Amman, May 13 -- Seventeen Palestinian children returned to the Gaza Strip on Tuesday after completing their treatment in Jordan, the state-run Petra news agency reported.

The children, with their families, arrived in Jordan on March 4 through land and air evacuations carried out by the Jordan Armed Forces-Arab Army in cooperation with the World Health Organization and the Jordanian Ministry of Health.

They were part of a first group of 29 children brought to Jordan for advanced medical care -- the initial phase of a broader initiative to treat 2,000 injured or ill children from Gaza in Jordanian hospitals. The remaining 12 children are continuing their treatment in hospitals across the kingdom.

The medical initiative is one of several h...