🔗 Share this article

Two years of fighting have ravaged Gaza.

Israel’s aerial assaults and military incursion have killed more than 67,000 Palestinians according to the Hamas-controlled health authority, nearly the entire population has been displaced, and the UN says the majority of residences have been damaged or destroyed.

The military operation came in response to Hamas’ unprecedented cross-border attack on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were slain and 251 others were captured.

Israeli authorities claim it is attempting to dismantle the armed and administrative capacities of the Islamist group, which is dedicated to Israel's destruction and has been governing Gaza since 2007.

A peace plan has been proposed by American President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that would halt hostilities at once. Hamas has agreed to free all remaining hostages - living and deceased - and to transfer Gaza’s governance to independent Palestinian experts, but it has refused to agree to disarmament or to relinquishing any political involvement in the leadership of Gaza.

Gaza is only 41km (25 miles) long and 10km wide - about a quarter of the size of London - surrounded on three sides by closed borders with Egypt and Israel and by the Mediterranean Sea to the west, where a naval blockade is enforced by Israel. It is inhabited by more than 2 million people.

Scale of Destruction

Over nine out of ten residences are estimated to be destroyed or damaged; the healthcare, water, sanitation and hygiene systems have collapsed; and experts supported by the UN say there is starvation in Gaza City.

A UN investigative commission says Israel has committed acts of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza - even though Israeli officials have dismissed the commission’s report, describing it as "inaccurate and misleading".

This graphic overview shows how Gaza has become in large parts uninhabitable.

How the Destruction Spread

Israel's campaign first targeted northern Gaza - where it said Hamas fighters were concealed within the civilian population. The group refuted these allegations.

The town in the north of Beit Hanoun, a mere 2km from the frontier, was one of the first areas hit by Israeli strikes. It experienced severe destruction.

Ongoing Israeli airstrikes targeted Gaza City and additional cities in the north and ordered civilians to move south of the Wadi Gaza river before it launched its ground invasion at the conclusion of October 2023.

But Israel was also launching air strikes on the urban areas in the south which hundreds of thousands of Gazans from the north were escaping to. By the close of November, parts of the south of the territory lay in ruins, as did much of the north.

Israeli forces escalated its airstrikes on southern and central Gaza at the start of December, before launching a ground offensive on Khan Younis, and by the start of 2024 over 50% of structures in Gaza had been destroyed or damaged.

By the time a truce was announced in early 2025 an approximately 60% of buildings across the Gaza Strip had been harmed, with Gaza City experiencing the most severe damage. More than 46,000 Palestinians had been killed, according to Gaza's health ministry.

And the destruction has continued since the truce was terminated by Israel in the month of March - including in Rafah in the south. The UN estimates over 90% of the residential buildings in Gaza have been damaged during the war.

Humanitarian Catastrophe

Throughout the war, Hamas - which is classified as a terror group by Israel, the UK and many other countries - and other armed groups allied to it have been engaged in intense battles against Israeli forces on the ground. They have also launched numerous projectiles into Israel, particularly during the initial phase of the war.

However, within Gaza, whole neighborhoods have been completely demolished, medical facilities and places of worship have been destroyed and farmland where greenhouses once stood have been turned into debris and dust by armored vehicles and machinery used for demolitions by Israeli troops.

Israeli authorities state Hamas uses non-military structures such as hospitals for armed operations - but the group denies these claims.

Before the war, most of Gaza's 2.1 million people lived in its primary urban centers - Rafah and Khan Younis in the south, Deir al-Balah city, in the centre, and the city of Gaza.

Within 10 days of October 7, 2023, Israel’s offensive had compelled almost 50% to leave their homes, according to the UN's Palestinian refugee agency.

And by the time the ceasefire was declared 15 months later, an estimated 1.9m people had been forcibly relocated - they continue to be unable to go back.

Families have moved repeatedly as Israeli forces shifted the focus of its operation, initially telling people in the north to move south of Wadi Gaza river, which cuts the Strip roughly in half, and later ordering people to evacuate a number of "evacuation zones" in the south.

Leaflet drops by the Israeli military warned people to leave ahead of military actions in the region. However, not all Israeli strikes are preceded by warnings.

Restricted Areas Grow

Since Israel ended the ceasefire, it has designated an increasing number of regions of Gaza as no-go zones - where limitations are enforced - or making them subject to displacement orders, meaning Gazans have been told to evacuate entirely.

At first the orders to evacuate applied to two areas - in the North Gaza and Khan Younis governorates - with a “no-go” area in place along the whole border.

Aid agencies have to co-ordinate with the Israeli authorities to operate in the "no-go" areas.

Israel had also blocked any humanitarian aid from entering the territory at the beginning of March - accusing Hamas of commandeering it. Restricted assistance is now permitted to enter, although relief groups still say it is insufficient.

By the start of April all the UN-supported bakeries in Gaza had been closed, most fresh vegetables were in extremely short supply and hospitals were rationing medications and antibiotics.

The NGO ActionAid warned that a "new cycle of starvation and thirst" loomed.

The Israeli Defense Minister announced on April 16 that Israel would establish protected areas in Gaza to provide a “buffer” to safeguard Israeli towns even after the war ended - Hamas has insisted that Israeli troops must pull out from Gaza under any lasting truce.

During that period almost 70% of Gaza was impacted by Israeli restrictions - including the majority of North Gaza and Gaza City governorates in the north and the whole of the Rafah governorate in the south, according to the UN.

And in May, Israel launched a land operation named Operation Gideon's Chariots, which Netanyahu said would seek to secure the release of the 48 remaining hostages - 20 of whom are believed to be living - and "complete the defeat" of the Palestinian armed group.

Since then the regions affected by evacuation directives and limitations have been extended to cover 82 percent of the territory, as per the UN.

The initial stage of the campaign focused on targets in Rafah, Khan Younis and northern Gaza but in the month of August Israel revealed intentions to seize and control the entire city of Gaza itself - which it has referred to as the “last stronghold” of Hamas.

The city had been the most densely populated part of the territory prior to the conflict, with 775,000 people living there.

Those who remained there were instructed to relocate south to al-Mawasi in the southwestern part of the Strip which Israel has designated as a “humanitarian area” - despite the fact that it has continued to carry out deadly strikes there and which the UN said was already overpopulated and dangerous.

Numerous residents have so far fled the city of Gaza, where a famine was confirmed in August 2025 by a UN-supported agency.

But hundreds of thousands more continue to stay in dire humanitarian conditions, with medical and vital services collapsing.

Global Reactions

In September 2025, multiple nations, {including