Satellite images show Rafah nearly wiped out as Gaza demolition goes on

Satellite images show Israeli forces have kept demolishing Gaza neighbourhoods, including Rafah, after the ceasefire. The destruction has deepened displacement, stalled reconstruction and intensified scrutiny of Israel's conduct.Image used for representational purposes onlyDeiral-balah,Oct 7, 2026 10:22 ISTSatellite imagery shows that Israel’s military campaign has razed large parts of Gaza, with Rafah, once home to around a quarter of a million people, almost entirely wiped out. Demolition by bulldozers and explosives has continued even after the Israel-Hamas ceasefire agreement reached a year ago, as the Israeli military strengthens its hold over about 60 per cent of the territory.The destruction has added to the hardship faced by Gaza’s two million Palestinians since Israel launched its campaign after the Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023. More than one in 10 people from Gaza’s prewar population has been killed or wounded, most families have been forced to move several times, and with almost the entire population homeless, much of the enclave has turned into sprawling tent settlements with little prospect of early reconstruction.While the ceasefire halted major offensives and the heaviest bombardment, Israeli strikes on tents, cars and buildings continue almost daily. Israel says the strikes target Hamas members, but women, children and other relatives are often among those killed. At the same time, rebuilding has barely begun because Israel bars most construction material from entering Gaza, and the ceasefire plan for large-scale reconstruction has stalled amid the failure of Israel and Hamas to agree on the militant group’s disarmament.For many Palestinians, the war’s consequences remain immediate. Najwa Abu Eita lost her seven-year-old daughter when Israeli forces struck her home in the Nuseirat refugee camp in September 2024. Her three other children were injured. Abu Eita lost an eye, her face remains badly scarred and damaged, and she has difficulty breathing. A hairdresser before the war, she now lives in a tent beside the ruins of her home and has no work. “My 4-year-old son tells me, Momma, I’ll give you one of my eyes. And inside, I’m weeping,” she said. Gaza’s population is now concentrated in about 40 per cent of the territory, while Israel controls the rest. Satellite images from Planet Labs PBC show that in the areas held by Israel, most buildings have been bulldozed or blown into rubble, much of it after major fighting ended a year ago. The Israeli military says it demolishes buildings to stop Hamas militants from using them or to destroy tunnel networks. But a UN-appointed expert said in a report in February that the destruction of civilian housing and infrastructure in Gaza was “unprecedented even by the terrible standards of modern warfare since the 20th century”. The report said this could amount to a crime against humanity or even genocide, which under international law includes “deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about physical destruction”. Israel rejects accusations of genocide and says it targets Hamas militants and infrastructure embedded in civilian areas.The Planet Labs imagery shows at least 50 Israeli military outposts across the Israeli-held part of Gaza, including at least 18 built after the ceasefire began. Many of them stand on former neighbourhoods where nearby rubble has been cleared away. Most of Rafah had already been razed before the ceasefire, but images show troops are still demolishing the few buildings left standing. Several abandoned UN buildings remain, along with a municipal sports field that now appears to contain a military base. Another new base has been built on what used to be the main intersection in Beni Suhaila, which has been levelled over the past year and is now cut by dirt tracks where streets once stood. In the north, recent satellite images show that most of the al-Awda Hospital Complex in Jabaliya has been reduced to rubble, along with several UN-run school buildings. Jabaliya, once home to Gaza’s biggest refugee camp with about 120,000 refugees and tens of thousands of other residents, has been heavily destroyed. One of the few structures still standing is the octagonal Indonesian Hospital, which has been empty since troops shut it down in June 2025. A new Israeli base has been built nearby. Beit Hanoun, once home to about 70,000 people, and Shijaiya, a Gaza City neighbourhood founded 800 years ago, have also been reduced to long stretches of flattened homes and apartment blocks.Gaza’s economy has also been shattered. A higher flow of aid and commercial goods has pulled the enclave back from famine that emerged in some areas last year during a months-long Israeli ban on food and other supplies. Even so, most people still depend on international relief and jobs are scarce, with many linked only to selling goods in markets. Shadi Barawi lost his father early in the war. Soon afterwards, shrapnel from a strike near his home in Gaza City hit him and his leg was amputated, making him one of about 6,000 amputees left by the war. “I lost all hope in life,” the 35-year-old said. He said he remained the sole support for his family of six and his five sisters. A barber before the war, he has returned to cutting hair in the tent where he lives, balancing on crutches because he does not have a prosthetic limb. “I’m working in tough circumstances,” he said. “I’m on one leg. I might do cuts for three customers, then I get tired and stop and rest, but then I keep going.”Thousands of bodies are still believed to be buried under collapsed buildings. Since the ceasefire, Gaza authorities have been moving slowly from one site to another to try to recover them. Last week, a search team reached the Gaza City home of Haneen al-Khodari. She said that when the building was hit in December 2023, she was thrown into a nearby tree, and after spending weeks in hospital she was told that her parents, siblings and many cousins had been killed. The bodies of 17 relatives had remained trapped under the wreckage since then. After eight hours of digging, the team found only the remains of a small child and two bones before the search was called off. Sitting on the pavement, al-Khodari said, “We had been waiting for this moment for three years.” A plastic sheet laid out in front of her carried what had been found, marked with the words, “Mixed bones.”Across Gaza, the war has left behind razed neighbourhoods, military outposts, shattered livelihoods and families still searching for relatives under the rubble. With strikes continuing, rebuilding stalled and most of the population still displaced, the effects of the conflict remain visible across the territory.With PTI Inputs- Ends