For two consecutive years, the Israeli army acting under direct orders from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right Coalition Government has been carrying out what Palestinian and international observers describe as war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
The assault, they say, has devastated every aspect of life in Gaza and across the Palestinian Territories, affecting people, homes, infrastructure, and the very foundations of existence.
With the second anniversary of the war on October 7, and amid renewed diplomatic efforts to enforce a US-backed ceasefire plan, new details of the devastation continue to emerge.
Reports by international organisations indicate that more than 80 per cent of Gaza’s infrastructure and buildings have been destroyed, leaving the enclave a wasteland of collapsed concrete without roads, water, electricity, or communications. In essence, all the elements of life have gone.
According to the Palestinian News Agency Wafa on 5 October, Israel, as the occupying power, has committed acts of genocide in the Gaza Strip. Its military campaigns have killed or wounded around 240,000 Palestinians, the vast majority of them women and children, with thousands still missing beneath the rubble.
Homes, schools, hospitals, universities, and public facilities lie in ruins, while famine has claimed 459 lives, including 154 children.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health said in its latest periodic report that Israel’s escalating atrocities have gone far beyond statistics, amounting to systematic violations of all human rights. The health system, it added, has been deliberately targeted in a pattern that “amounts to genocide.”
Since the beginning of what Palestinians describe as a war of extermination on October 7, 2023, the ministry has reported that 67,074 people have been killed and 169,430 injured, many with life-threatening wounds or severe trauma. Thousands remain trapped under the rubble or stranded on roads where rescue teams cannot reach them due to continued bombardment and destroyed infrastructure.
Of Gaza’s 36 hospitals, only a handful remain partially functional. The Israeli military, according to UN data, has carried out more than 400 attacks on medical facilities and personnel.
Thirty-four hospitals have been destroyed or severely damaged, including the Al-Shifa and Al-Ahli Arab (“Baptist”) Hospitals in Gaza City, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir Al-Balah, the Al-Awda Hospital in Nuseirat, and the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis. At least 150 ambulances have been destroyed and emergency crews routinely prevented from reaching victims.
A recent report by the World Health Organisation (WHO) found that more than 42,000 people in Gaza have sustained life-altering injuries since the war began, including 5,000 amputations. One in four of these cases involves children. Many others have suffered severe burns, brain and spinal injuries, or damage to limbs, leading to permanent disability.
The report also highlighted the rising number of facial and eye injuries, particularly among patients awaiting medical evacuation outside Gaza, with these injuries often resulting in disfigurement, disability, and social stigma.
Before the war, Gaza had around 1,300 physiotherapists and 400 occupational therapists. Many have since been displaced, and at least 42 killed, according to WHO data. Another rehabilitation worker was killed and one wounded in an Israeli strike last Thursday.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a press conference that two years of conflict had “shattered Gaza’s health system and inflicted profound suffering”.
“The destruction of Gaza’s civilian infrastructure is immense, and rebuilding it will take years,” he said. “But the physical and psychological damage to people is even greater.”
He stressed that rehabilitation services are essential not only for the war-wounded but also for those suffering from chronic diseases and disabilities.
UNDER STRAIN: Since the war began, the WHO has coordinated the evacuation of 7,841 patients for treatment outside Gaza.
Following the closure of the Rafah Crossing in May 2024, it assumed full responsibility for all medical evacuations. Most cases involve trauma, cancer, cardiac, or ophthalmological treatment. Egypt, the UAE, Qatar, Turkey, Jordan, and several EU countries have received the largest numbers of patients.
However, Ghebreyesus warned that around 15,600 patients including 3,800 children are still waiting for evacuation.
“At present, we can only conduct one evacuation per week,” he said. “We call on more countries to receive these patients and for medical evacuations to resume to the West Bank, including Jerusalem.”
In August this year, a UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report confirmed that famine had taken hold in the Gaza Governorate and was spreading south to Deir Al-Balah and Khan Younis.
The IPC report found that over 500,000 people are facing “catastrophic” conditions – Phase 5 on the international famine scale – characterised by extreme hunger, death, and severe malnutrition.
Another 1.07 million people (54 per cent of Gaza’s population) are in Phase 4 (“emergency” levels of food insecurity), and 396,000 (20 per cent) in Phase 3 (“crisis” levels).
UN agencies said that renewed fighting, repeated displacement, and Israel’s continued restrictions on humanitarian access have created an “unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe,” with most Gazans deprived of food, clean water, and essential services.
It marks the first officially confirmed famine in the Middle East since the IPC system was introduced.
Despite hundreds of aid trucks stalled at Gaza’s crossings, Israel as the occupying power continues to block or strictly control the entry and distribution of aid outside UN supervision.
The UN says the quantities allowed in are “barely a drop in the ocean.”
Since March, Israel has tightened its blockade, fully closing the crossings to aid convoys and worsening what UN officials describe as the “most severe collapse of human life in Gaza’s modern history.”
