my father couldn’t charge his phone to reach us.”

A relative performed a burial and preserved the grave location, placing a simple marker sent to the family, who planned to move it later to an official cemetery once conditions stabilised.

But after another major Israeli incursion around al-Shifa in March 2024, bulldozers levelled the cemetery, leaving no grave markers.

“Our relatives went back to find the grave after the operation, but they said they couldn’t locate it and the area where he was buried had been bulldozed,” Rola said.

About a year ago, with news of potential grave transfers from al-Shifa to Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, a committee of forensic authorities and the Red Crescent participated in digging operations based on residents’ testimonies.

Rola’s family searched for her father’s remains again, but to no avail.

“They dug in the spot we were sure was his grave … but they didn’t find a body.” To this day, the family does not know the whereabouts of her father’s remains.

“We still don’t know if they took the bodies, mixed them, or moved them,” she says. “My father has no grave today.”

“It’s as if they not only deprived us of our loved ones while they were alive, but also denied us the farewell after death.”

The Iranian fishing vessel called the Issamohamadi had been abandoned off the coast of Somalia following their seizure last week of the Hellas Aphrodite, which had been carrying a load of gasoline from India to South Africa. The pirates used the Issamohamadi, a type of traditional ship known across the Persian Gulf as a dhow, as a “mother ship” for a series of assaults capped by their taking of the tanker.

A team from the ESPS Victoria, a Spanish frigate, boarded the dhow and said the Issamohamadi’s original crew on board were in “good condition, safe and free.” Iran has not acknowledged the seizure of the ship.

The pirate group “operating in the area has been definitely disrupted,” the EU naval force’s Operation Atalanta said in a statement. EU forces “have gathered evidence and intelligence of the incident that together with the evidence collected on board Merchant Tanker Hellas Aphrodite, will be submitted to support the legal prosecution of the perpetrators.”

Piracy off the Somali coast peaked in 2011, when 237 attacks were reported. Somali piracy in the region that year cost the world’s economy some $7 billion, with $160 million paid out in ransoms, according to the Oceans Beyond Piracy monitoring group.

The threat was diminished by increased international naval patrols, a strengthening central government in Somalia, and other efforts.

However, Somali pirate attacks have resumed at a greater pace over the last year, in part due to the insecurity caused by Yemen’s Houthi rebels launching attacks in the Red Sea corridor over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip. The Houthis have signaled they’ve stopped their attacks as a shaky ceasefire holds in Gaza.

In 2024, there were seven reported incidents off Somalia, according to the International Maritime Bureau. So far this year, multiple fishing boats have been seized by Somali pirates. The Hellas Aphrodite represents the first commercial ship seized by pirates off Somalia since May 2024.

Eighteen-year-old Mohammed Ahmed Abu Haneen died on Friday from wounds sustained during the Israeli raid, the Wafa news agency reported.

Israeli forces also stormed the town of Aqaba, north of Tubas in the West Bank, and made a number of arrests earlier today in Hebron and Tal.

The Israeli army said they arrested 44 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank over the past week. A military statement says operations were carried out in various parts of the territory and all people detained were wanted by Israel. It added that troops also confiscated weapons and conducted interrogations during the operations.

Last week, 10-year-old Mohammad al-Hallaq was shot dead by Israeli forces while playing football in ar-Rihiya, Hebron.

According to the United Nations, more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli army and settlers since October 7, 2023, in the West Bank, including occupied East Jerusalem.

A fifth of the victims are children, including 206 boys and seven girls, the UN said. The number also includes 20 women and at least seven people with disabilities. This does not include Palestinians who died in Israeli detention during the same period, the UN added.

A United States-brokered Gaza ceasefire deal has seen nearly 2,000 Palestinian detainees released from Israeli jails, many bearing visible signs of abuse.

Dozens of Palestinian bodies returned have been badly mutilated and show signs of torture and execution.

Meanwhile, in tandem with the military’s sustained crackdown in the occupied territory, Israeli settlers have rampaged near Ramallah, destroying Palestinian property at an alarming rate daily with impunity, protected by the military.

Settlers set fire to several Palestinian vehicles in the hill area in Deir Dibwan, east of the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, at dawn this morning, Wafa reported. Settlers also attacked Palestinian farmers while they were harvesting olives in the lands of the village of Beit Iksa, northwest of Jerusalem.

On Sunday, an Israeli settler brutally assaulted a Palestinian woman while she was harvesting olives in the West Bank town of Turmus Aya.

