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Indirect talks between the United States and Iran aimed at ending the seven-month-long war continue – most recently via Qatar as mediator on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York – but the two sides still disagree about the agenda.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi left New York on Tuesday after telling state-run Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) that he expects an official response to Tehran’s proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz by the end of the day. The proposal, which Iran said would see the strait reopened within seven days, was first passed to the US via Qatari mediators last week.

United States President Donald Trump was reported to have rejected that offer, under which Tehran would reopen the strait in return for Washington lifting its naval blockade, waiving sanctions, releasing an estimated $12bn in frozen Iranian assets and enforcing a wider regional ceasefire that includes Lebanon.

Under Iran’s proposal, wider peace talks, including discussions of its nuclear programme, would begin only then

Despite Trump’s public rejection, Araghchi says he has not yet received a formal response from Washington. Meanwhile, US media reports that Trump may well be willing to relax sanctions and unfreeze Iranian assets have been strongly denied by the US president.

Instead, US officials say, the US wants a deal that resolves all outstanding issues, particularly Tehran’s nuclear programme, in one go, rather than pursuing a gradual, step-by-step approach.

Here’s what we know about the talks:

Qatari mediators met Araghchi in New York on Monday to discuss how to advance Tehran’s proposal for reopening the Strait of Hormuz and then progressing to wider peace talks.

In a post on Telegram, Araghchi insisted that the talks focused solely on the Strait of Hormuz. He denied that the US had formally rejected the Iranian proposal.

“Despite what the US president said, I said that we were waiting for the official US response through the mediators … They [Qatar] had ideas, and we discussed them. They are going to raise this issue with the American side again, and then the final response from the American side will be conveyed to us through the Qatari mediator,” Araghchi said late on Monday.

Araghchi also said negotiations had become more “serious”, but cautioned that Tehran’s position has not changed.

“I state firmly that there has been no change in Iran’s position. Our conditions for opening the strait are clear. Our position on other issues is also clear. At present, there has been no discussion at all about flexibility,” he added.

Tehran’s proposal includes elements of the Islamabad memorandum of understanding (MoU), which was signed by both the US and Iran on June 17.

Is Trump willing to accept some Iranian demands?

A US official told The Associated Press news agency last week that Trump is not willing to make a final peace deal with Iran until the issue of its nuclear programme is addressed. According to the official, who has not been named, the US president would be willing, however, to grant Iran sanctions relief and release some frozen funds if progress is made on the nuclear file.

Then, on Monday, US-based news outlet Axios also reported that Trump had offered Iran sanctions relief in return for concessions on its nuclear programme. The report also cited US officials, one of whom told Axios that the indirect talks had been “positive and constructive”, adding that Tehran had indicated it was “flexible” on nuclear issues.

Trump, however, angrily denounced the story as a “hoax” in a post on Truth Social, the social media platform he owns. He said the story was “not true” and demanded Axios remove the article.

Iran has been heavily sanctioned for decades. The restrictions have severely affected Iranians’ quality of life, including their access to essential medicines and healthcare.

In August, the US announced yet more sweeping economic sanctions on Iran and countries that trade with it as it sought to apply more economic pressure to isolate the country from the global economy during the diplomatic deadlock in their war.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent described the campaign as the “economic asphyxiation” of Iran.

It is difficult to quantify exactly how many Iranians have been killed by what Tehran views as “economic warfare”. However, a study published last year by the highly regarded medical journal The Lancet Global Health concluded that more than 564,250 people worldwide die annually as a result of US sanctions.

What does the US want?

In late February, just before the US launched its first strikes on Iran, the two sides were already holding talks hosted by Oman, which included the issue of Iran’s nuclear programme.

But before those talks could conclude, the US and Israel launched strikes, triggering the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, through which one-fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas is shipped in peacetime, by Iran. The closure of the strait has since become the primary point of contention between the two sides, when it had not been an issue before the war began. The strait is currently subject to blockades by both sides.

Throughout the war, Trump has repeatedly expressed his desire to strike a deal with Tehran. However, serious differences between the two sides will need to be resolved first, including the order in which issues are addressed for the purpose of peace talks.

Iran wants to establish its control of the Strait of Hormuz, have sanctions lifted and assets unfrozen, as well as ensure an end to US-Israeli strikes before it will go back to negotiating other issues, such as its nuclear programme. This was the order of events laid out in the MoU agreed between Iran and the US in June, but which quickly fell apart.

The US, however, wants everything to be on the table at the same time – it does not want to agree to anything relating to these Iranian demands before it addresses the other issues.

Scott Lucas, professor of US politics and international relations at University College Dublin, told Al Jazeera that Washington effectively wants Iran to surrender.

“The Strait of Hormuz has become a fundamental issue. The question here is, will both sides give? The memorandum of understanding clearly gave Iran a role in the management of the strait,” Lucas said.

