Newly updated Google Maps satellite imagery shows the scale of destruction across the besieged Gaza Strip nearly three years into Israel’s genocidal war.
asserted
imagery → update → war
With neighbourhood after neighbourhood reduced to rubble and little left but the faint outlines of main roads, it is now almost impossible to tell one part of Gaza from another.
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it → reduce → another
Farmland has been charred, and centuries-old places of worship have been damaged or wiped from the landscape.
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places → char → landscape
A recent assessment by the United Nations Satellite Centre (UNOSAT) found that the number of destroyed structures across Gaza has increased by 9 percent since a “ceasefire” took effect nearly a year ago.
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ceasefire → find → effect
Overall, about 82 percent of structures in Gaza, roughly 200,000 buildings, have been damaged, and about two-thirds of those have been destroyed, according to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.
uncertain
thirds → damage → refugees
Using satellite images recently released on Google Maps, Al Jazeera compared Gaza before the war with today, from Rafah in the south to North Gaza.
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Jazeera → use → Gaza
The images of Rafah were captured this year while those of northern Gaza date from 2025 and 2024.
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those → capture → 2025
Drag the slider to the left to see what remains of some of Gaza’s neighbourhoods.
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what → drag → neighbourhoods
Tal as-Sultan, Rafah
Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city, became a major refuge for Palestinians displaced from across Gaza, but about one million people were forced to flee the area after Israeli military operations began there in May 2024.
uncertain
operations → become → May
Most had already been displaced multiple times and were forced to move towards Khan Younis, a city just north of Rafah, and Deir el-Balah in central Gaza as UNRWA shelters in Rafah were emptied.
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shelters → displace → Rafah
In western Rafah, the once densely populated Tal as-Sultan neighbourhood has been almost entirely wiped out.
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neighbourhood → wipe → Rafah
Satellite images showed little more than sand where homes once stood.
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homes → show → sand
Al-Mawasi, Rafah
Al-Mawasi, once a sparsely populated coastal strip of sand and farmland stretching along the coast of the Rafah and Khan Younis governorates, was declared a “humanitarian zone” by Israel early in the war.
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Mawasi → stretch → war
It told displaced Palestinians to seek safety there.
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It → tell → safety
In May 2024 as Israel prepared to invade the city of Rafah, then-US President Joe Biden warned: “If they go into Rafah, … I’m not supplying the weapons.”
uncertain
I → prepare → weapons
Israel went ahead with the operation, pushing hundreds of thousands more people into al-Mawasi, which it has since bombed repeatedly.
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it → go → which
The latest satellite images show the once largely empty area now covered in tents and packed with families who have nowhere else to go.
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who → show → nowhere
Indonesian Istiqlal Mosque, Khan Younis
Khan Younis recorded the highest number of damaged structures of any governorate in UNOSAT’s October 2025 assessment with 51,885 structures.
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Mosque → record → structures
The governorate was also one of Gaza’s main agricultural hubs, and Khan Younis has recorded the largest total area of damaged cropland in the Gaza Strip.
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Younis → record → Strip
The Indonesian Istiqlal Mosque in the Ma’an area of Khan Younis was destroyed during the war after being reopened less than two years earlier.
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Mosque → destroy → war
Port of Gaza, Gaza City
Gaza governorate recorded the second-highest number of damaged structures in UNOSAT’s October 2025 assessment at 51,530 with 41,663 in Gaza City alone.
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Port → record → City
Among the worst-hit sites has been Gaza City’s port, the heart of a fishing industry that once supported about 110,000 people.
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that → hit → people
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization said the port has been severely damaged and most of its fishing boats destroyed.
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most → say → boats
Jabalia refugee camp, North Gaza
The North Gaza governorate had the highest proportion of damaged cropland in the Strip with 94 percent damaged by July 2025, according to the UN’s Office of Humanitarian Affairs.
uncertain
percent → have → Affairs
During the war, Beit Lahiya, Jabalia and other communities in the north were subjected to repeated Israeli military operations, forced displacements and severe restrictions to humanitarian aid.
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Lahiya → subject → aid
Jabalia refugee camp, the largest of Gaza’s eight camps, has been destroyed with satellite images showing entire blocks reduced to rubble.
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blocks → destroy → rubble
Since Israel’s war on Gaza began on October 7, 2023, more than 74,000 Palestinians have been killed and more than 175,000 have been injured.
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175,000 → begin → October
The true toll is likely higher because many people are still missing beneath the rubble.
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people → miss → rubble
Since the October “ceasefire” last year, more than 1,400 people have been killed and almost 5,000 injured.
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5,000 → kill → ceasefire
The Aporia
