On foot or riding rickshaws, many Palestinians exhausted by war in Gaza began returning to the ruins of their homes on the third day of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, shocked by complete destruction.The truce took effect on Sunday after 15 months of conflict with the handover of the first three hostages held by Hamas and the release of 90 Palestinians from Israeli jails.Now attention is starting to shift to the rebuilding of the coastal enclave which the Israeli military has laid to waste in its campaign to eliminate Hamas in retaliation for the militant group's Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel.Some Gazans couldn't even recognise where they once lived and turned their back on shattered neighbourhoods to return to tents where they have sheltered for the past several months. Others began to clear debris to try to move back to the wreckage of their homes."We are cleaning the house, and removing the rubble, so we are able to return home. Those are the quilts, pillows, nothing was left at the house," said Palestinian woman Walaa El-Err, pointing to her destroyed belongings at her bombed-out home in Nuseirat, a decades-old refugee camp in central Gaza.She said the feeling of returning to her neighbourhood was "indescribable." She said she'd stayed up all night on Saturday waiting for the truce to take effect the next day. But the optimism surrounding news of a ceasefire has dimmed."When I went into the camp, I teared up, as our camp was not like that, it was the best. When we left all towers, homes were still untouched, and none of the neighbours had been killed," she lamented.In Gaza City in the north, Abla, a mother of three children, waited for a few hours to make sure the truce held on Sunday before heading to her home in the Tel Al-Hawa suburb, devastated by Israeli bombardments and ground offensives.The scene was "horrific" she said, as the seven-floor building had been completely destroyed, "smashed like a piece of biscuit.""I heard the area was hit hard and the house could have been gone, but I was driven by both doubt and hope that it could have been saved," she told Reuters via a chat app."What I found wasn't just a house, it is the box of memories, where I had my children, celebrated their birthday parties, made them food, and taught them their first words and moves," she said.
