GAZA, (PIC)
The Gaza Center for Human Rights (GCHR) said Israel’s continued control over around 70% of the Gaza Strip, alongside the daily killing of civilians across the territory, shows that the occupation is no longer merely imposing forced displacement and shrinking the geographic space available for life. Rather, it said, Israel has turned what remains of the Gaza Strip into an open killing field, targeting civilians in residential neighborhoods, shelters, displacement areas and near the lines where Israeli forces are deployed, known in the media as the “Yellow Line.”
In a statement on Monday, the center said its field team had documented in recent days the continued killing of Palestinians by Israeli occupation forces through airstrikes, artillery shelling, direct gunfire and sniper fire.
It said the attacks constituted an ongoing violation of the principles of distinction, proportionality and the required precautions to protect civilians.
The GCHR warned that the deliberate ambiguity surrounding Israeli deployment lines, along with the absence of clear or declared boundaries that civilians can rely on, has turned these areas into death traps.
It noted that the United Nations had verified the killing of 196 Palestinians, including 18 women and 43 children, between October 10, 2025 and April 2026 in areas near Israeli military positions.
Those areas were described as unclear, revealing a recurring pattern of exposing civilians to the risk of death without prior warning or any genuine ability to avoid danger, the center said.
The rights group confirmed that dozens of additional victims were recorded in the same areas over the following two months, as Israeli measures aimed at further reducing the space available to civilians intensified.
As part of this ongoing pattern, the center’s field team documented Monday morning the killing of Hamouda Ezzat Ali Abu Daqqa and the injury of 15 others in an Israeli airstrike targeting a vehicle on Al-Rashid Street in Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Yunis.
Al-Mawasi is crowded with tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians who had previously been forcibly pushed there by Israeli occupation forces, which designated the area as a shelter zone.
The GCHR also documented the killing of Fadi Falah Daghmash and his wife, Reham Rashid, at dawn the same day, along with the injury of several other civilians, after Israeli warplanes targeted an apartment near the Jordanian Hospital in the Tel Al-Hawa neighborhood, southwest of Gaza City.
The attack, it said, further confirmed the continued targeting of civilian homes inside populated areas.
On Sunday evening, July 5, 2026, an Israeli aircraft targeted a gathering of Palestinians near Al-Samer junction in Gaza City, killing Jawhar Abdel Balawi and Ahmad Yahya Al-Batesh.
On Saturday evening, July 4, an Israeli drone targeted a group of Palestinians near Abu Sharkh roundabout, west of Jabalia refugee camp, killing Hudhaifa Hussein Allah Al-Hawajri and wounding several civilians.
On the same day, Israeli forces targeted a motorcycle near Asqoula roundabout in the Zeitoun neighborhood, killing Mohammed Najeeb Ashour.
The center said these incidents, along with hundreds of similar cases, confirmed that Israel was practicing systematic killing across the Gaza Strip.
It said the killings were not linked to combat activity or the presence of danger or threats, but amounted to killing for the purpose of killing and genocide, leaving civilians vulnerable to attack wherever they move, whether inside the remaining populated areas or near Israeli deployment lines.
The GCHR stressed that the continued targeting of civilians in areas that show no clear signs of danger, or in areas to which they had previously been forced to flee, constitutes a flagrant violation of the Geneva Conventions and customary rules of international humanitarian law.
It said the attacks reflected the unlawful use of lethal force against people who enjoy full legal protection.
The center warned that Israel’s control over around 70% of the Gaza Strip, combined with continued attacks on the remaining populated areas, has forced more than two million Palestinians to live in overcrowded pockets lacking the minimum conditions for life. At the same time, they face the risk of being killed at any moment and from any direction, turning the entire Gaza Strip into a scene of ongoing killing, persecution and forced displacement.
The center said these policies were creating conditions in which life becomes impossible and pushing residents to consider leaving their homeland by force.
The GCHR renewed its call on the international community to act immediately to stop these crimes, impose effective measures to protect civilians, end the genocide and ensure that those responsible are held accountable through international justice mechanisms.
It stressed that continued impunity encourages further grave violations against civilians in the Gaza Strip.