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) confirmed that 1.9 million Palestinians have been forcibly displaced across the Gaza Strip since the start of Israel’s war, noting that the overwhelming majority of residents have been displaced at least once.
The UN announced that more than 1.2 million people have fled their homes as a result of Israeli attacks on Gaza City since mid-March.
On 11 August, Israeli forces launched a wide scale assault on several Gaza City neighbourhoods, demolishing homes using explosive-packed robots, shelling residential areas, firing indiscriminately, and forcibly displacing families as part of what Israeli officials described as a plan to “gradually reoccupy” the Gaza Strip.
Just days earlier on 8 August, Netanyahu’s government formally approved a proposal to fully reoccupy Gaza, starting with Gaza City.
By 20 July, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) had reported that 88 per cent of Gaza’s total area, about 360 square km and home to roughly 2.3 million Palestinians, was under Israeli evacuation orders, effectively forcing mass displacement.
UN reports noted that between 20 and 27 September, about 15 per cent of newly displaced people were forced to walk for hours on foot. Many families were compelled to sell essential belongings to afford transportation, while others, especially those with mobility challenges, had no choice but to walk long distances to safety.
Hundreds of thousands remain trapped in Gaza City and northern Gaza, according to the UN. As of 27 September, only 40 shelters were still operating in northern Gaza, down from 95 in July, after 73 displacement sites were forced to close.
Humanitarian agencies, overwhelmed by insecurity and forced relocations, have either suspended or scaled back their operations. Many families in Gaza City are now sleeping in the open air, without any form of shelter.
SYSTEMATIC DEVASTATION: Gaza’s education sector has been devastated, with universities and schools bombed, educators and students killed, and entire institutions erased.
According to the Palestinian Ministry of Education, Israeli bombardments have completely destroyed 179 public schools, damaged 118 others, and damaged over 100 UNRWA schools.
In higher education, 20 universities and colleges have suffered extensive destruction, while 63 university buildings have been completely levelled.
The ministry has recorded the killing of 18,069 school students and the injury of 26,391, in addition to 1,319 university students killed and 2,809 wounded between October 2023 and September 2025.
More than 1,016 teachers and academic staff have also been killed and 4,667 others injured.
“These figures mean that at least 30 schools together with their students and staff have been wiped off the educational map of Gaza,” the ministry said.
The war has deprived more than 630,000 children in Gaza of their right to education since October 7, 2023, alongside tens of thousands who have reached kindergarten age but have never had the chance to enroll.
Total estimated losses in the education sector exceed $3.5 billion, including the destruction of buildings, laboratories, medical and engineering equipment, classrooms, and sports facilities.
The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has also warned that recovering from Gaza’s environmental damage could take decades, saying the environmental situation has sharply deteriorated since its last assessment in June 2024.
According to UNEP, fresh water supplies have become critically scarce and heavily contaminated. The destruction of sewage treatment systems and water pipelines, alongside the reliance on primitive cesspits, has led to the severe pollution of Gaza’s groundwater, the population’s main water source.
Coastal and marine areas are also believed to be highly contaminated.
Israeli forces have destroyed 92 per cent of Gaza’s 178,000 dunums of farmland (a dunum is 1,000 square metres) and 1,218 agricultural wells.
Since 2023, Gaza has lost 97 per cent of its fruit trees, 95 per cent of its shrubs, and 82 per cent of seasonal crops, rendering large scale food production virtually impossible.
Out of roughly 250,000 buildings in Gaza, about 80 per cent have been damaged or destroyed, leaving behind 61 million tons of debris, about 15 per cent of which is believed to be contaminated with asbestos, industrial waste, or heavy metals.
Housing losses are estimated at $27 billion, including 210,000 homes completely destroyed, 110,000 severely damaged, and 180,000 partially destroyed.
“The situation is going from bad to worse,” UNEP warned. “If it continues, it will leave an environmental legacy that could affect the health and well-being of generations in Gaza.”
UN satellite imagery from UNOSAT, updated every three months, reveals an accelerating pace of destruction across northern Gaza. As of July 8 this year, 42,470 buildings in Gaza City and the northern governorates had been totally destroyed, up from 33,837 in February.
In recent months, Israel has targeted and flattened residential towers in Gaza City, following the devastation of Rafah in the south.
Local and governmental reports describe Gaza’s economy as “entirely destroyed.” Industrial facilities have been systematically targeted, halting all forms of production and leading to acute shortages of basic goods in local markets. Preliminary losses are estimated at $4 billion.
According to preliminary data from the Federation of Chambers of Commerce, Gaza’s commercial sector, including markets, banks, exchange offices, restaurants, hotels, and warehouses, has suffered losses exceeding $4.3 billion.
Entire economic districts have been wiped out, leaving tens of thousands without livelihoods and a once-thriving economy in complete collapse.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 9 October, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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