“When the Trump administration pulled away from negotiating on the basis of the memorandum, they effectively went back to the idea of Iran having to completely allow passage through the Strait of Hormuz with no guarantees over it, in terms of not only what it means for Iran financially, but [also] in terms of Iranian security. The Iranian government is not going to agree to that, so we’re stuck in this limbo right now,” he added.

“Are the Trump folks going to come back to the talks on the basis of the memorandum of understanding or something that is a revised version of it, or are they going to try and break the government with economic warfare until at least after the US elections in November? That’s where we are right now.”

What does Iran want?

After half a century of bitter enmity with Washington, Iran wants to consolidate what it sees as the strategic gains it has made during a war it did not start. This specifically includes its newly established ability to close the Strait of Hormuz, sending global energy markets into a tailspin and placing additional pressure on the Trump administration.

Since US-Israeli strikes on Iran began on February 28, Hormuz has dominated talks aimed at ending the war and emerged as Tehran’s greatest point of leverage. Prior to the conflict, Iran did not exert control over the waterway and all commercial shipping passed through freely.

For this reason, Iran will not move on to wider peace talks until it has leveraged its control of the strait to get its demands met. “Our discussion is clear. Right now, it is only about the Strait of Hormuz,” Araghchi said late on Monday.

“The opening of the Strait of Hormuz is also subject to the fulfilment of a series of conditions that we announced to the other side.”

Ali Salehian, director of the Center for Intellectual Diplomacy at the Governance and Policy Think Tank in Iran, told Al Jazeera that Tehran does not believe Washington will honour any future deal as it did not honour what was agreed under the Pakistan-brokered June MoU.

“For Iran, the bottom line of every negotiation with Trump, considering all of his misbehaving and [military] targeting of Iran during negotiations, is the Islamabad MoU,” Salehian said.

“Tehran thinks that if the US doesn’t fulfil its commitments based on the MoU, there is no guarantee that any kind of future deal would be sustainable.”

What is likely to happen next?

It does not look likely that the diplomatic standoff will be eased anytime soon, analysts say.

Both the US and Iran have indicated throughout the war that they would prefer a diplomatic settlement to a continuation of the war. However, Trump has continued to threaten Iran with more strikes if it does not agree to a deal, and Araghchi told US news outlet NBC on Sunday that Tehran is also prepared to resume fighting, even though it has not abandoned diplomacy.

“We are fully prepared for the time for the war to be resumed, and I repeat, we stand firm in the face of any new aggression, even if it comes to a doomsday war,” he said.

Trump said last week that he expects a deal will be reached, but not until after the US midterms on November 3.

“For the moment, the Trump administration is going to try to make the Iranian government capitulate through economic warfare,” Lucas said.

However, a deep sense of distrust remains between the two sides. Senior Iranian officials believe Trump will restart the war after the midterms on a far greater scale and that Israel would also participate.

If that theory proves true, Tehran may well prefer the fighting to resume before November’s elections, as it would allow Iran to impose a greater cost on Trump.

“The reaction of the Iranians to that might be to actually trigger the war themselves, early, right before the midterm elections in order to maximise the pain that [it] will impose on the US president,” Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the US-based Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, told Al Jazeera earlier this month.

Mohammed Abu Hijleh still finds it hard to believe that his mother passed away just over a week ago; she had suffered from nothing more than diabetes. But the restrictions Israel imposes on various cities, towns, and villages in the occupied West Bank can alter a Palestinian’s life in an instant.

Zahriya Abu Hijleh, 66, was attending her niece’s wedding reception in her hometown of Deir Istiya, northwest of Salfit, on September 20, when she suddenly felt dizzy and collapsed.

After she was taken to the town’s medical centre, the doctor immediately ordered her transfer to Salfit Governmental Hospital, a facility just an eight-minute drive from Deir Istiya.

Mohammed requested an ambulance, but the vehicle could not enter the town because the iron gate operated by Israeli forces at the entrance was closed. Instead, an ambulance from the medical centre transported her to the gate, and from there, she was taken off the stretcher, carried past the gate on foot, and transferred to a second ambulance waiting on the other side.

It is a scenario that happens repeatedly in the occupied West Bank, Mohammed told Al Jazeera.

“My mother was breathing her last; had the gate been open, we wouldn’t have lost her on the way,” he said.

Medics later determined that Zahriya had suffered a pulmonary embolism and required urgent treatment, according to her family.

“Sadly, she died due to the delay,” Mohammed said. “She had no prior health issues other than diabetes.”

Comprehensive closures

The military checkpoints and iron gates erected by Israel in the West Bank have become a significant source of misery for Palestinians.

They disrupt daily life, causing delays for people trying to reach work, schools, and universities, while also posing a daily threat to the lives of the sick.

