Israel controls three corridors in Gaza, dissecting the strip in preparation for long-term occupation and the construction of Jewish settlements
The Israeli military announced on 12 April that it had completed the capture of the so-called Morag Corridor in the southern Gaza Strip, cutting off the city of Rafah from Khan Yunis.
Rafah is now completely surrounded by the military, with the 36th Division holding the Morag Corridor and the Gaza Division operating in the Philadelphi Corridor along the Egypt-Gaza border area, the military stated.
The 36th Division’s 188th Armored Brigade had pushed into the southern axis from the northwest. At the same time, the division’s Golani Infantry Brigade entered from the border in the southeast to complete the capture.
Israel’s buffer zone in southern Gaza will encompass the entire city of Rafah, which has largely been destroyed, and extend to the outskirts of Khan Yunis, an area equal to 20 percent of the Strip.
Earlier this week, the AP reported that Israel was already occupying 50 percent of Gaza’s territory, including a buffer zone stretching along the Israel-Gaza border in which the military has “razed Palestinian homes, farmland and infrastructure to the point of uninhabitability.”
Israel Katz, Israel’s defense minister, said on Saturday the capture of the Morag Corridor effectively turns Rafah into an “Israeli security zone.”
In a statement, Katz threatened Palestinians in Gaza, saying, “This is the last chance to banish Hamas and release all hostages, stopping the war.”
If they do not, Israeli operations will spread to “most of Gaza’s territory.”
Katz also said that the Netzarim Corridor, a route in central Gaza that divides the Strip into two parts, north and south, will also be expanded.
Israel withdrew from the Netzarim Corridor briefly during the ceasefire reached in January. Israeli troops occupied it once again after resuming the genocide on 18 March.
While Israel says the creation of the Morag Corridor was necessary to defeat Hamas, Robert Geist Pinfold, a lecturer in international security at King’s College London, says it is part of a longer-term Israeli strategy to control Gaza.
“On the one hand, it’s classic medieval siege warfare in 2025. On the other hand, I think there’s a more worrying long-term strategic logic to this. Israel has always sought to control the Gaza Strip, particularly to oversee what comes in and what comes out and ‘security’ over the territories, as Israel would call it,” he told Al-Jazeera on Saturday.
“These [Morag, Netzarim, and Philadelphi] corridors are named after settlements, and the settlements did not appear there randomly. They were put there for this specific purpose: to cut off Gaza’s urban areas and give Israel the ability to squeeze the territory when and if it desires,” he said.
Israeli leaders have also made clear their intention to ethnically cleanse Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinians to third countries such as Egypt and Jordan or further afield to Indonesia or various African countries. Members of Israel’s far-right movement are seeking to build Jewish settlements in Gaza to replace the expelled Palestinian population.
Early Saturday, five Palestinians in Gaza were killed in separate Israeli attacks across the enclave, Al-Jazeera reported.
One person was killed in a strike on a tent in the al-Mawasi humanitarian zone in southern Gaza.
Another was killed by an Israeli drone attack on the Qizan a-lNajjar area, south of Khan Yunis.
Two people were killed in Gaza City, and another was killed in a strike on a house in Jabalia.
Rafah is now completely surrounded by the military, with the 36th Division holding the Morag Corridor and the Gaza Division operating in the Philadelphi Corridor along the Egypt-Gaza border area, the military stated.
The 36th Division’s 188th Armored Brigade had pushed into the southern axis from the northwest. At the same time, the division’s Golani Infantry Brigade entered from the border in the southeast to complete the capture.
Israel’s buffer zone in southern Gaza will encompass the entire city of Rafah, which has largely been destroyed, and extend to the outskirts of Khan Yunis, an area equal to 20 percent of the Strip.
Earlier this week, the AP reported that Israel was already occupying 50 percent of Gaza’s territory, including a buffer zone stretching along the Israel-Gaza border in which the military has “razed Palestinian homes, farmland and infrastructure to the point of uninhabitability.”
Israel Katz, Israel’s defense minister, said on Saturday the capture of the Morag Corridor effectively turns Rafah into an “Israeli security zone.”
In a statement, Katz threatened Palestinians in Gaza, saying, “This is the last chance to banish Hamas and release all hostages, stopping the war.”
If they do not, Israeli operations will spread to “most of Gaza’s territory.”
Katz also said that the Netzarim Corridor, a route in central Gaza that divides the Strip into two parts, north and south, will also be expanded.
Israel withdrew from the Netzarim Corridor briefly during the ceasefire reached in January. Israeli troops occupied it once again after resuming the genocide on 18 March.
