Did IDF Strikes Stop at the Gaza Ceasefire? What Its Own Footage and the Ceasefire Record Show

Two of the 18 clips of IDF targeting footage provided to the Hanover Institute are dated after the Gaza ceasefire took effect on 10 October 2025, and both record a strike diverted because children were near the target. The documentary NAZA premiered eleven months into that ceasefire. The plan the ceasefire rests on, endorsed by the Security Council in resolution 2803, never uses the word “violation,” and the body it charges with reporting states that violations occur “on a near daily basis” without giving a number. On the records examined here, IDF strikes continued after the ceasefire began, and no body publishes a count of how often it was breached.

Key Findings

• 2 of the 18 IDF clips, a party’s own footage, are dated 29 May and 12 July 2026; both end with a munition diverted because a child, then four minors, approached the target.
• Resolution 2803 (2025), adopted by 13 votes to none with 2 abstentions, endorses a plan whose text contains the word “violation” nowhere and names no body to count breaches.
• The Board of Peace, in the only report the resolution requires, states that violations “continue to occur on a near daily basis, some of which are serious,” and publishes no total.
• The IDF publishes a dated list of what it calls Hamas violations of the ceasefire, its own account, with no total, no rate, and no entry for any violation by Israel.
• Gaza’s Ministry of Health, the other party’s own count, reports 1,359 people killed since the ceasefire, to 10 September 2026, without separating combatants from civilians.

What do the IDF’s clips show after the ceasefire began?

In 2 of the 18 clips of IDF targeting footage provided to the Hanover Institute, the IDF’s own record, the date on screen falls after the ceasefire of 10 October 2025. Both end with the munition diverted because children came near the target.

On 29 May 2026 the subtitles read “Watch out, a child is coming, we are going to divert,” then “He is coming, we are going to divert.” On 12 July 2026 they read “Four people approaching, ten seconds,” then “Four minors, currently not very close,” and “Divert [ammunition].”

Each clip records a strike already under way, seven and nine months into the ceasefire, redirected in its last seconds. Neither shows the target, the reason it was being struck, or where the munition landed. The two clips dated just before the ceasefire, 25 and 28 September 2025, record the same kind of stop, one called off and one diverted.

The clips establish that the IDF was carrying out strikes in Gaza on those two dates and stopped those two. They do not measure how many strikes the IDF carried out during the ceasefire, or how many it stopped. The 18 are a selection made before they reached the Institute, published exactly as received; the full set is set out in the Institute’s report on the IDF’s targeting record.

The film they arrived alongside concerns the war itself. The Guardian, which produced NAZA, reports that it rests on testimony from 24 Israeli military insiders about “the secret systems used in the war on Gaza.” The ceasefire period is where the IDF’s own footage runs past the film’s account.

When did the ceasefire take effect, and on whose account?

The IDF, in its own account, dates the ceasefire to noon on Friday 10 October 2025, when “a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas came into effect.” Its summary of the terms is its own.

The IDF states that the conditions “consist of a 20-point plan, whose first phase stated that Hamas would return all 48 of the remaining hostages in Gaza, and fully disarm.”

Gaza’s Ministry of Health, the other party, records its casualty counts from “the ceasefire of 11 October,” a day later. Neither record explains the difference.

The written instruments came after the start. The plan itself is dated 29 September 2025. On 13 October 2025 four states signed the Trump Declaration at Sharm el-Sheikh: the United States, Egypt, Qatar and Türkiye. Neither Israel nor Hamas signed it, and it contains no ceasefire term; its nearest operative sentence is “We hereby commit to the resolution of future disputes through diplomatic engagement and negotiation rather than through force or protracted conflict.”

On 17 November 2025 the Security Council adopted resolution 2803, by 13 votes to none with China and Russia abstaining. Its first paragraph “Endorses the Comprehensive Plan, acknowledges the parties have accepted it, and calls on all parties to implement it in its entirety, including maintenance of the ceasefire, in good faith and without delay.”

So the ceasefire has a start the two parties date a day apart, a plan drafted by a third party, a declaration signed by the four states that brokered it, and a Council endorsement 38 days after it began.

What does the ceasefire text say must stop?

