The Israeli military is planning to stay in Gaza through 2025 and is stepping up demolitions and the construction of more permanent military structures, Haaretz reported on Wednesday.
There is a significant portion of Gaza’s territory that’s under the control of the Israeli military, where the IDF has been destroying every building in sight and establishing military outposts, including the Netzarim Corridor, a strip of land that separates northern Gaza from the rest of the Strip.
According to Haaretz, the Netzarim corridor is currently five to six kilometers wide and about nine kilometers long, and the Israeli military is working to expand it even more. “Today, when you stand on the road in some places, you no longer see any houses,” an Israeli combat soldier said of the corridor, which includes the former site of a Jewish settlement.
The Israeli military has conducted a similar campaign of destruction along the Philadelphi Corridor, which is on the Gaza-Egypt border, and in a “buffer zone” along the entire Israel-Gaza border that cuts one kilometer into Gaza’s territory. In those areas as well, virtually all the buildings have been destroyed, and military outposts are going up. Haaretz previously reported that the Netzarim Corridor, the Philadelphi Corridor, and the buffer zone account for 26% of Gaza’s territory.
In northern Gaza, Israel is currently conducting an ethnic cleansing campaign focused on the cities of Beit Lahia, Beit Hanoun, and Jabalia, which have been completely cut off from aid deliveries as the Israeli military is starving the civilian population. Israeli forces are also demolishing buildings in the northern cities so the expelled Palestinians have nowhere to return.
The ethnic cleansing campaign and conquering of Gaza’s territory is expected to pave the way for Jewish settlements in Gaza. “When you see the roads being paved here, it’s clear that this isn’t intended for the ground maneuvers or for raids by the troops into various places. These roads lead, among other places, to the places from which some of the settlements were removed,” an Israeli officer in Gaza told Haaretz. “I don’t know of any intent to rebuild them, that isn’t something we’re told explicitly. But everyone understands where this is going.”
