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24 months of conflict have ravaged Gaza.

The Israeli bombing campaign and military incursion have resulted in over 67,000 Palestinian fatalities as reported by 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 military operation came in response to Hamas’ unprecedented cross-border attack on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were captured.

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

A ceasefire proposal has been proposed by American President Donald Trump and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that would end the fighting immediately. The group has consented to free all remaining hostages - alive and dead - and to transfer control of Gaza to independent Palestinian experts, but it has not committed to laying down arms or to giving up any future political role in the leadership of Gaza.

Gaza is merely 41km in length and 10km in width - about a quarter of the size of London - surrounded on three sides by closed borders with Israel and Egypt and by the Mediterranean Sea to the west, where Israel imposes a blockade. It is home to more than 2 million people.

Scale of Destruction

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

A United Nations commission of inquiry says Israeli forces have perpetrated acts of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza - although Israel has rejected the commission’s report, describing it as "distorted and false".

This graphic overview shows how Gaza has turned into unlivable.

Expansion of Damage

The Israeli operation first targeted northern Gaza - where it said Hamas fighters were hiding among the civilian population. The group refuted these allegations.

The town in the north of Beit Hanoun, only 2km (1.2 miles) from the frontier, was among the initial locations hit by Israeli strikes. It experienced severe destruction.

Israel continued to bomb Gaza City and other urban centres in the north and instructed residents to relocate southward of the Wadi Gaza river before it launched its ground invasion at the end of October 2023.

But Israel was also launching aerial bombardments on the southern cities 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 airstrikes on southern and central Gaza at the beginning of December, before launching a ground offensive on Khan Younis, and by January 2024 more than half of structures in Gaza had been destroyed or damaged.

By the time a ceasefire was declared in January 2025 an approximately 60% of buildings across the Gaza Strip had been damaged, with Gaza City suffering the heaviest destruction. More than 46,000 Palestinians had been killed, according to the Gaza health authority.

And the devastation has continued since Israel ended the ceasefire in the month of March - encompassing Rafah in the south. The UN calculates over 90% of the residential buildings in Gaza have been affected during the war.

Humanitarian Crisis

During the conflict, Hamas - which is designated as a terrorist organisation by multiple nations including Israel and the UK - and additional factions allied to it have been involved 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.

But in Gaza, whole neighborhoods have been razed to the ground, hospitals and mosques have been obliterated and farmland where greenhouses previously existed have been turned into sand and rubble by heavy vehicles and tanks used for destruction by Israeli soldiers.

Israel says militants utilize non-military structures such as medical centers for armed operations - but the group denies these claims.

Prior to the conflict, the majority of Gaza’s population 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 7 October 2023, the Israeli military campaign had forced nearly half to leave their homes, as per the UN's Palestinian refugee agency.

And by the time the truce was implemented 15 months later, an estimated 1.9m people had been internally displaced - they remain unable to return home.

Families have moved repeatedly as Israeli forces shifted the focus of its operation, first instructing people in the north to move south of Wadi Gaza river, which divides Gaza approximately in two, and subsequently directing people to evacuate a series of "evacuation zones" in the south.

Airdropped leaflets by the Israeli military alerted residents to evacuate before military actions in the region. However, not every Israeli attack are preceded by alerts.

Expansion of Restricted Zones

Since Israel ended the ceasefire, it has designated more and more areas of Gaza as no-go zones - where restrictions are in place - or imposing displacement orders, meaning Gazans have been told to leave completely.

Initially the evacuation orders applied to two areas - in the North Gaza and Khan Younis governorates - with a “no-go” area in place along the entire frontier.

Humanitarian organizations have to co-ordinate with the Israeli government to work within the "no-go" areas.

Israeli forces had also prevented any relief supplies from entering the territory at the start of March - accusing Hamas of diverting it. Limited aid is now permitted to enter, although relief groups still say it is nowhere near enough.

By the beginning of April every bakery supported by the UN in Gaza had been closed, most fresh vegetables were in extremely short supply and hospitals were rationing medications and antibiotics.

The NGO ActionAid cautioned that a "renewed period of hunger and dehydration" loomed.

Israel’s defence minister announced on April 16 that Israel would set up protected areas in Gaza to create a protective barrier to protect Israeli communities even after the war ended - the group has demanded that Israeli troops must pull out from Gaza under any lasting truce.

At the time nearly 70% of Gaza was impacted by Israeli restrictions - encompassing the majority of 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 land operation named Operation Gideon's Chariots, which the Prime Minister stated would aim to obtain the freedom of the 48 remaining hostages - 20 of which are thought to be alive - and "finish the destruction" of the Palestinian armed group.

From that point onward the areas covered by displacement orders and other restrictions have been extended to cover 82 percent of the territory, as per the UN.

The initial stage of the operation focused on objectives within northern Gaza, Khan Younis, and Rafah but in August Israel announced plans to seize and control all of Gaza City 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.

Those who remained there were ordered to move south to al-Mawasi in the south west of the Strip which Israel has designated as a “humanitarian area” - even though it has persisted in conducting lethal attacks there and which the UN said was already overcrowded and dangerous.

Numerous residents have so far fled Gaza City, where a starvation was verified in August 2025 by a UN-backed body.

But hundreds of thousands more remain there in dire humanitarian conditions, with medical and vital services failing.

International Response

In September 2025, multiple nations, {including