The plan annexed to resolution 2803 states that “all military operations, including aerial and artillery bombardment, will be suspended, and battle lines will remain frozen until conditions are met for the complete staged withdrawal.” That sentence, in the plan’s third point, is the whole of its cessation clause.

The point opens: “If both sides agree to this proposal, the war will immediately end. Israeli forces will withdraw to the agreed upon line to prepare for a hostage release.” The plan does not name, describe or map that line. The IDF’s statements refer to a “yellow line,” a name that appears nowhere in the plan or the resolution, and no document examined here maps either.

The plan never uses the word “ceasefire.” The word enters the record through the Council, whose first operative paragraph calls for “maintenance of the ceasefire,” and it appears three times in the resolution’s operative text. The plan speaks instead of a war that will “immediately end” and of operations that “will be suspended.”

Neither document uses the words “violation,” “breach,” “enforce” or “sanction.” The texts therefore say what stops, air and artillery bombardment and all military operations, and say nothing about what counts as failing to stop, who decides that it has happened, or what follows when it does.

That absence shapes every record below. A party that describes an incident as a violation is applying its own test, and a body that reports violations has no definition to count against. No document examined here says whether either IDF strike in the ceasefire-period clips fell inside or outside what the ceasefire allowed.

Who is charged with monitoring the ceasefire?

Resolution 2803 gives the monitoring role to a temporary International Stabilization Force, which shall “assist the BoP in monitoring the implementation of the ceasefire in Gaza.” That clause, in the resolution’s seventh paragraph, is the whole of the monitoring mandate.

The BoP is the Board of Peace, which the resolution establishes “as a transitional administration with international legal personality.” The plan names the President of the United States as its chair. The resolution’s only reporting duty, in its tenth paragraph, “Requests the BoP provide a written report on progress related to the above to the UN Security Council every six months.” The duty is to report progress, and the text sets no duty to count, classify or publish incidents.

The plan’s only “independent monitors” sit in its thirteenth point and supervise something else: “a process of demilitarization of Gaza under the supervision of independent monitors,” to be “verified by the independent monitors.” They are monitors of weapons decommissioning, not of the ceasefire, and the plan does not say who they are.

The force given the monitoring role had not deployed seven months in. The Board of Peace reported in May 2026 that “Preparations for deployment are well advanced” and that “Efforts are ongoing in force generation and deployment.” Five states signed the founding declaration of contributors on 19 February 2026: Albania, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Kosovo and Morocco.

The Board reports a separate coordination body, a Civil-Military Coordination Centre established on 17 October 2025 and “involving 50 partner nations and organizations.” Its report gives no incident count from that centre either. As of the Board’s report of 15 May 2026, two weeks before the first of the two clips, the body the Council charged with helping monitor the ceasefire was still being assembled, and the clause that charges it imposes no obligation to publish what it observes.

How often has the ceasefire been violated, on the reporting body’s account?

The Board of Peace, in the only report resolution 2803 requires, states that “violations continue to occur on a near daily basis, some of which are serious, and their human consequences, civilians killed, families living in fear, and continued impediments to humanitarian access, cannot be minimized.” The report gives no total, no rate, and no attribution of any violation to either party.

The report, dated 15 May 2026, covers 17 November 2025 to 14 May 2026 and reached the Council as the annex to a letter from the United States. It opens that paragraph: “Seven months into the ceasefire, the guns have largely fallen silent across Gaza for the first time in two years.” Elsewhere the Board of Peace states that “The ceasefire has held despite considerable challenges and violations during the reporting period,” and that “every violation, from whatever quarter, risks unraveling what has been painstakingly built.”

The report is the Board’s own account of its own work. Its finding on the principal obstacle, “Hamas’ refusal to accept verified decommissioning,” is its own attribution, not the determination of any court or inquiry.

The absence of a count is not a gap in the Board’s compliance. The resolution asked for a report on progress, and the Board supplied one. “Near daily” is nonetheless the entire quantification of violations in the only document the ceasefire’s own instrument requires, and “civilians killed” in the same sentence carries no number.

