Gaza Strip War in Maps After 24 Months of Fighting

Two years of conflict have devastated Gaza.

The Israeli aerial assaults and ground invasion have resulted in over 67,000 Palestinian fatalities as reported by the Hamas-controlled health authority, nearly the whole populace has been displaced, and the UN states the majority of residences have been damaged or destroyed.

The military operation was launched after Hamas's unprecedented cross-border attack on 7 October 2023, in which approximately 1,200 individuals were killed and 251 more were taken hostage.

Israel says it is trying to destroy the military and governing capabilities of the militant organization, which is dedicated to the elimination of Israel and has been in control of Gaza since 2007.

A peace plan has been proposed by American President Donald Trump and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that would halt hostilities at once. Hamas has agreed to release all captives - alive and dead - and to transfer Gaza’s governance to Palestinian technocrats, but it has not committed to laying down arms or to relinquishing 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 destroyed or damaged; 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 findings of the commission, labeling it as "inaccurate and misleading".

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

Expansion of Damage

Israel's campaign initially focused on the northern part of Gaza - where it claimed Hamas fighters were hiding among the civilian population. Hamas denied this.

The town in the north of Beit Hanoun, only 2km (1.2 miles) from the border, was one of the first areas struck by airstrikes. It experienced 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 launched its ground invasion at the conclusion of October 2023.

Simultaneously, Israel conducted aerial bombardments on the southern cities 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 a large portion of the north.

Israeli forces escalated its airstrikes on the southern and central regions at the beginning of December, before launching a ground offensive on Khan Younis, and by January 2024 more than half of Gaza's buildings had been destroyed or damaged.

By the time a truce was announced in early 2025 an estimated 60% of structures throughout Gaza had been damaged, with Gaza City suffering the heaviest destruction. Over 46,000 Palestinians had been killed, as per the Gaza health authority.

And the destruction has persisted since Israel ended the ceasefire in the month of March - including in Rafah in the south. The UN estimates more than 90% of the residential buildings in Gaza have been damaged during the war.

Humanitarian Crisis

Throughout the war, Hamas - which is classified as a terror group by Israel, the UK and many other countries - and other armed groups affiliated with 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 razed to the ground, hospitals and mosques have been destroyed and farmland where greenhouses once stood have been turned into sand and rubble by armored vehicles and machinery used for destruction by Israeli soldiers.

Israeli authorities state militants utilize civilian buildings such as medical centers for military purposes - but Hamas denies that.

Before the war, the majority of Gaza’s population lived in its primary urban centers - Rafah and Khan Younis in the south, Deir al-Balah, in the centre, and Gaza City.

In just 10 days of October 7, 2023, Israel’s offensive had compelled almost 50% to leave their homes, as per the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

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

Households have relocated multiple times as Israel changed the emphasis of their campaign, initially telling people in the north to relocate southward of the Wadi Gaza waterway, which cuts the Strip roughly in half, 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 military actions in the region. However, not every Israeli attack are preceded by warnings.

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 making them subject to evacuation directives, meaning Gazans have been told to leave completely.

Initially the orders to evacuate covered 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 authorities to operate in the "no-go" areas.

Israeli forces had also prevented any relief supplies from entering the territory at the beginning of March - alleging that Hamas was 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 shut down, most fresh vegetables were in very limited supply and medical facilities were limiting distribution of medications and antibiotics.

The humanitarian organization ActionAid cautioned that a "new cycle of starvation and thirst" loomed.

The Israeli Defense Minister declared on April 16 that Israel would set up protected areas in Gaza to create a protective barrier to safeguard Israeli towns following the conclusion of hostilities - the group has demanded that Israeli forces must withdraw from Gaza under any lasting truce.

During that period almost 70% of Gaza was affected by Israeli restrictions - including most of the North Gaza and Gaza City governorates in the north and the whole of the Rafah governorate in the south, as reported by 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 which are thought to be alive - and "finish the destruction" of the Palestinian armed group.

Since then the areas covered 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 August Israel revealed intentions 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 people residing there.

Individuals who stayed behind were ordered to move south to al-Mawasi in the southwestern part 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 unsafe.

Numerous residents have thus far evacuated the city of Gaza, where a starvation was verified in August 2025 by a UN-supported agency.

But many more thousands remain there in dire humanitarian conditions, with health and other essential services collapsing.

International Response

In September 2025, multiple nations, {including