Just as Palestinians in Gaza were regaining hope on Wednesday following news of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, deadly Israeli airstrikes rained down on the people, turning joy into fear.
Families wept as they saw the bodies of their loved ones wrapped in white shrouds and carried outside Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis on Friday – each with their names written in blue ink in Arabic.
Jomaa Abdel-Aal said two of his nephews – Mohammed Asaad Jarghoun, 28, and Mohammed Mahmoud Jarghoun, 27 – were killed in a tent in the center of Khan Younis around 2 a.m. on Friday.
“Every day we say goodbye to the martyrs. We’ve gotten used to saying goodbye to our loved ones,” Abdel-Aal told CBC News videographer Mohamed El Saife on Friday.
“May God reunite us with them in the afterlife,” he said. “Life has become an unbearable hell.”
Other mourners gathered to pray for those killed as women cried and clung to one another.
At least 117 people have been killed since Wednesday
On Friday, Israel’s security cabinet recommended approval of the Gaza ceasefire and hostage repatriation agreement ahead of a full cabinet meeting that would see final ratification of the agreement, which is set to officially enter into force on Sunday.
While final details were still being formalized, Israeli warplanes continued intensive strikes across the Gaza Strip in the days following Wednesday’s announcement.
Since then, at least 117 Palestinians, including 32 women and 30 children, have been killed and 266 others injured, according to the Palestinian Civil Defense in Gaza.
Palestinians gathered at Nasser Hospital near Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on Friday to pray for the bodies of their relatives killed in Israeli airstrikes just days before a ceasefire is expected to take effect.
Abdel Aal, who lost two children to air strikes in the 15-month war, said he did not hope for an end to the killings in Gaza.
“The Palestinian people have not been able to rejoice even for a moment during the last 75 years while death and destruction took place in these lands,” he said.
There was no comment from the Israeli military on the latest attacks.
Journalist killed in designated humanitarian zone
Earlier this week, just hours after Palestinians took to the streets to celebrate the news of Wednesday’s agreement, Ismail Al-Shiah’s brother, Ahmed Al-Shiah – a journalist in Gaza – was killed in an Israeli air strike, a charity soup kitchen hit the Al-Mawasi area west of Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip. The area was designated as a humanitarian security zone.
“He distributed food to orphans and worked for the charity,” Al-Shiah told CBC News on Thursday.
“This is a loss for Palestine and a loss for the country.”
In a widely shared video online, a young Palestinian man can be seen crouching over the body of his sister, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike on a house in central Gaza City early Thursday.
“Hala, get up, the war is over, we can go south,” he says, shaking the girl’s body. “Hala, we can leave Gaza and travel abroad, get up!”
Hope quickly turns to fear
Saeed Awad, a medic in Gaza, said Israeli bombings had increased since Wednesday, particularly in the central and northern Gaza Strip.
“All of this, of course, is ruining people’s happiness,” Awad told CBC News on Thursday. “And it affects the luck that was there (Wednesday).”
Awad said there was a strike in Ard al Mufti in central Gaza on Thursday, but Palestinian Civil Defense and ambulances were unable to reach the area.
“The house was on fire and no one could get there.”
Israel’s acceptance of the ceasefire agreement with Hamas will not be official until it is approved by the country’s security cabinet and government. However, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu postponed the vote, accusing Hamas of making last-minute demands and reversing agreements.
Tamer Abu Shaaban’s voice cracked as he stood over the tiny body of his young niece, wrapped in a white shroud, on the tiled floor of a Gaza City mortuary on Thursday. She was hit in the back by shrapnel from a rocket while playing in the courtyard of a school where the family was taking shelter, he said.
“Is this the truce they are talking about? What did this young girl, this child, do to deserve this? What did she do to deserve this? Is she fighting against you, Israel?” he asked.
The ceasefire agreement was reached on Wednesday after mediation by Qatar, Egypt and the USA. The agreement provides for an initial six-week ceasefire with the gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces and the release of hostages and Palestinian prisoners.
If successful, the ceasefire would end fighting between Hamas and Israeli forces, which have destroyed swathes of the Gaza Strip and killed more than 46,800 people, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry there. It does not say how many of the dead were militants.
Israel says it has killed over 17,000 militants without providing evidence.
The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed Israel in a surprise attack on October 7, 2023, killing about 1,200 people, including several Canadian citizens, and kidnapping about 250.
About 100 hostages are still in the Gaza Strip, and the Israeli military believes about a third and up to half of them are dead.