A second report falls due six months after the first, around November 2026. Until then the record holds one reporting period, one qualitative description, and no series from which a rise or fall in violations could be read. Anyone citing a number of violations for the ceasefire is citing a body other than the one the Council charged with reporting.

What does the IDF count as a violation?

The IDF publishes a dated list of what it calls Hamas violations of the ceasefire, its own account, on a page dated 19 February 2026, and gives no total. The page presents its entries as “IDF press releases addressing each ceasefire violation by Hamas since the start of the agreement.”

The IDF states the test it applies: “All these activities constitute a clear violation of the understandings of the ceasefire, and the IDF has been responding in accordance with the ceasefire agreement, eliminating terrorists who pose a threat to our troops and citizens of Israel.” The test is the IDF’s own, because the governing text defines no violation.

The recurring incident is a crossing of the line. The IDF records, in an entry of 20 October 2025: “the IDF identified several terrorists who crossed the yellow line and approached IDF troops operating in the Shejaiya area, posing an immediate threat to them. The troops fired toward the terrorists who crossed the yellow line in order to remove the threat to them.” A heading of 22 November reads: “Another Violation of the Ceasefire Agreement: An Armed Terrorist Crossed the Yellow Line on a Humanitarian Route, Fired at IDF Soldiers, And Was Eliminated.”

The list records only violations the IDF attributes to Hamas and other armed groups, and none by Israel. The words “terrorist” and “eliminated” are the IDF’s own. It gives no count of people killed in the incidents it lists, and its dates need checking before use: nineteen entries in its November block carry the year 2026 on a page dated February 2026, and so must be November 2025 entries with the wrong year.

The IDF’s statement on the film, of 11 September 2026, describes its conduct in the present tense: “the IDF strikes military targets and makes unprecedented efforts to minimize harm to civilians.” The two ceasefire-period clips are its own footage of two strikes stopped for children in that period. Its list of violations is its own account of why it was striking at all, and neither gives a figure for how often either occurred.

What does Gaza’s Ministry of Health count since the ceasefire?

Gaza’s Ministry of Health reported 1,359 people killed since the ceasefire it dates to 11 October, in its daily report of 10 September 2026, its own count and not independently verified. The same report gives 4,571 injured since the ceasefire and 831 bodies recovered from rubble.

The ministry is a health ministry under the authority governing Gaza, a party to the war, and its figures are its own. The Ministry of Health reported cumulative totals on the same day of 73,670 killed and 174,682 injured since October 2023. The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the Palestinian statistics office, estimates Gaza’s population at about 2.13 million at the end of 2025, an estimate rather than a count. The ministry publishes no split between combatants and civilians, and it adds records to its totals by administrative approval: 160 were added during August 2026 on the approval of what it calls a martyrs’ approval committee.

The ministry’s count and the IDF’s list measure different things. The ministry counts deaths it has registered; the IDF lists incidents it calls violations and says it responded to. Neither record says how many of the 1,359 died in the incidents on the IDF’s list, and neither is set against the other by any body examined here.

The two counts therefore cannot be combined into a measure of how the ceasefire held. A reader holding both knows that the IDF says it fired on people who crossed the line, that the ministry says 1,359 people were killed in the same period, and that no record links the two numbers.

The IDF’s two clips from the ceasefire period stand apart from both. They are the only records examined here that show a strike during the ceasefire at the moment of decision, and in each the IDF records a decision to divert.

What did the ceasefire’s first phase deliver, on the parties’ own accounts?

The Board of Peace reports that the last deceased hostage was recovered and returned to Israel on 26 January 2026, closing the exchange at the centre of the plan’s first phase. It states that of 251 people taken captive on 7 October 2023, 168 were returned alive, the last of them on 13 October 2025.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry counted 48 hostages still held on 14 September 2025, its own count, the same 48 the IDF’s page says the first phase required Hamas to return. On the other side of the exchange, the Board reports that Israel released 250 prisoners serving life sentences and some 1,700 Gazans detained after 7 October 2023.

The aid side has its own count. COGAT, the Israeli defense ministry unit that coordinates entry into Gaza, records 1,778,363 metric tons of food entering the Strip between 10 October 2025 and 7 June 2026, its own count. The tonnages rest on declarations by the humanitarian organizations and suppliers shipping the goods, not on weighing at the crossings.