Afaf Abu Alia, 53, suffered a brain haemorrhage due to the attack.

“The attack started with around 10 settlers, but more kept joining,” one Palestinian witness told Al Jazeera. “I think by the end, there were 40, protected by the army. We were outnumbered; we couldn’t defend ourselves.”

According to data from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), settlers have attacked Palestinians nearly 3,000 times in the occupied West Bank over the past two years.

UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, said on Friday that since October 7, 2023, “the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, has also witnessed a sharp escalation in violence”.

“The increasing annexation of the West Bank is happening steadily in a gross violation of international law,” UNRWA said, referring to the expansion and recognition of illegal Israeli settlements.

US lays down law to Israel on annexation
After a vote in the Israeli parliament on Wednesday advancing a bill that would formalise the annexation of the occupied West Bank, senior US officials have been adamant it won’t happen under their watch.

US President Donald Trump said on Thursday, “Israel is not going to do anything with the West Bank” amid growing condemnation of an Israeli parliamentary motion that seeks to formally annex the occupied Palestinian territory.

Earlier in the day, in an interview with Time Magazine, Trump said that the US is firmly against Israeli annexation. “It won’t happen. It won’t happen. It won’t happen because I gave my word to the Arab countries. And you can’t do that now,” Trump told Time.

US Vice President JD Vance, meanwhile, while in Israel, also said that Trump’s policy remains that the occupied West Bank won’t be annexed by Israel, calling the parliamentary vote in favour of annexation a “very stupid political stunt” that he “personally” took some insult from.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, in Israel to shore up the Gaza ceasefire and second-phase plans, has also lined up in the Trump’s administration’s firm opposition to Israeli annexation.

The Palestinian Civil Defence agency said that four people were killed in two separate attacks, both times “by Israeli gunfire as they were returning to check on their homes” in the al-Shaaf area, east of Tuffah neighbourhood, in eastern Gaza City.

Israel’s military claimed it had fired at militants who crossed the so-called yellow line of demarcation and had approached troops in the Shujayea neighbourhood, which is adjacent to Tuffah, and “posed a threat” to Israeli soldiers.

The yellow line, set out in a map shared by US President Donald Trump on October 4, is the boundary behind which Israeli troops pulled back and remain stationed under the ceasefire agreement with Hamas.

Gaza City residents reported confusion over the line’s location because of a lack of a visible boundary. “The whole area is in ruins. We saw the maps but we can’t tell where those lines are,” said Samir, 50, who lives in Tuffah in the city’s east.

Several outbreaks of violence have taken place since a fragile US-brokered ceasefire began on October 10, with at least 97 Palestinians killed in total, according to Gaza officials.

‘Blatant breaches’
Amid the rising death toll, Israel and Hamas have pointed the finger at one another for breaking the terms of the ceasefire, which took effect on October 10.

Israeli air attacks on Sunday killed 42 people, including children, according to local health officials. Israel said the strikes were in retaliation for a truce violation by Hamas fighters, who it claimed shot and killed two Israeli soldiers in Rafah.

Hamas denied involvement in the event, saying it has no contact with any of its remaining units in Israeli-controlled parts of Rafah and “is not responsible for any incidents” there. One official accused Israel of fabricating “pretexts” to resume the war.

The group, which has released 20 living Israeli captives, said it was working to complete the handover of the remaining bodies of captives in Gaza, citing “major challenges because of the extensive destruction” of the enclave.

The Red Cross received the body of a 13th deceased captive from Hamas on Monday and transferred it to the Israeli military, according to the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

On Sunday, Israel threatened to halt shipments of humanitarian aid into Gaza, though it later said it had resumed enforcing the ceasefire.

United Nations spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said the delivery of aid into the territory had resumed, though he did not say how much.

Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum said on Monday that Israel was still blocking the entry of aid into Gaza. “Several military checkpoints are blocking their entry, and these trucks are packed with various humanitarian supplies,” he said.

Abu Azzoum said the Israeli army had struck the eastern parts of Khan Younis on Monday, triggering fears among Palestinians that the ceasefire would not hold.

Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, said, “The fragile ceasefire in #Gaza must be upheld”, in a statement on X, and called for investigations into the “blatant breaches” of international humanitarian law.

Salvage efforts
Amid the continued violence, two of Trump’s envoys travelled to Israel on Monday to shore up the ceasefire deal.

Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, and the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, met with Netanyahu, according to an Israeli government spokesperson.

US Vice President JD Vance and the second lady, Usha Vance, are scheduled to visit Israel on Tuesday and meet with Netanyahu.