Israel periodically imposes closures on the West Bank for various reasons, including Jewish holidays. The current closure runs from September 27 to October 3, coinciding with the Jewish festival of Sukkot.

While Israeli settlers move freely between West Bank cities, and even storm Palestinian villages and towns under Israeli army protection, Palestinians are forced to wait for hours at closed checkpoints.

Ibtihal Mansour from Nablus endured such an ordeal last Friday while visiting her in-laws’ home in the village of al-Janiya, near Ramallah.

The family left the village at 10am, hoping to reach Nablus within 45 minutes. But they encountered closures at the Atara and Ein Siniya checkpoints north of Ramallah, effectively trapping them in the area.

“We tried taking alternative routes west of Ramallah, but were surprised to find the road between Ramallah and Nablus blocked by settlers, with all vehicle traffic completely halted. We remained on the roads, trying to find any way through, until midnight, a span of more than 14 hours,” she told Al Jazeera.

Her children were crying, exhausted after spending so long confined in the vehicle. Passing through one roadblock near Nablus, in an area called al-Lubban Asharqiya, a soldier forced Ibtihal to wake the children. When her 11-year-old son did not wake up, she said that the soldier punched him in the head, causing him to jolt awake crying.

“The scene was heartbreaking; I felt a deep lump in my throat and profound sorrow. Long hours of waiting in the vehicle ended with an assault like this, and the ordeal didn’t even end there,” she said, explaining that they had to turn back. “We were forced to spend the night at my sister-in-law’s home in Ramallah before setting out early the next morning for Nablus.”

Like Ibtihal’s family, many Palestinians travelling between cities and villages are forced to stay overnight in hotels or at relatives’ homes. Some municipalities have converted wedding halls and mosques into shelters for those stranded, providing meals donated by residents of towns near the checkpoints.

The Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission (CRRC) recorded 942 checkpoints, closure points, and obstacles across the occupied West Bank as of September 25, up from 793 in March 2024.

The total length of the obstacles amounts to approximately 107.7km (70 miles), according to data from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

The CRRC says the closures effectively fragment Palestinian communities, making access to workplaces, schools, medical facilities, and agricultural land dependent on whether roads and crossings are open.

Al Jazeera has reached out to Israeli authorities for comment on the road closures and the allegations from Palestinians in this article, but has yet to receive a response.

Strangling Hebron and Jerusalem

In Hebron – which has an Israeli settler presence in the centre of the Old City – the Israeli army has closed the Ibrahimi Mosque to Palestinians and tightened restrictions at checkpoints and gates leading to the site until Wednesday, all while securing access for settlers to celebrate Jewish holidays.

Issa Amro, coordinator of the Youth Against Settlements group, told Al Jazeera that soldiers have closed checkpoints and imposed curfews in several city neighbourhoods, restricting resident movement and making it increasingly difficult to reach the Old City and the Ibrahimi Mosque.

“The area west of the mosque contains settlements and closed zones, while access from the east is limited to a few roads. These measures make reaching the site both more difficult and more dangerous,” he explained.

The situation in occupied East Jerusalem is also fraught, as Israel imposes strict restrictions on Palestinian movement and access to the Al-Aqsa Mosque, while thousands of Israeli settlers enter the site and move about unhindered under heavy security escort.

Activist Fakhri Abu Diab told Al Jazeera that Israel’s closures in occupied East Jerusalem during the Jewish holidays are part of attempts to impose religious sovereignty over the city.

Abu Diab explained that Israeli settlers and hardliners head either to storm the Al-Aqsa Mosque or to synagogues to perform religious rituals, while Palestinians are forced to remain at home.

He described how the closures disrupt daily life in East Jerusalem, shutting shops, schools, and workplaces, and halting movement.

“Israeli police restrict the movement of Jerusalemites. Families and vehicles attempting to move about risk being attacked by extremists and settlers, while the latter are permitted to roam freely and dominate the streets,” he said.

LONG before Hollywood relied on CGI, making The Mummy meant dragging a crew into the depths of the Sahara Desert – and paying a brutal price for it.

From near-fatal accidents to deadly wildlife, the set was plagued with so much off-screen drama that crew claimed the ancient pharaohs had put a curse on production.

Despite the chaos, the film became a smash hit that helped launch the careers of its charismatic leads, Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz.

It also proved so popular that it led to two direct sequels and a hit spin-off over the next nine years.

Now, 25 years after it debuted, the beloved film is back for a fourth installment – scheduled for release in October next year – with Brendan and Rachel back at the helm.

New photos show librarian-turned-action heroine Evelyn O’Connell, played by Rachel, in character, looking as glamorous as ever at the age of 56.

A WHALEY GOOD TIME

Brendan Fraser gets Bafta nod after piling on 7stone for The Whale

BIG MOMENT

Brendan Fraser breaks down as his movie The Whale gets standing ovation

However, here are seven near-disaster stories from the original set that prove The Mummy filming was as perilous as its plot…

Brendan Fraser’s near-fatal noose

When the heroic character of Rick O’Connell is nearly executed at the start of the film, the horror wasn’t entirely just acting. 