The first phase’s other term, on the IDF’s account, was that Hamas would “fully disarm.” The plan puts disarmament in a later process under independent monitors, and the Board’s report names “Hamas’ refusal to accept verified decommissioning” as the principal obstacle, its own attribution.

On the parties’ and the Board’s accounts, then, the exchanges the first phase promised were completed within four months, aid entered under a count kept by one party, and, on the Board’s account, Hamas had not accepted verified decommissioning by May 2026. Each of those statements rests on a record kept by a body with a stake in the outcome, and each is dated.

What can the clips and the records not show about the ceasefire?

The IDF’s two ceasefire-period clips, its own record, show strikes diverted on 2 dates; they do not show the target, the reason it was struck, or how many other strikes were carried out that month. No record examined here supplies that count.

The gap runs through every document. The plan defines no breach; the resolution imposes no duty to count; the monitoring force had not deployed by May 2026. The Board of Peace reports violations “on a near daily basis” with no number, the IDF lists incidents with no total, and the Ministry of Health counts deaths without linking them to incidents.

A measure of how the ceasefire held would need three things no body publishes: a stated standard for what the ceasefire forbids, a record of each strike and each incident against that standard, and an attribution of each to a party. Each party publishes its own version of the second, on its own test, for its own side of the ledger.

The film’s questions sit before all of this. NAZA’s insiders, as The Guardian reports them, describe how targets were chosen during the war. Whether the same system chose targets after 10 October 2025 is not addressed in any record examined here. The two clips show that strikes were still being carried out, and that the same kind of stop still happened. Their dates are part of the footage as supplied, and the Institute has not verified when or where either clip was recorded.

Methodology and limitations

This report sets the two IDF clips dated after 10 October 2025 against the documents that govern the Gaza ceasefire: Security Council resolution 2803 of 17 November 2025 with its annexed plan and recorded vote, the Trump Declaration of 13 October 2025, the Board of Peace’s report of 15 May 2026, the IDF’s page listing what it calls ceasefire violations, the Gaza Ministry of Health’s daily report of 10 September 2026, and counts published by Israel’s Foreign Ministry and COGAT. The film’s claims come from The Guardian, which produced it; the film was not viewed.

The clips appear exactly as received, with their checksums; their dates are part of the footage as supplied and have not been verified. A clip counts as post-ceasefire where its on-screen date falls after 10 October 2025.

Every count here is a party’s own or the Board’s own. The ministry’s figures, the IDF’s list, COGAT’s tonnages and the Foreign Ministry’s hostage count are each self-reported and not independently verified. No body examined here publishes a count of ceasefire violations against a stated standard.

Conclusion

The IDF’s own footage answers the title’s first question plainly. Did its strikes stop at the ceasefire? They did not: two of its clips record strikes under way in May and July 2026, each diverted in its last seconds because children came near. Its own list of incidents says it kept firing on people who crossed the line, which it counts as violations by the other side. Gaza’s Ministry of Health counts deaths through the same months. The ceasefire held in the sense its reporting body uses, and strikes continued inside it.

What no record supplies is a way to judge them. The plan suspends all military operations and defines no breach; the force charged with monitoring had not arrived; the report the Council required describes violations near daily and never counts one. Each party keeps its own ledger, on its own test, for the other side’s conduct.

A ceasefire whose texts never say what breaks it leaves every strike inside it to be judged by the side that carried it out, or by the side it struck. Who, on the present record, is in a position to say whether the two strikes the IDF chose to stop were ones the ceasefire allowed it to begin?

Frequently Asked Questions

When did the Gaza ceasefire begin?

The IDF states that the ceasefire came into effect at 12:00 on Friday 10 October 2025. Gaza’s Ministry of Health dates its counts from the ceasefire of 11 October, and the Security Council endorsed the plan behind it on 17 November 2025.

Who signed the Trump Declaration of 13 October 2025?

The United States, Egypt, Qatar and Türkiye signed it at Sharm el-Sheikh. Neither Israel nor Hamas signed it, and it contains no ceasefire term.

What is the yellow line in Gaza?