The ceasefire’s next stage is expected to focus on disarming Hamas, Israeli withdrawal from additional areas it controls in Gaza, and the future governance of the devastated territory under an internationally backed “board of peace”.

Egypt hosted talks in Cairo on Monday with senior Hamas official Khalil al-Hayya over ways to follow up on implementing the ceasefire, Hamas said in a statement.

Hamas and other allied factions reject any foreign administration of Gaza, as envisaged in the Trump plan, and have so far resisted calls to lay down arms, which may complicate the implementation of the deal.

Asked about maintaining the Israel-Hamas ceasefire, Trump appeared to blame Hamas for the ceasefire breaches, saying that it was facing “some rebellion” in its ranks, which the leaders needed to straighten out.

“They have to be good, and if they’re not good, they’ll be eradicated,” he said. But he insisted that such actions would not involve US troops on the ground.

Since the ceasefire started, Hamas security forces have returned to the streets in Gaza, clashing with other armed groups and killing alleged gangsters.

Trump had last week said that Hamas had taken out “a couple of gangs that were very bad; very, very bad gangs”.

“And that didn’t bother me much, to be honest with you. That’s OK,” he said.

Israel claimed that it carried out dozens of strikes Israel on Hamas positions in southern Gaza Sunday came after the militant group allegedly targeted its troops in “a blatant violation” of the nine-day-old truce.
Asked by reporters whether the truce was still in effect, Trump said: “Yeah, it is”. The US president, who helped broker the deal, also suggested that Hamas leadership was not involved in any alleged breaches, instead blaming “some rebels within.”

“We want to make sure that it’s going to be very peaceful with Hamas,” Trump said. “It’s going to be handled toughly, but properly.”

Gaza’s civil defense agency said the Israeli strikes killed at least 45 people across the territory.

Four hospitals in Gaza confirmed the death toll of 45 to AFP, saying they had received the dead and wounded.

Israel’s military said it was looking into the reports of casualties.

The army said it had “renewed enforcement of the ceasefire” on Sunday but vowed to “respond firmly to any violation of it.”

Hamas denied the accusations, one official accusing Israel of fabricating “pretexts” to resume the war.

A security official also told AFP that Israel was suspending the entry of aid into Gaza due to ceasefire violations.

Israel repeatedly cut off aid to Gaza during the war, exacerbating dire humanitarian conditions, with the United Nations finding it caused a famine there.

‘Blood has returned’
The ceasefire, which began on October 10, halted more than two years of devastating war between Israel and Hamas.

The deal established the outline for hostage and prisoner exchanges, and proposed an ambitious roadmap for Gaza’s future. But it has quickly faced challenges to its implementation.

Israel said on Sunday that two of its soldiers died in clashes in the city of Rafah.

“Earlier today, terrorists fired anti-tank missiles and opened fire on IDF (Israeli army) forces,” in Rafah, the military said in a statement. “The IDF responded with air strikes by fighter jets and artillery fire, targeting the Rafah area.”

Palestinian witnesses told AFP clashes erupted in the southern city in an area still held by Israel.

One witness, a 38-year-old man who asked not to be named, said that Hamas had been fighting a local Palestinian gang known as Abu Shabab but the militants were “surprised by the presence of army tanks.”

“The air force conducted two strikes from the air,” he added.

Abdullah Abu Hasanin, 29, from Al?Bureij camp in central Gaza where Israel launched strikes, said: “The situation is as if the war has returned anew.

“We had hoped the agreement would hold, but the occupation respects nothing — not an agreement, not anything.”

He said he had rushed to the site of the bombing to help, adding: “The scene is indescribable. Blood has returned again.”

‘Security illusion’
AFP images from Bureij showed Palestinians running for cover from the strikes, as well as the dead and wounded arriving at Deir al-Balah hospital, accompanied by grieving relatives.

Defense Minister Israel Katz warned Hamas would “pay a heavy price for every shot and every breach of the ceasefire”, adding Israel’s response would “become increasingly severe.”

A statement from Izzat Al-Rishq, a member of Hamas’s political bureau, reaffirmed the group’s commitment to the ceasefire.

Israel, it said, “continues to breach the agreement and fabricate flimsy pretexts to justify its crimes.”

Hamas’s armed wing insisted on Sunday that it had “no knowledge” of any clashes in Rafah.

On Sunday, US Vice President JD Vance called on Gulf Arab countries to establish a “security infrastructure” to ensure that Hamas disarmed — a key part of the peace deal.