Brendan Fraser stood on his tiptoes with a tight, real noose around his neck for a close-up shot.

When a stuntman pulled the tension a fraction too far, it instantly cut off Brendan’s airway, knocking him out cold.

He blacked out, and woke up to the stunt coordinator slapping his face back to reality. 

The crew’s comforting reaction? “Welcome to the club – the same thing happened to Mel Gibson on Braveheart.”

Oscar nominee Brendan said on the Kelly Clarkson Show: “I was standing on my toes like this with the rope and you only got so far to go. 

“Stephen [Sommers, the director] ran over and he said, ‘Hey, it doesn’t really look like you’re choking. Can you sell it?’

“And then the next thing I knew, my elbow was in my ear, the world was sideways and there was gravel in my teeth.” 

Venomous snakes

Filming in the Moroccan desert meant sharing space with some of the world’s deadliest creepy-crawlies. 

Scorpions, venomous spiders, and deadly snakes routinely slithered into tents and boots.

The danger was so severe that production kept medical helicopters on 24/7 standby, airlifting multiple victims out of the Sahara to rush them to anti-venom treatment before it was too late.

While he avoided getting bitten, Brendan shared to Entertainment Weekly: “They sent a memo out describing a type of snake. I think it had yellow dots on it. 

“They said, ‘If you see this kind of snake, do not go near it. Because if it bites you, at best, they’ll amputate your limb.’

“Anyway, there I was, pissing down a rock, and I look down and there’s the yellow-dot snake. I was like ‘f***!’ I just ran for it.”

Kidnap Insurance

Shooting near volatile border zones in Erfoud, Morocco, came with its own political challenges. 

Universal Pictures was so terrified of their stars being targeted that they took out kidnap-and-ransom insurance policies on the lead actors. 

Brendan explained: “[Producer] Jim Jacks said, ‘I took out million-dollar kidnapping insurance policies on you.’ We were like, ‘So, basically, you put a bounty on our head?’ He’s like, ‘That’s one way of looking at it.’”

On top of that, the King of Morocco provided military protection, leaving the cast to perform their scenes surrounded by soldiers carrying loaded assault rifles.

Brendan Fraser’s broken bones

Playing the action hero came at a staggering physical cost for Brendan, who insisted on doing his own stunts. 

By the time the franchise wrapped, he had sustained multiple injuries including a torn spinal disc and a cracked rib, which led to numerous surgeries over several years.  

He told Vogue: “By the time I did the third Mummy picture in China, I was put together with tape and ice – just, like, really nerdy and fetishistic about ice packs. I was building an exoskeleton for myself daily.”

Speaking about the long-term impact of his stunts on his body, he told The Telegraph: “I was doing stunts that were getting more and more demanding, and my body was just giving out… I was trying to fulfill expectations that I thought were required of me, but eventually, you hit a wall.”

Dehydration measures

The film was shot in the grueling, scorching heat of the Sahara Desert, which meant extra care had to be given for the cast and crew’s wellbeing.

To combat the threat of extreme dehydration and heatstroke, the production’s medical team provided a special, foul-tasting electrolyte rehydration drink.

Every cast and crew member was required to consume this concoction every two hours to prevent fainting, severe heat sickness, and collapse.

Apocalyptic sandstorms 

If the heat and wildlife weren’t enough, mother nature repeatedly tried to hinder filming.

The lost city of Hamunaptra was constructed inside a dormant volcanic crater, which proved challenging.

The desert weather frequently interrupted production, with unpredictable dust storms sweeping through the Sahara location, shutting down filming and forcing cast and crew to seek shelter. 

Kevin O’Connor, who played Beni Gabor, told EW: “You’d see one little black cloud and you’d think, ‘What is this?’ 

“This little black cloud would turn into a sandstorm that was blinding and threw the camera equipment around. It was insane.”

For weeks, the streets of Serbia were teeming with young people rallying against the government. At the height of the protests in March 2025, more than 100,000 took to the streets.

The student movement had called for early elections for nearly two years, and President Aleksandar Vucic, who resigned on Sunday, finally heeded their call earlier this month. He announced snap parliamentary elections for October 25.

With the elections originally not due until December 2027, the early vote is seen as an attempt by governing populists to cling to power despite widespread discontent.

Vucic is vying for the prime minister’s post, a role he has held before, appearing to yield to protesters’ demands not out of goodwill but in the hopes of ushering in a result that keeps him in office, analysts say.

But experts warn that elections will hardly solve the underlying political tensions gripping the country, triggered after 16 people were killed in 2024 when a concrete canopy collapsed at a railway station. Student protesters blamed the disaster on government negligence and alleged corruption.

