On October 10, 2025, a ceasefire in the besieged Gaza Strip officially came into effect, based on the 20-point peace plan proposed by US President Donald Trump.
However, in practice, it quickly became clear that the ceasefire signaled a transition to a new phase of warfare, one characterized by destruction. While the bloodshed did decrease somewhat, it did not cease entirely, while the rate of destruction increased.
This destruction is not indiscriminate, carried out through shelling, but rather systematic demolition by bulldozers. It is a new phase of warfare in which armored Caterpillar D9 bulldozers have replaced tanks and artillery.
Within weeks of the agreement taking effect, satellite images captured by BBC Verify revealed that Israeli military units had not only failed to halt their operations in the occupied territories, but had intensified them. The photos, the most recent taken on November 8, document the systematic destruction of more than 1,500 residential buildings in areas that Israel was obligated to evacuate during the agreement.
This is corroborated by documented video footage showing Israeli engineering units leveling undamaged neighborhoods with bulldozers and clearing wide pathways through residential areas that had survived two years of bombardment.
One of the areas that suffered this type of systematic destruction is the large Abasan area in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip. Satellite images show that many buildings in the area showed no structural damage or alteration until the ceasefire, before Israeli military units razed them to the ground in the following weeks.
In another area, near Al-Bayouk (Al-Nasr), east of Rafah, BBC satellite images show the same scene, with numerous buildings that appeared intact from the air before the ceasefire being destroyed. The same pattern is repeated in Gaza City itself, in the Shuja’iyya neighborhood to the east, and also near the Indonesian Hospital on the outskirts of Jabalia refugee camp, where many homes and structures were razed to the ground after the ceasefire.
An analysis by Al Jazeera’s Sanad news agency, which included photographs taken between November 5 and December 13, reveals systematic destruction in the Shuja’iyya and Tuffah neighborhoods of Gaza City, as well as in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip, and extending to the southern city of Rafah.
These demolitions fall under a broader category of ceasefire violations committed by the Israeli army, which the Government Media Office in Gaza documented as totaling 969 violations up to December 28.
The list of violations included 298 direct gunfire incidents targeting civilians, 54 incursions by military vehicles into residential areas, and 455 incidents of shelling and targeting of civilians and their homes.
In addition, there were 162 incidents of demolition and destruction of homes, institutions, and civilian buildings, and 45 cases of unlawful arrests carried out by Israeli occupation forces. These violations resulted in the deaths of 418 Palestinians and injuries to 1,141 others.
However, the current Israeli demolition campaign appears broader and more strategic than mere “traditional” ceasefire violations. It amounts to a plan to completely reshape the Gaza Strip, both geographically and demographically, with the aim of punishing the Palestinian population and rendering their areas uninhabitable in order to force them to emigrate. This is the primary objective behind this war, which is simply reproducing itself in a new guise.
