Dust lifts easily along the road south of Rafah, where buses idle and people wait with their belongings gathered close. For many Gazans, the crossing back into the Strip is not marked by celebration, but by quiet attention — the kind that comes when movement itself feels provisional, watched, and conditional.
Those returning through the Rafah crossing describe a passage shaped by checks carried out by Palestinian militia stationed along the route. The journey home, long delayed by war and closure, unfolds through a series of pauses: documents examined, names confirmed, phones briefly inspected. It is not violence that defines these moments, they say, but scrutiny — a reminder that even return is something to be granted.
The checks have taken place as limited crossings resume, allowing a small number of people to re-enter Gaza after months spent displaced abroad or in Egypt. For families who left seeking medical care, safety, or temporary refuge, the return carries both relief and unease. Belongings are unpacked and repacked. Conversations are brief. Authority, once distant, now stands close enough to ask questions.
Some returnees speak of being stopped multiple times after crossing the border itself, encountering armed men unaffiliated with any formal border authority. The militia members, they say, asked about destinations and affiliations, enforcing their presence through procedure rather than force. In a territory where governance has fractured and reformed repeatedly, such encounters feel less like exceptions than part of the landscape.
Beyond the checkpoints, Gaza waits much as it was left — altered, damaged, but familiar. The return is incomplete, shaped by shortages, uncertainty, and the knowledge that movement may again be restricted without warning. Still, people step forward. Home, even when filtered through questioning eyes, remains a destination powerful enough to endure the delay.
As buses pull away and the dust settles, the crossing returns to stillness. What remains is not a spectacle, but a record of how return now happens — slowly, cautiously, and under watch — in a place where even the act of coming back must pass inspection.
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Sources
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