President Donald Trump signs the guestbook at the Knesset in Jerusalem, Israel, Monday, October 13, 2025, during a visit to celebrate the U.S.-brokered ceasefire and hostage release agreement between Israel and Hamas. | Official White House Photo by Daniel Torok via Wikimedia Commons
There is a ceasefire finally in effect in the Gaza Strip, where Israel launched a horrific military campaign in response to attacks on the country’s south on October 7, 2023. On that day, Hamas fighters and their fellow militants assaulted Israeli settlements and fortified military outposts. They killed around 1,200 people, and over 251 others were taken hostage, brought to Gaza, and hidden in underground tunnels. About 300 of those killed were Israeli soldiers.
Hamas claims that the attacks were in retaliation for Israel’s brutal and unjust occupation of Palestine. Gaza’s boundaries were drawn up as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, when Egypt occupied it. Egyptian forces were driven out of Gaza in the 1967 Six-Day War, and the Strip was occupied by Israel, which then built settlements and placed the enclave’s Palestinian population under military rule.
The release of 20 Israeli hostages who are still alive and the return of about 20 dead is a key demand of Israel in the ceasefire agreement. Since Israeli forces launched their retaliatory campaign in October 2023, at least 887 Israeli soldiers have been killed as of July 2025. The number of dead or wounded Hamas fighters is unknown.
The first phase of the peace agreement includes a total end to the fighting; the release of all remaining Israeli hostages, living or dead; and the release of a large number of Palestinian prisoners in exchange. Also, there will be a partial withdrawal of Israeli forces to an already agreed-upon yellow line, and more than 400 trucks of humanitarian aid a day will enter Gaza. An international group will monitor the ceasefire. The second stage of the agreement is under negotiation.
The question now is: can Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right ministers be trusted to maintain the ceasefire, or will they invent excuses or make impossible demands to break it, as they did in the previous truce after 33 hostages were released? They aim to continue the war and destroy Gaza to make it uninhabitable, kill all Hamas fighters, drive out the Palestinians, and make the territory a part of Israel.
Israel’s nonstop bombing of Gaza has killed at least 67,000 Palestinians. That is one in every 33 people. But many more bodies — perhaps, a thousand or more — lie buried under the rubble of collapsed buildings that Israel destroyed.
Most of Gaza — about 41 kilometers by 10 kilometers wide, and located on the eastern Mediterranean Sea — is where 2.1 million people are on the edge of starvation, if not already starving. Most of Gaza has been destroyed by Israeli bombing. The United Nations Satellite Center identified 192,812 seriously damaged structures as of July 2025, which translates to 78 percent of all buildings in Gaza at the time. Over 436,000 homes have been damaged or destroyed.
“The question now is: can Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right ministers be trusted to maintain the ceasefire, or will they invent excuses or make impossible demands to break it, as they did in the previous truce after 33 hostages were released?”
Internally displaced
It is estimated that, as of October 2025, 1.9 million to 2.1 million Palestinians in Gaza — approximately 90 percent to 95 percent of the population — have been internally displaced several times since October 23, 2023. They have been driven to southern Gaza, where they live in makeshift tents without adequate food, water, or medicine due to Israel’s blockade of aid trucks. If the ceasefire holds, Israel will allow 400 trucks into Gaza a day.
At least 20,000 children are among the dead; this translates to one child killed every hour for the past 24 months. It is estimated that about one in every 14 Palestinians — or 169,000 men, women, and children — have suffered injuries and been left with lifelong disabilities. The UN Children’s Fund has estimated that 3,000 to 4,000 children in Gaza have lost one or more limbs.
There are few medical facilities left for these injured people. By October 2025, between 94 percent and 95 percent of Gaza’s 36 hospitals will have been damaged or destroyed. There have been more than 400 attacks on health facilities, ambulances, doctors, and health workers. As of August 2025, over 1,700 health care workers have been killed. There are almost no medical supplies available, and amputations are done without anesthesia.
Israeli forces also attacked schools; 400 of these were hit. Some 95.2 percent of schools are partially destroyed and rendered unusable. Some 518 out of 564 schools will need major repairs or total reconstruction. Over 60 university buildings have been destroyed. Palestinian students are highly educated, and these schools are a great loss.
The Israeli blockade on food entering Gaza has caused widespread hunger. The world’s leading hunger monitoring agency, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), has assessed that half a million Palestinians — a quarter of Gaza’s population — are suffering from famine. An estimated 460 have already died from hunger.
United States President Donald Trump had bullied Netanyahu a few months ago to apologize to Qatar after Israel launched an attack against it. He said Israel was almost totally isolated and condemned worldwide, but he would help undo that. How he would do that is unclear; it’s a daunting task. The UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry set up by the UN Human Rights Council issued a report in September 2025, saying Israel was guilty of committing genocide against Gazans by employing harsh conditions aimed at destroying the population. It claimed Netanyahu and former defense chief Yoav Gallant had incited genocide with their words and actions.
The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants against the two on November 21, 2024, for alleged crimes against humanity, such as murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts. They allegedly used starvation as a weapon and directed attacks against a civilian population.
Trump’s 20-point peace plan, which is supported by many countries, offers the only hope for the Palestinians, and Israel reluctantly approved the first phase. For the second phase, Israel is demanding the total surrender of Hamas fighters and the right to keep its forces in Gaza. This impossible demand is Netanyahu’s attempt to halt the peace process and resume the war. We hope it will not be so.
