Gaza Reduced to Rubble: Satellite Images Show 83% of Gaza City Damaged, 1.9 Million Displaced

New satellite images have laid bare the full scale of destruction across the Gaza Strip, showing that entire cities and neighborhoods have been reduced to rubble after three years of Israeli bombardment.

The images, released by Google Earth and Google Maps in early 2026, reveal that once-densely populated areas are now largely wiped out. In the southern city of Rafah — home to approximately 300,000 Palestinians before the offensive — famous neighborhoods such as Tel al Sultan and al Saudi have been destroyed street by street, house by house [253772]. Two towns in southern Khan Younis, Juzaa and Abasan al Kabira, where more than 35,000 people lived, have suffered the same fate [253772].

"Looking at these images, it feels as if someone took each of these houses, put them in a mortar and crushed them," said Gazan poet Mosab Abu Toha, a Pulitzer Prize winner for his essays in The New Yorker [253772].

From above, much of Gaza has nothing left: no buildings, no paved roads, no mosques, restaurants or universities. In northern Gaza City, images show a makeshift tent camp inside the Palestine Stadium, where local football teams once played [253772]. Destruction is widespread both inside and around Al Shifa Hospital, Gaza's largest medical complex, where improvised mass graves are visible in its courtyard as many Gazans could not safely reach cemeteries [253772].

By September 2025, the United Nations Satellite Centre (UNOSAT) estimated that 83% of Gaza City's infrastructure had been damaged by Israeli airstrikes, with 17,734 structures completely destroyed [253772]. Israeli bulldozers have continued to operate since then [253772].

Further north, the towns of Beit Hanoun and Yabalia appear almost entirely burned and in ruins, with their farmland, orchards and greenhouses near the border flattened [253772].

Three years after October 7, 1.9 million Gazans — out of a population of just over two million — remain forcibly displaced, according to United Nations data. More than 371,888 homes have been destroyed or damaged, and more than half of the 36 hospitals are no longer working. The UN estimates that Gaza has been set back 77 years in terms of development [253772].

An independent UN investigation commission concluded in September 2025 that Israel is committing genocide in the Gaza Strip, citing the killing of civilians, mental harm to the Palestinian population, deliberate physical destruction, and measures blocking births [253772].

The destruction continues amid ongoing Israeli military operations. An airstrike hit Gaza City, killing four Palestinians and injuring ten others, according to local reports [253580]. Another strike hit the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood in northern Gaza City early Sunday morning, injuring five Palestinians [251200].

A young girl named Raseel is recovering from multiple surgeries after a strike hit her tent in Gaza, according to witnesses who say an Israeli helicopter carried out the attack. Israel's military says it has no record of the incident [254000].

An Israeli air strike also killed the head of Hamas' armed wing in north Gaza, with officials from both sides confirming the death of Izz al-Din Al-Beik in Gaza City's Nasr neighbourhood [252886]. A separate Israeli drone strike killed Mohammed Abdul Aziz al-Najjar, a presenter for Quran Radio, while he was producing media material about Quran memorization [253657].

Israel has barred journalists from entering Gaza for three years, making satellite imagery one of the few ways to document the scale of destruction [253772].

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