Gaza War in Visualizations After Two Years of Fighting

24 months of fighting have ravaged Gaza.

Israel’s aerial assaults and military incursion have resulted in over 67,000 Palestinian fatalities according to the Hamas-controlled health authority, almost the entire population has been forced to move, and the UN states most homes have been destroyed or severely damaged.

The military operation was launched after Hamas’ unprecedented cross-border attack on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were slain and 251 others were captured.

Israel says it is trying to destroy the armed and administrative capacities of the Islamist group, which is dedicated 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 halt hostilities at once. Hamas has agreed to free all remaining hostages - alive and dead - and to hand over control of Gaza to Palestinian technocrats, but it has not committed to disarmament 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 Egypt and Israel and by the Mediterranean Sea to the west, where a naval blockade is enforced by Israel. It is inhabited by over two million residents.

Extent of Damage

More than 90% of homes are estimated 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 United Nations commission of inquiry says Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza - even though Israeli officials have dismissed the commission’s report, labeling it as "distorted and false".

This graphic overview shows how Gaza has turned into uninhabitable.

Expansion of Damage

Israel's campaign first targeted the northern part of Gaza - where it claimed militants were concealed within the non-combatant residents. The group refuted these allegations.

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

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

But Israel was also launching aerial bombardments on the southern cities which numerous Gaza residents from the north were fleeing towards. By the close of November, parts of the south of the territory lay in ruins, as did much of the north.

Israeli forces escalated its airstrikes on the southern and central regions at the start of December, before initiating a land assault on Khan Younis, and by the start of 2024 more than half of structures in Gaza had been damaged or destroyed.

By the time a truce was announced in early 2025 an approximately 60% of buildings across the Gaza Strip had been harmed, with Gaza City experiencing the most severe damage. Over 46,000 Palestinians had been fatally wounded, as per 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 Crisis

During the conflict, the militant group - which is classified as a terrorist organisation by multiple nations including Israel and the UK - and additional factions affiliated with it have been engaged in fierce combat against Israeli forces on the ground. They have also fired thousands of rockets into Israel, especially in the first months of the war.

But in Gaza, whole neighborhoods 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 destruction by Israeli troops.

Israel says Hamas uses civilian buildings such as hospitals for armed operations - but the group denies these claims.

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

Within 10 days of October 7, 2023, Israel’s offensive had compelled almost 50% to abandon their residences, according to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

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 Wadi Gaza river, which divides Gaza approximately in two, and later ordering people to evacuate a series of "evacuation zones" in the south.

Leaflet drops by the Israeli army warned people to leave ahead of 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 an increasing number of regions of Gaza as no-go zones - where limitations are enforced - or making them subject to evacuation directives, meaning Gazans have been told to evacuate entirely.

At first 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.

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

Israel had also blocked any humanitarian aid from entering the territory at the beginning of March - accusing Hamas of commandeering it. Limited aid is now allowed in, although aid agencies still say it is nowhere near enough.

By the beginning of April all the UN-supported bakeries in Gaza had been shut down, most fresh vegetables were in very limited supply and hospitals were limiting distribution of painkillers and antibiotics.

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

The Israeli Defense Minister declared on April 16 that Israel would set up security zones in Gaza to provide a “buffer” to protect Israeli communities even after the war ended - the group has demanded that Israeli forces must withdraw from Gaza under any permanent ceasefire.

At the time almost 70% of Gaza was impacted 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, as reported by the UN.

And in the month of May, Israel launched a land operation named Operation Gideon's Chariots, which Netanyahu said would seek to obtain the freedom of the 48 remaining hostages - 20 of which are thought to be alive - and "complete the defeat" 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 first phase of the campaign focused on targets in Rafah, Khan Younis and northern Gaza but in August Israel revealed intentions to capture and occupy all of Gaza City itself - which it has called the “last stronghold” of Hamas.

The city had been the most densely populated 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 south west of the Strip which Israel has designated as a “humanitarian area” - despite the fact that it has persisted in conducting lethal attacks there and which the UN said was already overcrowded and unsafe.

Hundreds of thousands of residents have thus far evacuated the city of Gaza, where a famine was confirmed in August 2025 by a UN-backed body.

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

International Response

In September 2025, several countries, {including