The move “is essentially about reducing political risk”, Viktor Stamenkovic, a researcher at Belgrade’s Institute for Political Studies, told Al Jazeera.

“Given the circumstances, the ruling camp is choosing the electoral sequence it considers least dangerous,” he said, referring to Vucic’s Serbian Progressive Party (SNS).

Saving his skin: Elections a cling to power

Vucic could stall no more – both the presidential and parliamentary vote would have had to be held next year.

“Vucic has, for some time, been aware that further delay is unlikely to work in his favour,” Stamenkovic said.

Vucic’s presidential term expires before the mandate of the current parliament, said Stamenkovic. Serbia’s recent political history explains the order of the elections – the parliamentary before the presidential, the analyst added.

Presidential elections can fundamentally alter the parliamentary dynamics that follow – which is how Vucic’s party came to power, Stamenkovic explained.

Vucic cannot run for a third term under Serbia’s constitution, and no other SNS figure is as popular as him.

“In 2012, the presidential victory of the SNS candidate Tomislav Nikolic changed the political momentum so dramatically that the bloc, which had previously appeared capable of forming a parliamentary majority, was ultimately unable to do so,” said Stamenkovic. “The presidential result altered the calculations of the parliamentary parties and paved the way for a government led by SNS.”

Vucic, therefore, has good reason to fear the same scenario being repeated.

Vucic has built a personalised political system centred on himself rather than his party or any successor, said Stamenkovic.

“He therefore has to find a way of transferring his own political strength from the presidency into the parliamentary arena … effectively staking his political future on the parliamentary election.”

For Milica Vojinovic, an investigative reporter at the Serbian outlet KRIK, the goal of the governing party is to stay in power at any cost.

“They [want to] continue their corruption projects, which usually means finding new ways and public procurements through which they can take money… [including from] public budgets,” Vojinovic told Al Jazeera.

She cited irregularities in past elections, such as vote buying by the SNS, documented by election observers and human rights organisations, and feared that the next elections will see an “escalation of these tactics, now that the student movement is actually threatening to win the election and take power from Vucic’s party”.

The vote will not resolve country’s discord

Since 2024, the governing party has lost a sense of political legitimacy, said Stamenkovic.

“Even if – and this is a big if – SNS wins another parliamentary majority, it is difficult to envisage a return to a situation in which it can govern normally and claim the kind of broad social legitimacy it once enjoyed,” he said. “Virtually all polling shows that a majority of the country believes Serbia is heading in the wrong direction and that the time has come for change.”

Mass demonstrations have not taken place in Serbia for some time, as the student movement has shifted from organising large rallies to election campaigning.

The youth movement recently submitted their election list to state election authorities after a jubilant march through the capital of Belgrade, formally entering the race.

Polls show that this vote could bring representatives of the student movement into parliament and state institutions, said the Serbia-based Center for Research, Transparency and Accountability (CRTA).

“This is important for Serbia’s democracy … [They] will definitely improve the legitimacy of the parliament as the representative body,” the group said.

Transparency and anticorruption are priorities for most citizens, with the social and political reality in the country having changed in the two years since the railway station incident, the organisation added.

Vojinovic, however, predicted that if Vucic’s party continues to hold power, “we are to expect the most repressive measures seen so far against everyone who has been criticising, or in any way opposing, the government”.

Criminal cases have already been brought against some activists in the student movement, as well as a political analyst, she said.

According to Human Rights Watch, foreign agent laws, first introduced by Russia and seen being picked up by other nations, have been used to brand independent civil society, media and other dissenting voices as illegitimate and acting on behalf of foreign interests. Such a law was proposed in Serbia in 2024.

“Recent smear campaigns against my newsroom, as well as other independent media outlets and NGOs, lead us to believe that they may be a precursor to the introduction of a ‘foreign agents law’ in the near future, should Vucic’s party remain in power,” Vojinovic added.

EU rift no matter

Meanwhile, Serbia is no closer to joining the European Union, but that is not a real priority for Vucic, the experts said.

“It is widely understood that Serbia cannot make meaningful progress towards EU membership under the current system of government,” said Stamenkovic. “What matters much more to Vucic is avoiding serious political pressure and criticism from Brussels.”

Ratko Mladic’s funeral illustrates this balancing act: Serbia hosted the semi-official honouring of the former Bosnian Serb army general – who died while serving a life sentence for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the 1992–1995 war in Bosnia – but Vucic did not attend, he said.

“In some ways, the relationship between Vucic’s government and the EU resembles a couple trapped in a disastrous marriage who nevertheless do not divorce because both sides continue to benefit from the relationship.

“Vucic cooperates with the EU on issues that matter to Brussels, while the EU has for years been willing to overlook a great deal about the increasingly authoritarian nature of his rule,” he added.

The two are also at odds over Russia, which Serbia has ties with.

