Nearly a month after the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, worshippers in Nuseirat, central Gaza, gathered inside a mosque that had been bombarded and left in ruins.

Its walls are cracked, the roof torn open to the sky.

Men spread their prayer mats across the dusty floor, bowing and kneeling among the rubble as the call to prayer echoed from a loudspeaker.

“After the ceasefire, things became stable, although the mosque is not fully ready for prayers,” said Imam Mohammad Abu Rous.

“We pray that the coming days will be better and that we will be able to rebuild this mosque and all of Gaza, God willing.”

“The situation is difficult for everyone,” said Adnan Imad, a resident of Nuseirat.

“As you can see, we pray in this mosque despite it being bombed, destroyed, and dilapidated. There are rats everywhere. We suffer greatly just to be able to perform our prayers in this mosque.”

Inside the mosque, an old man sat quietly in a corner, reading from a worn Quran, while others listened intently to the Friday sermon.

Imad said that life has barely changed since the ceasefire.

“Nothing has improved in the slightest. Prices are the same, everything is the same. We have no electricity, no water, and no ablution facilities in the mosque,” he said.

“If people want to perform ablution, there is no water.“

The fragile agreement, which began on October 10, aims to wind down the war that was triggered by the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel that killed about 1,200 people and saw 251 taken hostage.

Israel responded with a sweeping military offensive that has killed more than 68,800 Palestinians in Gaza, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

The ministry, part of the Hamas-run government and staffed by medical professionals, maintains detailed records viewed as generally reliable by independent experts.