US and Egyptian contractors screening vehicles at Gaza checkpoint

As he and his family queued in their car, Mohammed al-Rifi declared that that he would be able to “get back to life” once he reached Gaza City.

“I feel like I died and now I will get back to life,” he told Reuters news agency. “The feeling is indescribable – to see my family, my people, my neighbourhood.”

“My children did not see their home, did not know their home, did not know anything. They ended up on sand,” he added. “There was no life… I want to sit on the rubble and rest.”

Last week, US President Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy Steven Witkoff said “outside overseers” would be based in the Netzarim corridor crossing points to “[make] sure people are safe, and people who are entering are not armed, and no-one has bad motivations”.

A source familiar with the planning of the operation told the BBC that a “multinational consortium” had been brought together by the ceasefire mediators to “oversee, manage and secure a critical vehicle checkpoint along Salah al-Din road, facilitating the safe return of displaced Palestinians to northern Gaza”.

The source said the consortium “aims to ensure orderly vehicle movement while preventing the transport of weapons northward, in line with the ceasefire terms”, and that the checkpoint would be staffed by “neutral parties with regional experience and security expertise”.

“Current participants in the consortium include Safe Reach Solutions (SRS), a strategic planning and logistics company; UG Solutions, a globally trusted provider of integrated security solutions; and an Egyptian security company, reflecting a diverse and international composition,” they added.

Last week, the Washington Post reported that the contractors’ staff would be authorised to confiscate any weapons or military materiel found, external, but that the vehicles carrying them and their passengers would be allowed to continue their journey.

Palestinians were “going to go through that checkpoint, and we are not going to stop them. They just can’t carry anything deemed unsafe,” an UG Solutions official was quoted as saying.

They also stressed that the staff were “simply there to man the checkpoint” and would have no military mission or ability to detain combatants.

However, they will be armed with assault rifles, sniper rifles and pistols, according to an internal UG Solutions document seen by the newspaper.