I visited Gaza four times during the Israel-Hamas War and was on the Israeli side of the border countless times, starting four days after the October 7 massacre, while the IDF was still mopping up the terrorist invaders.
And yet it was critical for me to see the changes, both on the Israeli side and, as much as possible, on the Gazan side since the January 19 ceasefire.
The ceasefire led to massive IDF withdrawals from nearly all of Gaza, other than a 700- to 1,100-meter perimeter and a small force on the Philadelphi Corridor with Egypt.
As of February 3, it also led to Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinian population returning to their communities, including hundreds of thousands to northern Gaza.
I would have visited the Gaza border closer to February 3, but after initially expressing an openness to organizing a tour, the IDF declined to cooperate.
Many local contacts on the Gaza border have also become temporarily overwhelmed with managing the week-to-week and sometimes day-to-day changes regarding the rounds of hostage returns.
Finally, I managed to organize a tour to visit Nirim (near Khan Yunis in southern Gaza), Be’eri (near El-Bureij in central Gaza), Alumim, and Nahal Oz (both near Gaza City’s Shejaia neighborhood in northern Gaza).
On a personal level, the tour was night and day compared with earlier visits. There were hardly any roadblocks (in the early months of the war, roadblocks were everywhere in the South), there were no rockets blowing up over my head, and my GPS was not scrambled.
'Radical transformation' at the Gaza border
What I saw was a mixed picture of radical transformation and potential long-term quiet, along with still dangerous tensions beneath the surface.
Given the lack of IDF cooperation, I had to suffice with driving around nearby border fields and seeking makeshift lookout spots to judge the progress on both sides of the border.
(The IDF seemed more excited about showing off victories in the field in Gaza than about showing withdrawals – another blatant sign that they have not updated the public when withdrawing other than with vague messages that try to bury the withdrawal theme.)
I also had off-the-record discussions with some soldiers and local village security volunteers.
In terms of radical transformation, vast areas of Khan Yunis and Shejaia have been flattened since the start of the war.
In an earlier briefing, which The Jerusalem Post was part of, it was made clear that hundreds of meters of residences and buildings near the border would be destroyed to make room for a security perimeter and to make it harder for future Gaza invaders to sneak up on Israeli communities in the Gaza periphery.
In parts of Gaza, houses were destroyed only if Hamas was using them to fight from. But in areas close to the Israeli border, a policy decision was made to “clean house” – regardless of whether they were used by Hamas – to generally improve Israel’s defensive posture.
Israel's side of the Gaza border
The Israeli towns in the periphery are still much worse off than one might have expected.
Although many of the 22 villages that Hamas conquered have been rebuilt and repopulated, at least 10 of them are still prohibited from letting their residents return.
In Nirim, for example, only members of the local voluntary emergency response team and some essential workers are permitted to return.
No one knows how long this policy will last, but some believe it could still be in place when the new school year begins in the fall, if not longer.
In terms of a lasting quiet, the good news was that I did not hear or see any active fighting.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians may have returned to northern Gaza, and Palestinians, in general, may be returning to their communities from refugee areas on the Mediterranean coastline, but this has not led to any major new security threat.
This is the reality even though the number of soldiers deployed to Gaza is down from five divisions at the start of the war to one to two lighter divisions now.
The less robust Gaza Division and reservist Division 252 have replaced the more powerful Divisions 98, 162, and 36.
I could not see a large number of IDF forces at any of the spots that I stopped at – certainly nothing compared with what I saw during my visits in the early months of the war, when vast fields were covered with tanks, armored Namer personnel carriers, and legions of troops.
But I was told that the IDF is building 14 tougher positions along the border, a significant increase, and a number of smaller outposts were flagged for me as having quadrupled in size.
Some local security volunteers said they had plenty of ammunition and training materials, while some said they were sorely lacking and complained about the IDF not keeping promises to improve their ability to defend their towns.
Despite the quiet that I experienced, I was told that there was constant gunfire and drone surveillance on the Gaza border.
I also was told that for each of the half dozen or so laconic messages that the IDF has sent out in recent weeks about using so-called distancing fire to disabuse terrorist threats of the notion that they can approach unhindered, such incidents actually are constant, and the military is only picking a select few to update the public about.
Some soldiers also expressed concern about reports in recent days of penetrations into Israel from Gaza. Even though each incident has been shown to be false, I could see the concern in many soldiers’ eyes that the future is less secure than people think.
In addition, some soldiers said many Gazans are starting to plant improvised explosives near the border without necessarily being stopped.
Nevertheless, the buzz of Israeli drones has made some residents in the Gaza border towns feel safer – as though there is a constant IDF eye watching for intruders in a way there was not on October 7.
Furthermore, sources say the mix of more soldiers and improvements physically and technologically for the border fence and obstacles to invasion somewhat increase Gaza border residents’ sense of safety.
But still hanging over their heads is whether the war is really over now – or whether there could be a return to war if phase two of the hostage deal and ceasefire negotiations blow up.