A public opinion poll in June by the CRTA and Stanford University’s Democracy Action Lab showed that among SNS voters, 15 percent wanted closer ties with the EU while 60 percent favoured relations with Russia.

“There is every reason to expect election day itself to be highly contentious,” said Stamenkovic.

Tulkarem, occupied West Bank – Hakim Mar’i spends his days lying on a single bed, his disfigured leg raised. The windows of Mar’i’s dilapidated apartment, his latest temporary shelter, are covered with old blankets. Unable to work, Mar’i has no money for electricity, so the blankets have to do. At night, his family lives in near darkness.

The apartment is just around the corner from mounds of rubble and gnarled iron structures that mark one entrance to the now-emptied Tulkarem refugee camp. For Mar’i and other Palestinians, the camp was a home once considered temporary. But now, even the physical structure – their home – that tied those generations together is gone.

The apartment is just around the corner from mounds of rubble and gnarled iron structures that mark one entrance to the now-emptied Tulkarem refugee camp. For Mar’i and other Palestinians, the camp was a home once considered temporary. But generations lived there, and now, the physical structure – their home – that tied his family together over the years is gone.

Impoverished, Hakim’s family is in disarray. With its debts mounting and its members facing another eviction, he said he has considered taking his life several times over the past year and a half.

Mar’i cannot afford treatment for his debilitating leg injury, which has developed severe infections. He said he sustained it while working as a labourer inside Israel in 2019. The wound worsened after Israeli soldiers severely beat him when they forced his family from the Tulkarem camp. Diabetes and other untreated conditions have piled on, but he is unable to pay for the needed medical care.

“This joint here is completely gone,” he said, gesturing at the swollen, blackened lower leg that prevents him from working.

“The medicine – by God, the medicine, I haven’t been able to get. My wife and kids tell me: get out travel. Go to America, Turkey – so I can the medical treatment I need… I’m a sick man.”

His mother, Salwa, sat beside him, less than a kilometre (0.6 miles) from their former four-storey home. She wept when asked about the family home that was built floor by floor after they were first displaced in 1948 from al-Khudayra, the Arabic name for Hadera, a city in Israel. “We really put a lot into that house,” she said.

After their removal, the Israeli military razed the Mar’i home so a road traversing the now-emptied camp could be built. “Seeing it destroyed was really painful for us – all of us,” she said.

It has been more than 20 months since Israeli forces emptied the Jenin, Tulkarem and Nur Shams refugee camps in a sweeping military operation in the northern West Bank, displacing tens of thousands of Palestinians whose families had already been refugees for three generations. Constantly renewed orders for a closed military zone now prevent their return.

Since January 2025, Hakim’s family has been forced to move four times. First, they fled to a converted youth centre before landing in a cramped apartment with their four children, all under 15.

Unable to pay rent, the family could see the landlord’s generosity run its course as this once-temporary housing arrangement now has no end in sight. Hakim owes money at the local shops for food he bought on credit. Some nights, the children eat at neighbours’ houses.

“I have children. I have food. I have drink,” he said. “My hands are empty. Nobody is with me. Nobody is standing beside me.”

‘We’re already at the brink’

The Mar’i family is among more than 33,000 Palestinians forcibly removed from the Jenin, Nur Shams and Tulkarem camps by Israeli forces in early 2025. This is the largest single episode of forced displacement in the West Bank since Israel’s occupation began in 1967, according to the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).

UN satellite imagery shows that 20 percent of all buildings across the three camps have been destroyed and another 28 percent are damaged.

“The level of destruction we are seeing is severe and unprecedented,” said Roland Friedrich, director of West Bank affairs for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.

According to Friedrich, 85 percent of those displaced have no regular income after many lost jobs when the camps were emptied. More than 80 percent of residents are renting, an unfamiliar expense for families who never paid for housing or utilities inside the camps.

The closed military zone covering the camps is renewed every two months, Friedrich said, with no indication of when – or whether – residents will be allowed to return. “What we saw there is forced displacement,” Friedrich said. “The UN’s position is very clear: People have to be allowed to return. The camps must be rebuilt.”

Unlike after the 2000-2005 second Intifada when the Jenin camp was rebuilt, displaced families and UNRWA staff fear there is no return plan this time.

The Israeli military stated the camps were emptied for “operational security” in its effort to root out fighters from the camps. Friedrich worried the aim of the military operations is to “change the geographical expression of the Palestinian refugee issue”.

Now more than 20 months into what was meant to be an emergency response, funding shortages have left UNRWA unable to cover the vast needs of the displaced population. It has moved some operations to keep schools and basic health clinics functioning. With funds dwindling, the agency has shifted to a “targeted approach”, leaving thousands without support.

Friedrich pointed to a rise in gender-based violence linked to the economic strain on families and to growing depression and anxiety among displaced children observed by UNRWA’s psychosocial teams. “We’re already at the brink now,” he declared.

