Gaza Truce Is Not Enough, Say Residents of Bombed-Out Neighborhood

Palestinian children walk among the houses destroyed in Israeli strikes during the conflict, amid the temporary truce between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas, at Khan Younis refugee camp, in the southern Gaza Strip, November 29, 2023. (Reuters)
Palestinian children walk among the houses destroyed in Israeli strikes during the conflict, amid the temporary truce between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas, at Khan Younis refugee camp, in the southern Gaza Strip, November 29, 2023. (Reuters)
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Gaza Truce Is Not Enough, Say Residents of Bombed-Out Neighborhood

Palestinian children walk among the houses destroyed in Israeli strikes during the conflict, amid the temporary truce between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas, at Khan Younis refugee camp, in the southern Gaza Strip, November 29, 2023. (Reuters)
Palestinian children walk among the houses destroyed in Israeli strikes during the conflict, amid the temporary truce between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas, at Khan Younis refugee camp, in the southern Gaza Strip, November 29, 2023. (Reuters)

Returning home to find their neighborhood wrecked by bombs, residents of Abu Ta'imah on the outskirts of Gaza's Khan Younis said the Palestinian territory needed a permanent ceasefire, not just an extension of the truce between Israel and Hamas.

Local people fled the area on the eastern edge of the city at the start of the war and did not return until the truce, which was in its sixth day on Wednesday.

"We were shocked to see this destruction. We were shocked to see our homes, our streets, our lands, our yards and everything demolished," said Gihad Nabil, who was recently married and had been living in Abu Ta'imah with his wife.

Standing on a roof with a view of ruined buildings and mounds of rubble as far as the eye could see, he said the area had been home to about 5,000 or 6,000 people before the war. He asked where they would go.

"My house is completely destroyed. My brother's home, my uncle's my neighbor's, all of them destroyed. We don't need this truce, we need a complete ceasefire," he said, likening what he was seeing to an earthquake zone.

As Nabil and another man sat on the roof, talking and smoking a shisha pipe, a group of children down below sat around a small fire built on a pile of rubble and warmed up bread, which they shared.

Three of the children climbed onto the carcass of a car whose pockmarked blue metalwork looked like crumpled paper and posed for a Reuters camera, framed by twisted cables and jagged chunks of concrete.

Militants from Hamas, the group that runs Gaza, triggered the war on Oct. 7 when they rampaged through southern Israel, killing 1,200 people including babies and children and taking 240 hostages of all ages, according to Israel's tally.

Israel vowed to destroy Hamas and launched an assault on Gaza that has killed more than 15,000 people, four in 10 of them children, according to health officials there.

Gone in a moment

The war has displaced 80% of Gazans from their homes, according to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who on Wednesday described the situation as an epic humanitarian catastrophe.

Abdelrahman Abu Ta'imah, a member of the clan that gave the area its name, searched through his bombed-out apartment, pulling clothes and a pink mattress from the debris.

"I have been struggling and working for 30 years in this country," he said, adding that even before the war life was hard because of the blockade imposed on Gaza by Israel and Egypt since 2007, when Hamas took control of the enclave.

"Money doesn't come easy, then all of a sudden, all the work and effort of 30 years disappeared in a moment. One rocket makes all this go away. Why is that?" he asked.

From the start of its attack, Israel told Palestinians living in northern Gaza to move to the southern part of the strip, which includes Khan Younis and its environs.

However, Israeli forces have also pounded the south, though less intensively than the north. Israel says it targets Hamas infrastructure, and accuses Hamas of putting civilians in harm's way by using them as human shields.

Diplomatic efforts were underway on Wednesday to prolong the truce, which has allowed more aid trucks to enter Gaza and some Israeli and foreign hostages to be released, as well as some Palestinian detainees to be freed from Israeli prisons.

But Abu Ta'imah said a short truce was not enough and he longed for a permanent solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"Ever since we were born, we've been enduring wars and destruction. Every time we rebuild, there comes a fiercer war than the one before," he said.



