Israeli forces now control roughly 60 percent of the Gaza Strip after expanding their eastern zone by about 37 kilometers, officials and analysts say. The advance has come with a fresh surge of strikes that medics say killed more than 25 Palestinians in the past week, including a 40‑year‑old woman in Khan Younis; the military acknowledged it killed six Palestinian police officers it said were planning attacks. The escalation has effectively sidelined the U.S.-backed 12‑member technocratic committee Washington promoted as the path to rebuilding services and roads for civilians.

New surge in strikes and casualties

Over the past week Gaza has seen a fresh uptick in lethal incidents, according to medics and local health officials who say more than 25 Palestinians were killed in recent days. That raises the death toll since the October ceasefire to above 800, the officials reported. At least four people were killed in the last 24 hours, one of them a 40‑year‑old woman in Khan Younis.

Those figures come as the enclave continues to bear the effects of a conflict that, the reporting notes, has lasted more than two years and has taken a heavy human toll — more than 72,500 Palestinians killed across that period. The immediate spike in violence has concentrated on populated areas where control and access are already limited.

Targeting police and expanding the "yellow line"

The Israeli military has said it recently killed six Palestinian police officers, asserting they had been involved in planning imminent attacks. The military provided no public evidence for that claim. Analysts in Gaza say the pattern of strikes goes beyond targeting individual operatives.

"It wants to make it an unlivable environment, forcing residents to seek displacement, which serves the strategic goal of this war," said Ahmed al‑Tanani, a political analyst in Gaza. He argues the killings of police figures are aimed at preventing any local security structure from restoring order.

Mastheads

At the same time, Israeli forces have been pushing the boundary of territory they control — an area referred to in local reporting as the "yellow line." Analysts say that line has been extended by about 37 kilometers (23 miles) to the east, bringing the portion of the Gaza Strip under Israeli military control to roughly 60 percent. That advance has further constrained movement inside the enclave and increased the effective partitioning of territory.

Withdrawal commitments not met

Under the terms of the ceasefire, Israeli forces were expected to pull back from Gaza by the end of phase one. But the military hasn't carried out that withdrawal, even as the truce moved into its second phase.

The continued presence of troops, combined with expanded control zones, has limited civilian mobility and complicated efforts to normalize security and daily life.

Those developments have immediate and visible effects. Roads and crossings that are needed for the delivery of goods and services stay under military control. And when security institutions are degraded by targeted strikes, the delivery of basic services becomes harder to disentangle from the occupation itself, local analysts say.

US‑backed governance plan sidelined

The military escalation has coincided with the effective paralysis of the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, a 12‑member body of technocrats that Washington promoted as the core of a reconstruction and governance plan under the Trump administration’s so‑called Board of Peace. The US had presented the committee as a pathway to rebuilding infrastructure and restoring public services.

"It is difficult to separate the committee’s work from providing services to citizens, and it's hard to separate serving citizens from the security apparatus and the presence of the occupation," said Iyad al‑Qarra, a political analyst. He added that Israel has isolated the committee in Cairo, preventing it from operating on the ground inside Gaza.

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Analysts say Israel now controls roughly 60 percent of Gaza after extending its eastern control zone by about 37 kilometers.

This article was created with AI assistance.