Under Trump’s 20-point plan, Israeli forces have withdrawn beyond the so-called Yellow Line. That leaves them in control of around half of Gaza, including the territory’s borders but not its main cities.

Bodies returned
Hamas in turn has released 20 surviving hostages and is in the process of returning the remaining bodies of those who have died.

Israel returned the bodies of 15 Palestinians to Gaza on Sunday, bringing the total number handed over to 150, the health ministry in the territory said.

Israel has linked the reopening of the Rafah crossing — the main gateway into Gaza — to the recovery of all of the deceased.

Hamas has said it needs time and technical assistance to recover the remaining bodies from under Gaza’s rubble.

Israel has killed at least 68,159 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry in the territory, figures the United Nations considers credible.

Hamas’s 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.

With AFP.

Local media reported artillery attacks in al-Bureij refugee camp, central Gaza, resulting in at least 10 people wounded over the past 24 hours.

According to an Al Jazeera correspondent, Israeli artillery shelling also targeted the Shujaiya neighbourhood in Gaza City.

Under the US-brokered ceasefire deal, which came into force last Friday, the Israeli army is stipulated to "immediately end" all military operations, including aerial and artillery bombardment and targeted attacks.

However, dozens of Palestinians have been wounded and killed in the past few days.

Meanwhile, unidentified explosives detonated in the Nuseirat refugee camp.

Last week, Mahmoud Basal, spokesperson for the Palestinian Civil Defence in Gaza, warned that ordnance and explosive robots remain in the area, and urged civilians to stay clear, as they pose a serious danger to life.

"I want to highlight that some homes where [Israeli forces] were stationed have been booby-trapped and have not yet exploded. Civilians returning to these homes may be shocked to find them filled with explosives," he said.

For over two years, Israel's genocidal war on Gaza killed nearly 68,000 people, with over 80 percent of victims identified as civilians, according to leaked Israeli military data.

The daily bombardment has destroyed much of the blockaded strip and worsened humanitarian conditions. According to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa), almost all of the territory's farmland is "destroyed or inaccessible".

Israel restricts aid
Israel's restrictions on food aid and life-saving essentials have also caused widespread famine.

As part of the first phase of US President Donald Trump's 20-point ceasefire plan, Gaza's crossings were to fully reopen on Monday to allow the entry of 400 aid trucks daily, with the number expected to rise to 600 in the following days.

However, rights groups have noted that Israeli authorities continue to restrict and limit the amount of aid entering the strip.

While 480 trucks reached the besieged enclave on Wednesday, the Government Media Office in Gaza described the aid entering as a "drop in the ocean of needs", insufficient for over 2.4 million people.

"The strip requires 600 aid trucks, which must flow continuously and in large quantities, including aid trucks, fuel, cooking gas, relief supplies and medical supplies, urgently, regularly and without interruption," it added.

Unrwa's commissioner-general, Philippe Lazzarini, urged in a post on X that the "flow of aid must be unrestricted for @UNRWA and international NGOs".

Meanwhile, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) said on Friday that an average of 560 tonnes of food have been brought into Gaza every day since the ceasefire began last Friday, but more is needed to feed the Palestinians.

"We're still below what we need, but we're getting there… The ceasefire has opened a narrow window of opportunity, and WFP is moving very quickly and swiftly to scale up food assistance," WFP spokesperson Abeer Etefa told reporters in Geneva.

Over a tense period of accusation and counter-accusation, Israel’s army has shot at unarmed Palestinians and bombed Gaza on more than one occasion. The latest was on Sunday, when it claimed Hamas fighters had attacked its soldiers in the Rafah area, which Israel controls.

Israel’s war on Gaza, described by international organisations and a United Nations commission as a genocide, has killed more than 68,000 people and wounded 170,200 since October 2023. A total of 1,139 people died in Israel during the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, 2023, and nearly 200 were taken captive.

So, who broke the ceasefire? Is there still a ceasefire? Are the Palestinian people finally getting peace and aid? Here’s what we know:

What happened? Why did people say the ceasefire was broken?
The Israeli military said on Sunday that Hamas had violated the agreement and two of its fighters had killed two Israeli soldiers in Rafah.

Israel then carried out a “massive and extensive wave” of strikes across the Gaza Strip.

Hamas’s armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, said it was unaware of any clashes, pointing out that Israel controls the Rafah area and that the Brigades had no contact with any Palestinian fighters in Rafah.

