Nearly 50% of all buildings in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed since Israel launched its brutal war on the Palestinian territory almost four months ago, according to British broadcaster BBC.
Satellite data analyzed by U.S. universities and seen by the BBC suggests that between 144,000 and 175,000 buildings across the coastal strip have been damaged or destroyed since Oct. 7. That corresponds to between 50% and 61% of Gaza's buildings.
The images, analyzed by Corey Scher of the City University of New York and Jamon Van Den Hoek of Oregon State University, also show that the bombardment of the southern and central Gaza Strip has intensified since the beginning of December.
Khan Younis, the main city in southern Gaza where Israeli officials allege Hamas' military leaders have their stronghold, has been particularly hard hit, according to the analysis.
Israel has repeatedly claimed that it is at war with the Palestinian resistance group Hamas, not with civilians. It accuses Hamas of carrying out attacks from residential areas, hospitals and other civilian buildings, and of using civilians as shields. Hamas denies this.
Throughout the Gaza Strip, residential areas have been devastated, formerly busy shopping streets reduced to rubble, universities destroyed and farmland churned up, the BBC reported.
The images showed that more than 38,000 buildings in Khan Younis have been destroyed or damaged. Thousands of people have fled the southern city due to the fierce fighting.
According to the United Nations, more than 1.3 million of the 2.2 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip, or more than half of the Gaza Strip's inhabitants, are now living in Rafah on the territory's southern border with Egypt.
On Oct. 7, Hamas and several other Palestinian resistance groups carried out an incursion of Israel near the southern border with the Gaza Strip, resulting in the deaths of around 1,140 people.
Israel responded with massive airstrikes and brutal a ground offensive that has killed almost 27,000 people, mostly women and children.
