Zionist bombardment levels Mushataha Tower, a residential building in Gaza City. Photo: AFP.
The Israeli army has unleashed the “gates of hell” on Gaza City in a massive air campaign to level high-rise residential towers. The assault began with the Mushtaha Tower, one of Gaza’s most recognizable modern landmarks, on September 6. The 14-story building housed about 70 apartments sheltering hundreds of displaced families, in addition to the hundreds of tents and shelters clustered around it.
On the same day, warplanes targeted the Soussi Tower in the industrial zone south of the city, and struck the Ru’ya building in Tel al-Hawa. All three towers, now destroyed, were a priority on the Israeli army’s list. The army alleged the sites housed Hamas command centers and facilities used by the resistance to monitor nearby Israeli forces with advanced cameras.
The targeted towers had become major shelters for hundreds of families forcibly displaced from ruined areas in the eastern Gaza Strip.
On September 7, airstrikes targeted five buildings in the densely populated al-Daraj district, home to tens of thousands who have not left since the war began, as well as four homes in al-Yarmouk and the al-Sahaba area of Gaza City (zones that have been largely untouched by heavy bombardment so far).
The strikes also destroyed al-Jazira Club in western Gaza—another major shelter—and wiped out hundreds of tents surrounding it. Notably, the Israeli army has been deliberately targeting buildings encircled by large camps, using oversized missiles and bombs designed to obliterate shelters and force residents southward toward the Mawasi area of Khan Younis.
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On the ground, Israeli tanks continue advancing into the eastern sections of Sheikh Radwan, where in recent days the Zionists brought in dozens of engineering vehicles to carry out widespread demolitions of neighborhoods, buildings, and homes. Giant cranes fitted with surveillance cameras and automatic weapons have been deployed, turning western Sheikh Radwan into an inferno as artillery and random gunfire relentlessly pound homes in an effort to force out the remaining residents by fire. Meanwhile, Israeli forces have withdrawn from al-Zaytoun after a 17-day ground operation that left behind total devastation of streets, homes, and infrastructure.
The Israeli goal, unmistakably clear at this point, is to destroy Gaza City entirely and erase any chance of survival or life within it. While residents grasp this intent, they resist Israel’s drive to displace them southward rapidly. Instead, a reverse displacement is underway, with people moving westward within northern Gaza. The neighborhoods of Karama, Tawam, and Maqousi have become jam-packed with hundreds of thousands fleeing the east, choosing to remain in the northeast rather than head south.
Gaza’s Government Media Office reported that in the past two days, 20,000 displaced people have returned north from the south, contradicting the Israeli narrative, which claimed that around 90,000 people have fled Gaza City toward central and southern areas. According to Abu Muhammad al-Atawna, central and southern Gaza are already overcrowded, with no space left even to set up a tent, while Mawasi itself is choked with displaced people from Rafah and Khan Younis.
(Al-Akhbar English) by Yousef Fares
Yousef Fares
Yousef Fares is a Palestinian reporter in Gaza. He is an author at Al-Akhbar News and he regularly posts updates on his telegram channel.