‘Everyone went their own way’

While Hakim’s displacement plays out in the shadow of the camp, the family of Khadija Zbeidat face their own imminent eviction on the outskirts of Tulkarem. They live in the neighbourhood of Dhinnaba, where sparse houses are interspersed with greenhouses. They are unable to afford a residence closer to the city centre.

As Khadija sat on a couch in the middle of the yard, her many children and grandchildren ran past a small patch of plants she has planted – one of her few remaining joys. “I love plants,” she said. “We had many flowers in our home in the camp. Having the plants here is all I have to feel like myself,” she told Al Jazeera.

Khadija, a widow, shares a tiny spartan room with nine family members, nearly all children, along with a small bathroom and a kitchen barely big enough for one person to cook in. A worn couch takes up one corner. The ceiling is peeling above it.

The room was given to them rent free by a relative of Khadija’s brother-in-law after they spent four months crammed into her daughter’s house with nine other people. “It got really cramped, the pressure on each other,” Zbeidat said. “And we became a burden too.”

Khadija’s family was displaced in January 2025 from the Tulkarem camp’s Haret al-Nadi section, a significant part of which has been destroyed, she said.

“The camp was excellent,” she said of their life before. “I swear, I wish they’d take us back. Everything was close to us, dear – … the closeness, that sense of belonging and the warmth, the company and the neighbours.”

The memories that she cherishes most dearly and that bring her to tears are of food: the stuffed grape leaves and the maamoul cookies made as a neighbourhood together for Eid. This year, there was none of it.

“Nothing. No cookies,” she said. “Nobody even had it in them to do anything any more. Everyone went their own way – scattered.”

Like the Mar’i family and others, they were not allowed to bring their belongings during their abrupt displacement. Some residents have since been allowed to retrieve belongings once or twice from their homes in the camps, but much of what they own remains left behind. Khadija’s daughter-in-law at one point returned to the ruins of the camp – at the risk of being shot – to retrieve a doll left behind that Khadija’s granddaughter Sandy would not stop crying about.

In Tulkarem, displaced families live either in the poorest areas closest to the camp, like the Mar’is, or on the cheaper outskirts, like the Zbeidats, remaining close enough to the health and schooling services that UNRWA still provides. But even a simple trip to buy groceries requires Khadija, who has no car, to travel 2km (1.2 miles).

At night, the family sits outside rather than in the stifling heat of the poorly ventilated room, watching Israeli military drones pass low overhead. “What to do? We’re used to seeing them, to having them around, to them raiding houses,” Khadija said. “It doesn’t matter any more.”

The military raids that always haunted life in the refugee camps have now come to wherever the displaced refugees have fled to. “We don’t feel safe,” Khadija said. “Nor the kids. It’s dangerous. When they want to go out somewhere, my heart stays busy until they come back.”

Waiting to be kicked out again

For months after the displacement, landlords, relatives and shopkeepers absorbed much of the shock, allowing families to stay for free or buy food on credit. But as the emergency stretches to almost two years now, that informal safety net is fraying. The pressure is felt particularly in economically moribund Tulkarem, where many families had relied on jobs inside Israel before Palestinian work permits were revoked after the Hamas-led attacks in southern Israel and the start of Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza in October 2023.

The owner of the property where Khadija’s family is staying recently sent his sister to tell Khadija’s family to leave. “They think it’s been too long,” Khadija explained. “They want the land, to benefit from the land and the room. … But where can we get money, where to pay from? The rent is very high, and we can’t afford it. We don’t know what to do if she comes again and kicks us out.”

Hakim’s family is on the brink of eviction too. Like others, he received from UNRWA a one-time rental subsidy of 3,000 shekels ($985) and a separate 1,700-shekel ($560) multipurpose cash payment for short-term assistance. “Every minute, I am waiting for the landlord to kick us out,” he said.

Khadija’s family survives on credit from shopkeepers who know their situation and, for now, still extend it – but patience is wearing thin.

Hakim said this goodwill is collapsing: “You tell them: ‘Give me a day, two days. Be patient with me.’ They won’t bear it.”

As distant as a return to her family’s lands in 1948 feels now, Khadija still hopes to return to the camp one day. But she worries that her children may inherit an even more precarious existence than the one that preceded this latest dispossession – refugees for generations displaced yet again. “Only God knows what tomorrow will bring us,” Khadija said.

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Gaza City, Gaza Strip – The partially collapsed roof above Masada Abu Jarad’s apartment is now made up of broken concrete with twisted steel bars protruding from its edges.

And underneath the section of the room that is now open to the elements after the building’s partial collapse, Masada’s family have pitched a tent to provide shelter.

The 60-year-old knows the structure is dangerous. The Palestinian Red Crescent and the Civil Defence visited the family last week and warned them that they should leave. But in Gaza, where Israel refuses to allow proper reconstruction to take place after almost three years of its genocidal war, there are few places for them to go.

