They all looked thin. Some of them have been there for days, begging to get into Israel. Some were Fatah fighters who shed their uniforms and weapons and fled to the border because they're afraid of being killed if they go back inside Gaza. (A few were wounded by Hamas gunfire and evacuated over the weekend.)

And then there was our man in Gaza waiting for us right in the middle of the Tunnel! He said everything was okay, everything was quiet and we delightedly shed any apprehensions we might have been harboring about this trip and hustled off behind him to our waiting van.

Ten minutes later we are in the middle of Gaza City, stuck in traffic like every trip we've ever made down there since late last century. Our man didn't warn us it was this normal. We haven’t seen a single checkpoint, only police.

But the uniforms look new, blue and black camouflage, and the badges looked new -- they are the Hamas Executive Force. These are the same masked gunmen who overran the Gaza Strip in three short days and put the vaunted U.S.-encouraged Fatah forces to flight. They look like a respectable police force. We are impressed, and make pictures.

Video: Watch Tom Aspell's report for Nightly News

Teenage boys wearing Day-Glo vests are helping direct traffic at intersections. Some traffic lights are working. Three men from the Palestinian Electricity Department are repairing an overhead cable. One of them climbs poles with spikes on his boots -- and walks funny when he comes down on the road.

We go to the United Nations office, where the director tells us Gaza has vegetables and fruit because they're grown locally, but prices of staples like sugar and cooking oil have jumped 50 percent, and all-important flour stocks will last just over a week.

There are 1.4 million Palestinians on the Gaza Strip which covers 140 square miles. They will need soap, detergent, toilet paper, diapers -- a lot of stuff. And Israel has the exits sealed for now, so nothing is coming in from outside.

Then the hospital: Grim stuff. ICU wards full of comatose Palestinian boys -- gunshot victims. The beeping of all of the life-support systems is very loud. The staff is quiet and concerned. They need the beds for more victims, or elderly patients in crisis. They need to move many of these critical patients to better hospitals in Israel, but Gaza is shut tight. Only a handful of hospital patients have made it out in the past week. We make our pictures and leave.

We then meet Muhammed Zahar, the Hamas leader normally responsible for foreign relations. We are invited to his house, where he is seated in the corner of a reception area. We ask him questions. He reminds us that 72 percent of Gazans voted for Hamas in democratic elections in 2006. We knew that. But how did it come down to this, a big battle in which his men crushed Fatah and the Palestinian Authority? 

"Fatah leaders and Fatah military commanders ran away," he said. So they did. A few dozen of them were at the Erez checkpoint right now, we recalled.

From there back on the streets, stopping along the way and filming a happy businessman, and then two civilians in a taxi. Nobody really feels like talking politics or blaming one side or the other for last week's fighting.

"All we want is to just be safe," said one of our subjects. 

We totally agreed when we left to return to Erez. It took about 30 minutes because we drove through a refugee camp. By now it is late afternoon so there were few people on the hot, gray, narrow streets -- some boys playing football, an old man sitting idle in the shade.

When we reach Erez, we say farewell to our man in Gaza and walk back down the Tunnel to the Israeli gate. We are buzzed and clicked through gates and scanners for 40 minutes and on our way to the Tel Aviv bureau by 7 p.m.

EMAIL THIS