🔗 Share this article

Two years of fighting have ravaged Gaza.

The Israeli bombing campaign and military incursion have resulted in over 67,000 Palestinian fatalities according to the Hamas-controlled health authority, almost the whole populace has been forced to move, and the UN says most homes have been destroyed or severely damaged.

The offensive came in response to Hamas's unprecedented assault across the border on 7 October 2023, in which approximately 1,200 individuals were slain and 251 others were taken hostage.

Israeli authorities claim it is trying to destroy the military and governing capabilities of the Islamist group, which is dedicated to Israel's destruction and has been in control of Gaza since 2007.

A ceasefire proposal has been proposed by American President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that would end the fighting immediately. Hamas has agreed to free all remaining hostages - living and deceased - and to transfer control of Gaza to independent Palestinian experts, but it has not committed to disarmament or to giving up any political involvement in the leadership of Gaza.

Gaza is only 41km (25 miles) long and 10km wide - roughly one-fourth the area of London - bordered on three sides by closed borders with Egypt and Israel and by the Mediterranean Sea to the west, where Israel imposes a blockade. It is inhabited by more than 2 million people.

Scale of Destruction

More than 90% of homes are estimated to be damaged or destroyed; the medical, water, and sanitation infrastructure have broken down; and UN-backed experts say there is starvation in Gaza City.

A UN investigative commission says Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza - even though Israeli officials have dismissed the findings of the commission, describing it as "distorted and false".

This visual guide shows how Gaza has become in large parts uninhabitable.

Expansion of Damage

The Israeli operation initially focused on the northern part of Gaza - where it said militants were hiding among the civilian population. The group refuted these allegations.

The town in the north of Beit Hanoun, a mere 2km from the border, was among the initial locations struck by Israeli strikes. It sustained heavy damage.

Ongoing Israeli airstrikes targeted Gaza City and additional cities in the north and instructed residents to move south of the Wadi Gaza river before it launched its ground invasion at the end 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 fleeing towards. By the end of November, parts of the south of the territory lay in ruins, as did a large portion of the north.

Israel intensified its bombing of the southern and central regions at the start of December, before launching a ground offensive on Khan Younis, and by January 2024 over 50% of Gaza's buildings had been destroyed or damaged.

By the time a truce was announced in early 2025 an approximately 60% of structures throughout Gaza had been harmed, with Gaza City suffering the heaviest destruction. Over 46,000 Palestinians had been fatally wounded, according to Gaza's health ministry.

And the devastation has persisted since Israel ended the ceasefire in March - encompassing Rafah in the south. The UN calculates more than 90% of the housing units in Gaza have been affected during the war.

Humanitarian Catastrophe

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

However, within Gaza, entire districts have been razed to the ground, medical facilities and places of worship have been destroyed and agricultural land where greenhouses once stood have been reduced to debris and dust by armored vehicles and machinery used for demolitions by Israeli soldiers.

Israeli authorities state Hamas uses non-military structures such as medical centers for military purposes - but the group denies these claims.

Prior to the conflict, the majority of Gaza’s population lived in its four main cities - Rafah and Khan Younis in the south, Deir al-Balah city, in the centre, and Gaza City.

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

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

Families have moved multiple times as Israel changed the emphasis of their campaign, first instructing people in the north to relocate southward of the Wadi Gaza waterway, which divides Gaza approximately in two, and later ordering people to evacuate a number of "safe zones" in the south.

Airdropped leaflets by the Israeli army warned people to leave ahead of operations in the area. However, not all Israeli strikes are preceded by warnings.

Restricted Areas Grow

After the truce was terminated, it has designated an increasing number of regions of Gaza as prohibited areas - where limitations are enforced - or imposing evacuation directives, meaning residents have been instructed to evacuate entirely.

Initially the orders to evacuate covered two regions - in the North Gaza and Khan Younis governorates - with a “no-go” area in place along the whole border.

Aid agencies have to coordinate with the Israeli government to work within the "no-go" areas.

Israeli forces had also prevented any relief supplies from entering Gaza at the beginning of March - alleging that Hamas was diverting it. Limited aid is now allowed in, 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 very limited supply and hospitals were rationing medications and antibiotics.

The humanitarian organization ActionAid warned that a "renewed period of hunger and dehydration" loomed.

The Israeli Defense Minister declared on April 16 that Israel would set up security zones in Gaza to provide a “buffer” to safeguard Israeli towns following the conclusion of hostilities - the group has demanded that Israeli forces must withdraw from Gaza under any permanent ceasefire.

During that period nearly 70% of Gaza was impacted by Israeli restrictions - encompassing most of the North Gaza and Gaza City governorates in the north and the entire Rafah governorate in the south, as reported by the UN.

And in May, Israel initiated a ground offensive named Operation Gideon’s Chariots, which the Prime Minister stated would aim to secure the release of the 48 captives still held - 20 of which are believed to be living - and "complete the defeat" of the Palestinian armed group.

Since then the areas covered by displacement orders and other restrictions have been expanded to include 82% of Gaza, according to the UN.

The initial stage of the campaign focused on objectives within northern Gaza, Khan Younis, and Rafah but in August Israel announced plans 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 before the war, with 775,000 people living there.

Individuals who stayed behind were ordered to move 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 persisted in conducting deadly strikes there and which the UN said was already overpopulated and dangerous.

Numerous residents have thus far evacuated Gaza City, where a famine was confirmed in August 2025 by a UN-supported agency.

But hundreds of thousands more remain there in dire humanitarian conditions, with health and other essential services failing.

International Response

In September 2025, several countries, {including