This was not the only time Hamas has been accused of violating the ceasefire.

Israel has said Hamas is dragging its feet on returning the bodies of 28 captives who were killed during Israel’s bombardment of Gaza.

Hamas has said from the outset hat it needs heavy digging equipment to be able to excavate and find all the captives’ bodies, as well as the bodies of some 10,000 Palestinians believed to have died beneath the rubble of Israel’s bombing.

What were the terms of the ceasefire?
The ceasefire is a 20-point proposal unveiled by the US at the end of September and mediated with the help of Qatar, Egypt, and Turkiye.

The conditions include:

An end to hostilities in Gaza by both Israel and Hamas
Israel lifting its blockade of all aid entering Gaza and stopping its interference in its distribution
Hamas releasing all captives held in Gaza, alive or dead
Israel releasing some 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and disappeared people
Hamas removing itself from Gaza’s governance, which would be in the hands of a technocratic government
Israeli forces withdrawing from Gaza in stages
Hamas disarming under the agreement, with amnesty for some members and safe passage to other countries for others.
Hamas’s response accepted the condition of releasing all captives and leaving Gaza’s governance to an “independent Palestinian administration”.

As for the remaining demands on Hamas, it said they needed to be “addressed within an inclusive Palestinian national framework, of which we will be an integral part and to which we will contribute”.

Did Israel abide by the terms?
Israel has violated the deal 80 times, the Government Media Office in Gaza says, killing at least 97 Palestinians.

On Friday, the Israeli military fired on a civilian vehicle, killing 11 members of the Abu Shaaban family in the Zeitoun neighbourhood.

There were seven children and three women in the car – the family was trying to reach their home.

On Sunday, Israel killed dozens in Gaza in air raids and attacks.

On Monday, after Israel said it would abide by the deal again, it killed several Palestinians in northern Gaza’s Shujayea neighbourhood, alleging they “posed a threat” to Israeli soldiers after they crossed the unmarked “yellow line” behind which Israel’s army has pulled back.

Israel also imposed restrictions on aid, keeping the Rafah crossing closed and telling the UN on Tuesday that it would only allow 300 aid trucks – half of the number in the deal.

Did Hamas abide by the terms?
Hamas released all 20 living captives and, despite accusing Israel of violating the ceasefire over and over, has also recovered and returned 12 of the 28 bodies of the captives.

On Friday, Hamas reiterated that it is committed to the terms of the ceasefire deal, but that recovery was very difficult given the sheer volume of rubble Israel created with its relentless bombing.

Without new equipment and external assistance, Hamas noted, the effort would be slow and could not be guaranteed.

Hamas’s efforts at retrieving captives’ bodies come as Gaza’s civil defence said more than 10,000 slain Palestinians remain trapped under debris and rubble across the enclave.

Were people able to go home and receive aid?
Not really.

Entire neighbourhoods have disappeared under Israeli bombs, making it almost impossible for people who lived there to figure out where their houses were.

In addition, the “invisible yellow line” beyond which Palestinians run the risk of being shot and killed is striking fear in many, especially people who don’t know if their home is on the Israeli or Palestinian side of the yellow line.

A rough map shows that the yellow line leaves about 58 percent of Gaza under Israeli control.

Food and resources also remain fatally scarce in the besieged enclave as Israel continues to block humanitarian aid.

The Israeli government did not pledge to fully pull its forces out of Gaza, saying it may keep a buffer zone until there is no “resurgent terror threat” – a loophole experts told Al Jazeera gives it a margin to remain indefinitely.

So, is the ceasefire broken or still on?
US President Trump has said the ceasefire is still in effect, reiterating that US officials would ensure the situation is “very peaceful”.

After Israeli attacks killed dozens on Sunday, the Israeli army said a ceasefire in Gaza had resumed, in addition to aid inflow.

Hamas has maintained that it remains committed to abiding by the ceasefire terms and working towards lasting peace.

President Donald Trump has landed in Egypt for a signing ceremony on the Gaza plan which will be attended by other global leaders. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was invited by Egypt to attend but is not going.

The ceasefire deal was secured after days of indirect negotiations brokered by the US, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey on the terms of a 20-point plan put forward by Trump.

Trump spoke earlier at the Israeli parliament, where he said Gaza would be immediately demilitarized and Hamas would be disarmed. He also used his speech to lobby for Netanyahu to receive a pardon that would offer a reprieve from his ongoing corruption trial.

