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24 months of fighting have devastated Gaza.

The Israeli aerial assaults and military incursion have resulted in over 67,000 Palestinian fatalities according to the Hamas-run health ministry, almost the whole populace has been displaced, and the UN says most homes have been destroyed or severely damaged.

The offensive came in response to Hamas's unprecedented cross-border attack 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 armed and administrative capacities of the militant organization, which is committed to Israel's destruction and has been governing Gaza since 2007.

A ceasefire proposal has been put forward by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that would halt hostilities at once. The group has consented to free all remaining hostages - alive and dead - and to hand over Gaza’s governance to Palestinian technocrats, but it has refused to agree to disarmament or to relinquishing any political involvement in Gaza’s leadership.

Gaza is merely 41km in length and 10km in width - about a quarter of the size of London - surrounded on three sides by sealed frontiers with Egypt and Israel and by the Mediterranean Sea 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 medical, water, and sanitation infrastructure have collapsed; and experts supported by the UN say there is famine in Gaza City.

A United Nations commission of inquiry says Israel has committed acts of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza - even though Israeli officials have dismissed the findings of the commission, labeling it as "inaccurate and misleading".

This visual guide shows how Gaza has turned into uninhabitable.

Expansion of Damage

The Israeli operation initially focused on northern Gaza - where it said Hamas fighters were hiding among the non-combatant residents. Hamas denied this.

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

Ongoing Israeli airstrikes targeted Gaza City and other urban centres in the north and ordered civilians 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 air strikes on the southern cities which hundreds of thousands of Gazans from the north were fleeing towards. By the close of November, parts of the south of the territory lay in ruins, as did a large portion of the north.

Israeli forces escalated its airstrikes on southern and central Gaza at the beginning of December, before launching a ground offensive on Khan Younis, and by the start of 2024 more than half of Gaza's buildings 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 damaged, with Gaza City experiencing the most severe damage. More than 46,000 Palestinians had been killed, according to the Gaza health authority.

And the devastation has continued since the truce was terminated by Israel in March - encompassing Rafah in the south. The UN calculates over 90% of the housing units in Gaza have been affected during the war.

Humanitarian Catastrophe

Throughout the war, Hamas - which is classified as a terror group by multiple nations including Israel and the UK - and other armed groups affiliated with it have been involved in fierce combat against Israeli troops on the ground. They have also fired thousands of rockets into Israel, particularly during the initial phase of the war.

But in Gaza, entire districts have been completely demolished, hospitals and mosques have been obliterated and agricultural land where greenhouses once stood have been reduced to sand and rubble by armored vehicles and machinery used for destruction by Israeli soldiers.

Israel says Hamas uses civilian buildings such as hospitals for armed operations - but Hamas denies that.

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

In just 10 days of October 7, 2023, the Israeli military campaign had forced nearly half to leave their homes, as per the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

And by the time the truce was implemented after 15 months, an approximately 1.9 million individuals had been internally displaced - they continue to be unable to go back.

Families have moved repeatedly as Israeli forces shifted the emphasis of their campaign, initially telling people in the north to relocate southward 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.

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.

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 displacement orders, meaning residents have been instructed to evacuate entirely.

Initially the orders to evacuate applied to 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 humanitarian aid from entering the territory at the beginning of March - alleging that Hamas was commandeering it. Limited aid is now allowed in, 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 shut down, most fresh vegetables were in extremely short supply and hospitals were limiting distribution of painkillers and antibiotics.

The NGO ActionAid cautioned that a "new cycle of starvation and thirst" was imminent.

Israel’s defence minister declared on April 16 that Israel would set up protected areas in Gaza to provide a “buffer” to protect Israeli communities following the conclusion of hostilities - the group has demanded that Israeli troops must pull out from Gaza under any permanent ceasefire.

During that period almost 70% of Gaza was affected by limitations imposed by Israel - encompassing the majority of North Gaza and Gaza City governorates in the north and the entire Rafah governorate in the south, according to the UN.

And in May, Israel launched a ground offensive named Operation Gideon's Chariots, which Netanyahu said would seek to secure the release of the 48 captives still held - 20 of whom are thought to be alive - and "complete the defeat" of the Palestinian armed group.

Since then the regions affected by displacement orders and other restrictions have been extended to cover 82 percent of the territory, according to the UN.

The initial stage of the operation focused on targets in Rafah, Khan Younis and northern Gaza but in the month of August Israel announced plans to seize and control all of Gaza City itself - which it has called the “last stronghold” of Hamas.

The city had been the most crowded part of the territory prior to the conflict, with 775,000 residents living there.

Those who remained there were ordered to move south to al-Mawasi in the south west of the Strip which Israel has classified 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.

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

But many more thousands remain there in severe living conditions, with medical and vital services failing.

International Response

In September 2025, multiple nations, {including