JERUSALEM, Oct 18, 2025 (BSS/AFP) - The United Nations' aid chief took stock 
of the monumental task of restoring dignity and hygiene to Palestinians 
clinging to life in Gaza's ruins on Saturday, as Israel and Hamas exchanged 
more bodies.

A convoy of white UN jeeps carried relief coordinator Tom Fletcher and his 
team through the twisted rubble of shattered homes to see a wastewater 
treatment plant in Sheikh Radwan, north of Gaza City.

"I drove through here seven to eight months ago when most of these buildings 
were still standing and, to see the devastation -- this is a vast part of the 
city, just a wasteland -- and it's absolutely devastating to see," he told 
AFP.

The densely populated cities of the Gaza Strip, home to more than two million 
Palestinians, have largely been reduced to ruins by two years of bombardment 
and intense fighting between Hamas and the Israeli army.

Just over a week since US President Donald Trump helped broker a truce, the 
main border crossing to Egypt has yet to be reopened, but hundreds of trucks 
roll in daily via Israeli checkpoints and aid is being distributed.

Hamas has returned the final 20 surviving hostages it was holding and has 
begun to hand over the remains of another 28 who died.

On Friday night, it turned over a body identified by Israel as Eliyahu 
Margalit, 75, who died in the October 7, 2023 attack that ignited the war in 
Gaza.

On Saturday, in line with the terms of the ceasefire deal, Israel returned 
the bodies of 15 more Palestinians to Gaza, the health ministry in the Hamas-
run territory said.

- Digging latrines -

Surveying the damaged pumping equipment and a grim lake of sewage at the 
Sheikh Radwan wastewater plant, Fletcher said the task ahead for the UN and 
aid agencies was a "massive, massive job".

The British diplomat said he had met residents returning to destroyed homes 
trying to dig latrines in the ruins.

"They're telling me most of all they want dignity," he said. "We've got to 
get the power back on so we can start to get the sanitation system back in 
place.

"We have a massive 60-day plan now to surge in food, get a million meals out 
there a day, start to rebuild the health sector, bring in tents for the 
winter, get hundreds of thousands of kids back into school."

According to figures supplied to mediators by the Israeli military's civil 
affairs agency and released by the UN humanitarian office, on Thursday some 
950 trucks carrying aid and commercial supplies crossed into Gaza from 
Israel.

Relief agencies have called for the Rafah border crossing from Egypt to be 
reopened to speed the flow of food, fuel and medicines, and Turkey has a team 
of rescue specialists waiting at the border to help find bodies in the 
rubble.

Some violent incidents have taken place despite the ceasefire.

Gaza's civil defence agency, which operates under Hamas authority, said 
Saturday that it had recovered the bodies of nine Palestinians -- two men, 
three women and four children -- from the Shaaban family after Israeli troops 
fired two tank shells at a bus.

Two more victims were blown apart in the blast and have yet to be recovered, 
it said.

At Gaza City's Al-Ahli Hospital, the victims were laid out in white shrouds 
as their relatives mourned.

"My daughter, her children and her husband; my son, his children and his wife 
were killed. What did they do wrong?" demanded grandmother Umm Mohammed 
Shaaban. "They were little... What did they do wrong? There is no truce."

The military said it had fired on a vehicle that approached the so-called 
"yellow line", to which its forces withdrew under the terms of the ceasefire, 
and gave no estimate of casualties

"The troops fired warning shots toward the suspicious vehicle, but the 
vehicle continued to approach the troops in a way that caused an imminent 
threat to them," the military said.

"The troops opened fire to remove the threat, in accordance with the 
agreement."

- Hostage remains -

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved the ceasefire but is 
under pressure at home to restrict access to Gaza until the remaining bodies 
of the hostages taken during Hamas's brutal attacks have been returned.

On Saturday, his office confirmed that the latest body, returned by Hamas via 
the Red Cross on Friday night, had been identified as Margalit, an elderly 
farmer who was known to his friends at the Nir Oz kibbutz as "Churchill".

"He was a cowboy at heart, and for many years managed the cattle branch and 
the horse stables of Nir Oz," said the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a 
support group founded by relatives of the hostages.

"On October 7, he went out to feed his beloved horses and was kidnapped from 
the stable."

Margalit was married with three children and three grandchildren. His 
daughter Nili Margalit, also taken hostage, was freed during the war's first 
brief truce in November 2023.

In its statement about Margalit, Netanyahu's office said "we will not 
compromise... and will spare no effort until we return all of the fallen 
abductees, down to the last one".