Mid East

Guardian - Any Israeli military advance into southern Gaza’s Rafah area could cause mass deaths among the more than one million Palestinians trapped there, with humanitarian aid in danger of collapse, aid workers said on Friday reports Reuters. Israel has threatened to advance from Khan Younis, Gaza’s main southern city, to Rafah, where the population has increased five-fold as people have fled bombardment, often under evacuation orders, since Israel began its assault on Gaza’s ruling Hamas movement. About 1.5 million people are now jammed into overcrowded shelters or on the street in a patch of land hemmed in by Egyptian and Israeli border fences and the Mediterranean Sea as well as Israeli forces. According to Reuters, a doctor who left Gaza last week described Rafah as a “closed jail” with faecal matter running through streets so crowded that there is barely space for medics’ vehicles to pass.

NPR - In the months since the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel, more than half of Gaza's buildings have been damaged or destroyed by Israel's military response. Some researchers and human rights advocates say the destruction amounts to "domicide," or systematic destruction of homes.  More than 650,000 displaced people in Gaza don't have homes to return to, according to the United Nations. Gaza's reconstruction will be a herculean task. Even if the war ended today, the housing shortage could last for several years.m The destruction of homes was a part of South Africa's accusations that Israel is committing genocide.