Gaza returning to Jabalia describes “horrible” destruction

Palestinians who returned to the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza in recent days expressed shock at the level of destruction following a three-week Israeli military operation against Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups.

A displaced man who was among more than 60,000 people who fled intense fighting and shelling in and around the countryside last month said he witnessed “horrible scenes”.

“Even the sand beneath our feet is burnt; it’s unbearable to keep walking,” he told BBC Arabic. “The streets are full of rubble and demolished buildings. Words cannot describe the devastation.”

The man – who asked not to be identified – also said he saw injured and dead people “lying on the ground” and that essential services and goods were not available.

“There is no electricity or water. There are no clinics and no medicines,” she added. “Wells have been destroyed, shops and supermarkets have been demolished and there is a food shortage.”

The city of Jabalia and its former urban refugee camp – the largest in Gaza, with more than 110,000 registered residents – saw weeks of devastating shelling and fighting after the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in October.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said troops secured control of the camp in late December after a series of operations in which it said “many terrorists” were killed.

It later scaled back combat operations in northern Gaza, declaring that local Hamas battalions had been disbanded. But this left a power vacuum in which the group was able to rebuild itself.

On May 12, the IDF said troops were returning to Jabalia for an operation “based on intelligence information about Hamas’ attempts to reassemble its terrorist infrastructure and operatives in the area.”

Over the next three weeks, battles raged as tanks and troops advanced into the refugee camp under the cover of intense air and artillery attacks. A military official described the fighting as “perhaps the most violent” they had seen in the past seven months.

On Friday, the IDF announced that troops had completed their mission, having “eliminated hundreds of terrorists in intense fighting and close encounters” and destroyed dozens of “terrorist infrastructure and combat complexes.”

Troops also located and destroyed more than 10 kilometers of a network of underground tunnels and recovered the bodies of seven Israelis taken hostage by Hamas in October, he said.

Displaced families were soon photographed walking back to the camp through streets lined with destroyed buildings, carrying what was left of their belongings.

A spokesman for the Hamas-run Gaza Civil Defense force, Mahmoud Bassal, said on Friday that his rescue teams found dozens of bodies in the Jabalia camp, mainly women and children – including 30 members of one family.

On Sunday, the director of the Kamal Adwan hospital in the nearby town of Beit Lahia, Dr. Husam Abu Safiyeh, told Al Araby TV that 120 bodies had been recovered in and around Jabalia, and that many more were believed to be buried under rubble, boulder. .

The identities of the dead were still unclear. But the IDF’s Arab spokesman, Lt. Col. Avichay Adraee, downplayed such reports on Friday, insisting to X that they were members of Hamas and other armed groups.

Bassal also said that Israeli forces destroyed most of the camp’s houses, as well as its central market and almost all of its infrastructure.

He added that the fifth floor of al-Awda hospital in Jabalia was destroyed along with Kamal Adwan’s main electrical generators.

The head of the municipal emergency committee for northern Gaza, Naji Sarhan, declared Jabalia town, Jabalia camp, Beit Lahia and neighboring Beit Hanoun as “disaster zones” on Sunday, estimating that 50,000 housing units had been destroyed. destroyed there, according to a UN situation. report.

He appealed to the international community for immediate assistance with shelters and support in repairing water wells and other critical infrastructure.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, Unrwa, said it had received “horrible reports” from the Jabalia camp, where it provides services.

They included displaced people, including children, who were reportedly killed and injured while taking refuge in a school run by Unrwa that was besieged by Israeli tanks, according to a post on X, formerly Twitter. There were also reports of Unrwa offices destroyed by airstrikes and demolished by Israeli forces, he added.

Unrwa head Philippe Lazzarini said thousands of people from the camp now “have no choice but to live among the rubble and in destroyed Unrwa facilities”.

One of the returnees told BBC Arabic’s Gaza Lifeline program that he and his seven-year-old son saw “the bodies of martyrs scattered all over the streets” on Saturday.

“East Jabalia has been subjected to unprecedented devastation,” said Diab Abu Salama. “All the shops in Jabalia were destroyed, as were the houses surrounding them.”

“There is no doubt that the objective of the occupation [Israel] by displacing people and destroying their homes and shops is forcing them to leave this country”, he stated, before adding: “But we will remain firm”.

Musaed Zaqzouq, for his part, described how he found only rubble where his house stood three weeks ago.

“The scene was very horrible,” he said. “The family home was completely destroyed, as was the neighborhood where I lived.”

“Water pipes were destroyed… sewage channels were damaged,” he added. “There is no longer a suitable place for housing.”

One woman, who asked not to be named, said the level of devastation was such that “we walked the streets as if we were seeing them for the first time.”

She also urged the international community to take action to help Palestinians in Jabalia and other parts of Gaza.

“What is the reason for all this mass destruction?” she asked. “Please hurry and come to us to see how tormented we are.”

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza to destroy Hamas in response to the group’s cross-border attack on southern Israel on October 7, during which around 1,200 people were killed and another 251 were taken hostage.

At least 36,470 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry.