BEIT LAHIYA, Gaza Strip: The grove of orange, olive and palm trees that once stood in front of Ne’man Abu Jarad’s house was bulldozed away. The roses and jasmine flowers on the roof and in the garden, which he lovingly watered so his family could enjoy their fragrance, were also gone.
The house itself was a damaged, hollowed-out shell. But after 15 months of brutal war, it stood.
At the sight of it Monday, Ne’man; his wife, Majida; and three of their six daughters dropped the bags they had been lugging since dawn, fell to their knees and prayed, whispering, “Praise be to God, praise be to God.” The sunset blazed orange in the sky above.
After 477 days of hell — fleeing the length of the Gaza Strip, hiding from bombardment, sweltering in tents, scrounging for food and water, losing their possessions – they had finally returned home.
“Our joy is unmatched by any other, not the joy of success, of a marriage or of a birth,” Majida said. “This is a joy that can’t be described in words, in writing or in any expression.”
In October, at the one-year anniversary of the Gaza war, The Associated Press traced the Abu Jarad family’s flight around the territory seeking safety. They were eight of the roughly 1.8 million Palestinians driven from their homes by Israel’s massive campaign of retaliation against Hamas following the militants’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel.
Like many families, they were displaced multiple times. Ne’man, Majida and their daughters – the youngest in first grade, the oldest in her early 20s – fled their home at the northernmost part of Gaza hours after Israeli bombardment began. They would move seven times in total, fleeing all the way to Gaza’s southernmost city Rafah.
Each time, their conditions worsened. By October 2024, they were languishing in a sprawling tent camp near the southern city of Khan Younis, exhausted and depressed, with little hope of seeing home again.
Hope suddenly revived when Israel and Hamas reached a long-awaited ceasefire earlier this month. On Jan. 19, the first day of the truce, Majida began packing up their clothes, food and other belongings. On Sunday, the announcement came: The next day, Israeli troops would pull back from two main roads, allowing Palestinians to return to the north.
Since Monday, more than 375,000 Palestinians have made their way back to northern Gaza, many of them on foot.
The Abu Jarads set off Monday from their tent at 5 a.m., loading bags stuffed with their belongings into a car. The driver took them to the edge of the Netzarim Corridor, the swath of land across Gaza that Israeli forces had turned into a military zone that – until this week – had barred any returns north.
There, they got out and walked, joining the massive crowds making their way down the coastal road. For around 8 kilometers (5 miles), the 49-year-old Ne’eman carried one sack on his back, held another in his arms, and two bags dangled from the crooks of his elbows. They stopped frequently, to rest, rearrange bags, and drop items along the way.
“The road is really hard,” Majida told an AP journalist who accompanied them on the journey. “But our joy for the return makes us forget we’re tired. Every meter we walk, our joy gives us strength to continue.”
Reaching the southern outskirts of Gaza City, they hired a van. But it quickly ran out of fuel, and they waited more than an hour before they found another one. Driving through the city, they got their first look at the war’s devastating impact in the north.
Over 15 months, Israel launched repeated offensives in Gaza City and surrounding areas, trying to crush Hamas fighters who often operated in densely populated neighborhoods. After each assault, militants would regroup, and a new assault would follow.
The van made its way down city streets strewn with rubble, lined with buildings that were damaged husks or had been reduced to piles of concrete.
“They destroyed even more in this area,” Ne’man said, staring out the window as they left Gaza City and entered the towns of Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun – scene of one of Israel’s most ferocious offensives in the last three months before the ceasefire.
As the sun began to set, the van dropped them off at the edge of their neighborhood. Ne’man’s daughters stood in shock. One gaped, her hands on her cheeks. Her sister pointed out at the field of flattened houses. They walked the last few hundred meters, over a landscape of rutted, bulldozed dirt.
Trudging as fast as he could under the bags draping from his body, Ne’man — a taxi driver before the war — repeated over and over in excitement, “God is great, God is great. To God is all thanks.”
Their home still stood, sort of — a hollow shell in a row of damaged buildings. After they prayed in front of it, Ne’eman leaned on the bare concrete wall of his house and kissed it. To his joy he discovered that one flowering vine in front of the house had miraculously survived. He immediately set about examining and arranging its tendrils.
One of the girls dashed in through the now doorless front entrance. “Oh Lord, oh Lord,” her gasps came from the darkness inside. Then she began to cry, as if all the shock, sorrow, happiness and relief were gushing out of her.
Like others streaming back into northern Gaza, the Abu Jarads will face the question of how to survive in the ruins of cities decimated by war. Water and food remain scarce, leaving the population still reliant on humanitarian aid, which is being ramped up under the ceasefire. There is no electricity. Tens of thousands are homeless.
Adjoining the Abu Jarads’ home, Ne’man’s brother’s three-story house is now a pile of concrete wreckage after it was destroyed by an airstrike. It damaged Ne’man’s home as it collapsed, “but, thank God, there is an undamaged room which we will live in,” he said. He vows to repair what is damaged.
Grief from the war lays heavily on him, Ne’man said. His uncle lost his home, and several of his uncle’s children were killed. Several of his neighbors’ homes were destroyed. Ne’man said he will have to walk several kilometers (miles) to find water, just like he did in the displacement camps.
“Once again, we will live through suffering and fatigue.”
