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Two years of fighting have ravaged Gaza.

The Israeli bombing campaign and military incursion have killed more than 67,000 Palestinians according to the Hamas-controlled health ministry, almost the entire population has been displaced, and the UN states the majority of residences have been damaged or destroyed.

The offensive came in response to Hamas's unprecedented cross-border attack on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were slain and 251 more were captured.

Israel says it is attempting to dismantle the military and governing capabilities of the Islamist group, which is committed to the elimination of Israel 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 end the fighting immediately. Hamas has agreed to release all captives - living and deceased - and to hand over Gaza’s governance to independent Palestinian experts, but it has refused to agree to laying down arms or to giving up any future political role in Gaza’s leadership.

Gaza is merely 41km in length and 10km in width - about a quarter of the size of London - bordered on three sides by closed borders with Israel and Egypt and by the Mediterranean coast to the west, where a naval blockade is enforced by Israel. It is home to over two million residents.

Extent of Damage

Over nine out of ten residences are estimated 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 UN investigative commission says Israeli forces have perpetrated genocide against Palestinians in Gaza - although Israeli officials have dismissed the commission’s report, labeling it as "inaccurate and misleading".

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

How the Destruction Spread

The Israeli operation initially focused on the northern part of Gaza - where it claimed militants were concealed within the civilian population. The group refuted these allegations.

The northern town of Beit Hanoun, only 2km (1.2 miles) from the frontier, was one of the first areas struck by airstrikes. It sustained heavy damage.

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 initiated its land offensive at the end of October 2023.

But Israel was also launching aerial bombardments on the urban areas in the south which hundreds of thousands of Gazans from the north were escaping to. By the end of November, parts of the south of the territory lay in ruins, as did much 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 structures in Gaza 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. More than 46,000 Palestinians had been fatally wounded, as per the Gaza health authority.

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

Humanitarian Crisis

During the conflict, 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 involved in fierce combat 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 razed to the ground, medical facilities and places of worship have been obliterated and farmland where greenhouses once stood have been turned into sand and rubble by heavy vehicles and tanks used for destruction by Israeli soldiers.

Israeli authorities state militants utilize civilian buildings 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 - Khan Younis and Rafah in the south, Deir al-Balah city, in the centre, and the city of Gaza.

In just 10 days of 7 October 2023, Israel’s offensive had compelled almost 50% to abandon their residences, according to the UN's Palestinian refugee agency.

And by the time the truce was implemented after 15 months, an approximately 1.9 million individuals had been forcibly relocated - they remain unable to return home.

Households have relocated multiple times as Israeli forces shifted the focus of its operation, initially telling people in the north to relocate southward of the Wadi Gaza waterway, which divides Gaza approximately in two, and subsequently directing people to evacuate a series of "safe zones" in the south.

Airdropped leaflets by the Israeli army warned people to evacuate before military actions in the region. However, not all Israeli strikes are preceded by alerts.

Restricted Areas Grow

After the truce was terminated, it has designated more and more areas of Gaza as no-go zones - where limitations are enforced - or making them subject to evacuation directives, meaning residents have been instructed to leave completely.

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

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

Israel had also blocked any relief supplies from entering the territory at the beginning of March - alleging that Hamas was diverting it. Limited aid is now allowed in, although aid agencies still say it is insufficient.

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

The humanitarian organization ActionAid cautioned that a "renewed period of hunger and dehydration" was imminent.

Israel’s defence minister announced on 16 April that Israel would set up security zones in Gaza to provide a “buffer” to protect Israeli communities even after the war ended - Hamas has insisted that Israeli troops must pull out from Gaza under any lasting truce.

At the time nearly 70% of Gaza was affected by limitations imposed by Israel - 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 the month of May, Israel launched 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 whom are thought to be alive - and "finish the destruction" of the militant organization.

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

The initial stage of the operation focused on objectives within northern Gaza, Khan Younis, and Rafah but in August Israel revealed intentions to capture and occupy all of Gaza City itself - which it has referred to as the “last stronghold” of Hamas.

The city had been the most crowded part of the territory before the war, 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 classified as a “humanitarian area” - even though it has persisted in conducting lethal attacks 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-backed body.

But hundreds of thousands more continue to stay in severe living conditions, with medical and vital services failing.

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