It is the name the IDF’s statements give to the line its forces hold in Gaza. The plan speaks only of “the agreed upon line” and does not map it, and no published instrument examined here defines the yellow line.

Who monitors the Gaza ceasefire?

Resolution 2803 charges an International Stabilization Force with assisting the Board of Peace “in monitoring the implementation of the ceasefire.” The Board reported in May 2026 that the force was still being assembled.

Does resolution 2803 say what counts as a ceasefire violation?

No. Neither the resolution nor the plan it endorses uses the word “violation,” and neither names a body to decide whether one has occurred.

How many people have been killed in Gaza since the ceasefire?

Gaza’s Ministry of Health reported 1,359 killed since the ceasefire, to 10 September 2026, its own count and not independently verified. It does not separate combatants from civilians.

Did the IDF stop strikes during the ceasefire because civilians were near?

Two of the IDF clips provided to the Institute, dated 29 May and 12 July 2026, record a munition diverted because a child, then four minors, approached the target. They are a selection and do not show how often that happened.

Sources

• Board of Peace, 2026. Implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 2803 (2025): Report of the Board of Peace through the Office of the High Representative for Gaza. S/2026/418, 15 May 2026. https://documents.un.org/api/symbol/access?s=S/2026/418&l=E&t=pdf. Official record, the reporting body’s own account.
• COGAT, 2026. Humanitarian Situation Report During the Ceasefire. July 2026. https://gaza-aid-data.gov.il/media/e2gjueei/humanitarian-situation-report-during-the-ceasefire-cogat-july-2026.pdf. Official record, a party’s own count.
• Israel Defense Forces, 2026. A broken record on repeat: Major Ceasefire Violations. 19 February 2026. https://www.idf.il/en/mini-sites/israel-hamas-war-gaza/articles-israel-hamas-war-gaza/a-broken-record-on-repeat-major-ceasefire-violations/. Official record, a party’s own account.
• Israel Defense Forces, 2026. The IDF Spokesperson’s Response Following the Publication of the Movie “NAZA.” 11 September 2026. https://www.idf.il/en/mini-sites/israel-hamas-war-gaza/articles-israel-hamas-war-gaza/distributions-swords-of-iron-war-gaza/the-idf-spokesperson-s-response-following-the-publication-of-the-movie-naza/. Official statement, a party’s own.
• Israel Defense Forces, 2024 to 2026. Targeting footage of strikes diverted or called off, 18 clips. Provided to the Hanover Institute, 17 September 2026, and published as received. Official record, a party’s own footage.
• Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2025. Israel’s Objectives and Current Operation. Permanent Mission of Israel to the Multilateral Organizations in France, updated 17 September 2025. https://embassies.gov.il/multilateral-organizations-france/en/news/israels-objectives-and-current-operation. Official record, a party’s own count.
• Ministry of Health, Gaza, 2026. Daily statistical report, 10 September 2026. Media office channel, message 7607. https://t.me/MOHMediaGaza/7607. Official record, a party’s own count.
• Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, 2025. A Brief on the Status of the Palestinian People at the End of 2025. Ramallah. https://www.pcbs.gov.ps/en/post-details/?postId=23319. Official record, national statistical office, estimates.
• The Guardian, 2026. Secret systems used by Israel in mass killings of Gaza civilians revealed in new film. 10 September 2026. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/sep/10/secret-systems-used-by-israel-in-mass-killings-of-gaza-civilians-revealed-in-new-film. International press, the film’s producer.
• United Nations Security Council, 2025. Resolution 2803 (2025), with the Comprehensive Plan to End the Gaza Conflict as Annex 1. S/RES/2803 (2025), adopted 17 November 2025; recorded vote in S/PV.10046. https://documents.un.org/api/symbol/access?s=S/RES/2803(2025)&l=E&t=pdf. Resolution text and recorded vote.
• United States, Egypt, Qatar and Türkiye, 2025. The Trump Declaration for Enduring Peace and Prosperity. Signed at Sharm el-Sheikh, 13 October 2025. Daily Compilation of Presidential Documents, DCPD-202501008. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/DCPD-202501008/html/DCPD-202501008.htm. Joint statement by four states; the Federal Register notes that an original was not available for verification.