“We have no options,” Masada says. “I want to leave, but who will give me an alternative?”

She has lived in the building in Gaza City’s Palestine Square area for the past year, after returning to northern Gaza from displacement earlier in the war. But this still isn’t home. Masada’s family is originally from Beit Lahiya in the far north of the Strip, but had to leave early in the war after Israel decimated the area. They are still unable to return.

After repeated displacement, the prospect of moving again without a safe destination has become exhausting. And even if they could move, the cost is prohibitive.

“Even if there is a better place, tell me how I can afford to rent it,” Masada said.

Masada’s experience reflects a wider housing crisis across Gaza for the Palestinians who have survived Israel’s war, which has killed more than 73,000 Palestinians.

A joint assessment by the United Nations, World Bank, and European Union found that 371,888 housing units, 76.6 percent of the housing stock, had been destroyed or damaged as of October 2025. The assessment also found that rebuilding Gaza will need more than $71bn over the next decade.

The dangers of Gaza’s depleted and damaged housing stock became starkly visible on September 16, when a six-storey war-damaged residential building in Gaza City collapsed, killing 21 people, including 12 children, according to the UN and Gaza Civil Defence.

The collapse has become a warning for families living in other damaged structures.

‘I stay awake so they can sleep’

Abdullah Abu Hajar, 40, lives with his wife and five children in the al-Najma building in Gaza City’s southern Remal neighbourhood.

The six-storey building is severely damaged and unstable. About 17 families, roughly 50 to 60 people, are living there, according to Abdullah.

On the outside walls, municipal notices warn residents and passers-by that the building is unsafe and at risk of collapse.

At night, while his wife and children try to sleep, Abdullah stays awake and listens.

Every unfamiliar sound, such as concrete shifting, stones moving or an unexplained creaking somewhere inside the building, puts him on alert.

“I stay awake all night, keeping watch,” he said. “I can’t close my eyes. I keep just listening to sounds around me.”

Abdullah explained that he feels worried for his children, even though they have adapted to the danger. But he has not.

And after the September 16 building collapse, he grew even more fearful. Since then, he said, he has barely slept.

“I’m already on edge,” he said. “But I don’t know where I can go.”

Abdullah and his family were displaced from Beit Hanoon in northern Gaza after it was attacked by Israel, and moved repeatedly during the war, eventually finding the al-Najma building.

His extended family faces the same uncertainty. Abdullah said that one of his relatives has been moving between southern and northern Gaza, looking for a place where he can pitch a tent.

“I told him to come and stay with us,” Abdullah said. “But he is hesitant because of the condition of this building. At the same time, he has nowhere else to go.”

A room among the rubble

For Islam Hassanein, 36, the same fears are entwined with the place she calls home.

A mother of five, Islam has spent nearly a year living with her family in a single room on the third floor of a damaged building.

She found the room after searching for somewhere to stay. It was filled with rubble and debris.

“We cleaned it and stayed in it,” she said.

The building is leaning and visibly damaged. The plumbing doesn’t work, so the family uses a bathroom outside. There is little that resembles a family home.

But leaving has proved no easier than staying. “We keep looking, but we can’t find anywhere,” she says. “They might even force us out of here. What are we supposed to do?”

Islam says she would leave immediately if she were offered a safe place.

“If they find us a good place and provide us with a tent, we will leave from the morning,” she says. “But where is this place? And where is the tent?”

The building itself regularly reminds her of the dangers.

“Every day, you hear the cracking,” she says. “People who live here tell us, ‘It’s cracking.’ Then a column fell, and they took us out of the building temporarily.”

The potentially deadly risks will become harder to manage as winter approaches, with its colder and wetter weather.

Water can enter through exposed roofs and walls, and the already weakened structure will face additional pressure from heavy rain.

“Last winter was terrifying,” Islam said. “We were constantly afraid that the building would collapse. I spent most days in my family’s tent because this building was full of openings and would flood whenever it rained.”

“Now, I am very afraid of this winter, and I don’t know what we are going to do.”

The UN says thousands of people are sheltering in damaged buildings considered unsafe because better housing options are unavailable.

Israeli restrictions on the entry of tents, tarpaulins and other essential shelter materials are making the situation more difficult, leaving Gaza in a state of limbo, unable to move on from the war, particularly as Israel can choose to escalate the conflict at any time.

UNICEF estimates that nearly 84 percent of Gaza’s population, more than 1.76 million people, are living in overcrowded displacement sites or damaged and inadequate shelters, with little protection from cold, heavy rain and flooding.

Islam says the war has forced families to take risks they once would have considered unthinkable.

She worries about her five children, but sees few choices available to her.

“They are all afraid,” she said. “But what can we do? If there is an alternative, I will leave. We leave it to God.”