Located in the north of the Palestinian territory, the cities of Gaza and Beit Hanoun are the most affected by the bombings.
In retaliation for the Hamas attack on Israel on Saturday October 7, the Israeli army rained a deluge of fire on the Gaza Strip. In less than a week after the start of their offensive, IDF helicopters and warplanes have dropped more than 6,000 bombs on the Palestinian enclave and its inhabitants, according to the Israeli Air Force count. These bombings left 3,748 dead and 12,065 injured, according to a report established by Hamas on Wednesday October 18.
To measure the extent of the destruction caused by these strikes, franceinfo mapped them using data analyzes carried out by the specialist firm Masae Analytics from images taken by the Copernicus Sentinel-1 satellite, between September 18 and October 17. 2023. Data from October 17 was acquired before the destruction of al-Ahli Hospital.
In the north of the Palestinian territory, two areas were particularly affected: the densely populated Gaza City and Beit Hanoun, just six kilometers from the Israeli city of Sderot.
In Gaza City, many buildings in the Rimal neighborhood, located along the coast and close to the city center, were razed by Israeli airstrikes. With its many banks, shopping centers and restaurants, it is one of the most prosperous areas of the city. It is also here that various centers of power for Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, are located.
Significant damage in two refugee camps
A few kilometers away, the refugee camps of Al-Shati (or Beach Camp) and Jabaliya, the largest of the eight refugee camps in the Gaza Strip, also suffered significant destruction. According to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), more than 90,000 refugees are registered in the former and more than 116,000 in the latter. Israel claims to be targeting the city of Gaza, in the North, to destroy the centers from which the Palestinian Islamist movement, classified as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union, operates.
While the threat of a ground offensive looms over Gaza, the IDF has been urging residents of the north of the territory since October 13, approximately 1.1 million people out of a total of 2 million, to flee to the South. In a few days, more than a million people have already left their homes towards Rafah, where they hope to be able to cross the border with Egypt. The exodus of Gazans is causing considerable concern within the international community, which is calling for the opening of a humanitarian corridor.