Amid a lack of clarity over who will run Gaza in the long term, it’s notable that Donald Trump seems to be cooling on the idea of Tony Blair, the former UK prime minister, playing a key role.

Under Trump’s 20-point plan, a “Board of Peace” — chaired by Trump and including Blair — will oversee a technocratic committee of Palestinians responsible for public services. Yet on Air Force One to Tel Aviv, Trump cast some doubt on that, perhaps alluding to Blair’s unpopularity in the Arab world because of the UK’s involvement in the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

“First, I want to find out that Tony will be popular with all because I just don’t know that,” Trump told reporters. “I have always liked Tony but I want to find out that he is an acceptable choice to everybody.”

The Israeli military said the ceasefire officially began at 12pm local time (9am GMT), following the completion of its withdrawal to agreed-upon lines of the first phase. There was no immediate comment from Hamas.

The Israeli government ratified the agreement on Friday morning, just hours after Hamas announced that a deal had been reached.

Israel’s public broadcaster, Kan, on Thursday published a leaked copy of the agreement's first phase signed in Egypt, which states that the war would “immediately end” once approved by Israel.

The document also specifies that the first step in implementation will be a formal announcement by US President Donald Trump declaring the end of the war in Gaza.

Trump is expected to visit Egypt over the weekend to attend an official signing ceremony, followed by a visit to Israel on Monday.

On Thursday, Hamas chief negotiator Khalil al-Hayya confirmed that the Palestinian movement had also approved the agreement “to end the war”.

He added that the United States and other mediators had provided guarantees that the signing of the deal would mean the war “has ended indefinitely”.

However, Israeli air strikes, artillery fire and gunfire were reported in Gaza City and Khan Younis on Friday morning. No injuries were reported.

Israeli forces also carried out bombings in Gaza on Thursday, after mediators announced a deal had been reached, killing at least eight Palestinians.

By midday on Friday, Israeli tanks had withdrawn from al-Rashid Road, which stretches from southern to northern Gaza and had previously been blocked to prevent displaced people from returning home.

As soon as the troops pulled back, thousands of people were seen flooding back to Gaza City on foot along the road.

The next stage of the agreement is scheduled for midday on Monday – 72 hours after the withdrawal is complete – when 20 living Israeli captives and several bodies are expected to be released. In exchange, Israel will release around 2,000 Palestinian prisoners, including 250 serving life sentences.

However, the list of those to be freed has not yet been finalised. Reports on Thursday indicated ongoing disagreements over the identities of several prisoners, with Hamas pushing for the release of high-profile figures, and Israel objecting.

Among the six reportedly disputed names are Marwan Barghouti, a popular Fatah military leader; Ahmad Sa’adat, head of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine; and senior Hamas figures Hassan Salama, Abdullah Barghouti, Ibrahim Hamed and Abbas al-Sayed.

At least 400 aid trucks are also expected to enter Gaza, though there have been no reports of their arrival so far.

Next stage
The ceasefire deal marks the first phase of the US's so-called "peace plan", with further stages to be negotiated at a later date.

These are expected to include the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, the disarmament of Hamas, the deployment of international troops in the territory, and other provisions.

Neither Hamas, Israel, nor the mediators have clarified the timeline for these talks.

It also remains unclear whether the continuation of the ceasefire depends on agreement over the subsequent stages.

The war on Gaza began on 7 October 2023, following a surprise Hamas-led attack on Israel. Hamas cited Israel’s decades-long occupation, growing violations at Al-Aqsa Mosque, the crippling blockade of Gaza, and the mistreatment of Palestinian prisoners as the main reasons for its assault.

The Israeli army's southern command – stationed along the Gaza boundary and tasked with monitoring Palestinians, enforcing the blockade and routinely bombing the enclave – collapsed during the initial hours of the Hamas attack, resulting in widespread chaos.

Palestinians killed at least 1,180 people in the assault, with more than 700 additional deaths reported in the fighting since. Nearly half of Israel’s total death toll is civilians, while the remainder are soldiers.

In response, Israel launched a relentless bombing campaign on the Gaza Strip, followed by a devastating ground invasion that lasted two years, accompanied by a strict siege on the population.

Since then, Israeli forces have killed more than 67,000 Palestinians, over 80 percent of whom are believed to be civilians, according to leaked data from the Israeli military.

The assault also caused widespread famine and led to the destruction or damage of nearly every standing structure in Gaza – including homes, hospitals, schools, mosques and churches.

Numerous international bodies, UN experts and countries have classified Israel’s actions as acts of genocide against the Palestinian people.