The Buildup to Attacks on Israeli Football Supporters in Amsterdam

Israeli Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters demonstrate and light flares in Amsterdam, Netherlands, November 7, 2024, in this screengrab obtained from a social media video. Michel Van Bergen/via REUTERS/File Photo
Israeli Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters demonstrate and light flares in Amsterdam, Netherlands, November 7, 2024, in this screengrab obtained from a social media video. Michel Van Bergen/via REUTERS/File Photo
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The Buildup to Attacks on Israeli Football Supporters in Amsterdam

Israeli Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters demonstrate and light flares in Amsterdam, Netherlands, November 7, 2024, in this screengrab obtained from a social media video. Michel Van Bergen/via REUTERS/File Photo
Israeli Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters demonstrate and light flares in Amsterdam, Netherlands, November 7, 2024, in this screengrab obtained from a social media video. Michel Van Bergen/via REUTERS/File Photo

Supporters of Israeli soccer team Maccabi Tel Aviv were targeted for beatings by groups of thugs in the early hours of Friday following a match with Amsterdam's Ajax, the city's mayor Femke Halsema has said. Among dozens of Israeli supporters who were chased and assaulted, five suffered injuries needing hospital treatment, police said. In all 63 suspects have been arrested and authorities promised an investigation, as politicians within the country and beyond expressed their condemnation.

Here is a closer look at how the situation escalated.

Tension began to build on Wednesday as some of the 3,000 visiting Maccabi supporters had minor altercations back and forth with locals including taxi drivers and Ajax supporters in the city centre, police said.

A police report said groups of Maccabi supporters burned a Palestinian flag on Dam square, pulled another down from a nearby building and vandalized a taxi.

After a call went out on social media, angry Muslim taxi drivers gathered outside a casino where a group of 400 Maccabi supporters were gathered, and police intervened amid skirmishes.

Dutch media have reported on videos showing the beating of a Muslim taxi driver and a group of youths yelling anti-Semitic slurs at a person in a canal said to be a Maccabi supporter who was pushed in.

Reuters was unable to confirm those incidents took place as portrayed.

On the day of the match, Maccabi supporters were filmed chanting anti-Arab slogans in front of the National Monument on Amsterdam's central Dam square, including swear words against Palestine, in videos verified by Reuters.

Police guarded the perimeter but fights around the fringes were reported.

Dutch pro-Palestinian groups planned a demonstration outside the stadium during the game, arguing that the match should have been cancelled because of alleged Israeli war crimes in Gaza. Israel denies war crimes, saying it is defending itself and blaming Hamas for civilian deaths, which the militants reject.

Dutch authorities were aware of anger over the war in Gaza, but saw no reason to cancel the match. The relationship between supporters -- the usual source of football violence -- is generally good between the two teams, Halsema said on Friday.

Ajax has strong Jewish associations, and fans sometimes carry Star of David flags to matches; it also has many Muslim supporters.

Less than 1% of Amsterdam's population is Jewish following the Holocaust, while around 15% is Muslim, mostly second and first generation immigrants from North Africa and the Middle East. The conservative Dutch government has vowed to implement Europe's strictest measures to limit immigration and reject asylum-seekers.

Ajax's most hardcore group of supporters, known as the F-Side, had said politics and football should be kept separate and that they would "intervene if necessary" if it went ahead at the ground.

Riot police at the stadium kept opposing groups apart and few incidents were reported when the match ended around 11 p.m.

However in the city center, around midnight, security fell apart.

Calls to target returning Maccabi supporters began circulating on Dutch messaging groups, leading to what mayor Halsema described as "anti-Semitic hit and run assaults".

Police used to dispersing football mobs could not easily stop smaller, highly mobile groups of attackers with no obvious club allegiance.

Police said they collected around 200 Maccabi fans on Dam square to protect them and escort them back to their hotels, but many were assaulted elsewhere in town, with perpetrators quickly fleeing on motor scooters.

Films on social media and verified by Reuters showed groups attacking Israelis.

Of the 63 people detained, most were later released pending charges.

Amsterdam banned demonstrations through the weekend and gave police emergency stop-and-search powers.