While Israel says the creation of the Morag Corridor was necessary to defeat Hamas, Robert Geist Pinfold, a lecturer in international security at King’s College London, says it is part of a longer-term Israeli strategy to control Gaza.
“On the one hand, it’s classic medieval siege warfare in 2025. On the other hand, I think there’s a more worrying long-term strategic logic to this. Israel has always sought to control the Gaza Strip, particularly to oversee what comes in and what comes out and ‘security’ over the territories, as Israel would call it,” he told Al-Jazeera on Saturday.
“These [Morag, Netzarim, and Philadelphi] corridors are named after settlements, and the settlements did not appear there randomly. They were put there for this specific purpose: to cut off Gaza’s urban areas and give Israel the ability to squeeze the territory when and if it desires,” he said.
Israeli leaders have also made clear their intention to ethnically cleanse Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinians to third countries such as Egypt and Jordan or further afield to Indonesia or various African countries. Members of Israel’s far-right movement are seeking to build Jewish settlements in Gaza to replace the expelled Palestinian population.
Early Saturday, five Palestinians in Gaza were killed in separate Israeli attacks across the enclave, Al-Jazeera reported.
One person was killed in a strike on a tent in the al-Mawasi humanitarian zone in southern Gaza.
Another was killed by an Israeli drone attack on the Qizan a-lNajjar area, south of Khan Yunis.
Two people were killed in Gaza City, and another was killed in a strike on a house in Jabalia.
At least 1,563 people have been killed since Israel resumed offensive on March 18, as humanitarian situation worsens in Gaza.
The number of people killed in Israeli attacks on the Gaza since Israel broke a ceasefire with the Palestinian armed group Hamas last month has now exceeded 1,560, according to health officials.
In a new statement on Saturday, the Health Ministry in Gaza said Israeli attacks had killed at least 21 people in the latest 24-hour reporting period, bringing the overall number of fatalities since Israel resumed its bombardment of Gaza on March 18 to 1,563. Hundreds of them were children, according to rescuers.
A total of 50,933 people have been killed and 116,045 wounded since the start of the war in October 2023, the ministry added in its latest daily update.
On Saturday, an Israeli attack on Gaza’s Tuffah neighbourhood killed at least people and wounded two children. Two other Palestinians were killed in al-Atatra district of Beit Lahiya, in the northern part of Gaza, with another killed in an Israeli drone attack on the Qizan an-Najjar area, south of Khan Younis.
Several casualties were also reported following Israeli air raids on the tent shelters of civilians in the al-Mawasi area, west of Khan Younis, which Israel had designated a so-called “safe zone”.
Reporting from outside al-Ahli Hospital in Deir el-Balah, central Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary said a newborn named Sham had succumbed to her wounds after her family was hit in an attack.
“She was in very critical condition where her arm was amputated and she died a couple of hours later, because her injury was very critical and doctors were unable to help her situation,” she said.
Khoudary reported that the ambulances arriving daily to the hospital have mostly been carrying children and women.
“Due to the lack of medical supplies, most of these Palestinian children and women are witnessing a very deteriorating situation,” she added.
‘Post-apocalyptic’
On Friday, Ravina Shamdasani, spokeswoman for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, reported that 36 of the 224 documented Israeli strikes in Gaza, between March 18 and April 9, involved killings of women and children.
In a statement, the Palestinian rights group Al-Haq said the findings by the UN further confirmed a pattern it previously identified.
“Such a calculated effort to exterminate women, boys, girls & even infants, has not been witnessed in any other modern conflict,” Al-Haq said in a post on social media.
In an interview with Al Jazeera’s Upfront, UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) chief Philippe Lazzarini described the situation in Gaza as a “post-apocalyptic” killing zone.
Speaking at the Antalya Diplomacy Forum in Turkiye on Friday, Lazzarini also reiterated that Israel has been preventing the entry of food, fuel, medicine and other vital humanitarian supplies into Gaza since early March, contravening international law.
In a separate post on X on Saturday, UNRWA Director of Communications Juliette Touma warned that all basic supplies “are running out” in Gaza.
“It means babies, children are going to bed hungry.”
Israel has pledged to press on with its military offensive, with officials in recent days outlining plans to seize new swaths of territory in southern Gaza and issuing a series of forced displacement orders.
“Palestinians do not know where to go,” Khoudary said, after the latest Israeli orders on Saturday for Shujayea and Khan Younis.
According to UNRWA, some 400,000 Palestinians have been forcibly displaced across Gaza since the fragile ceasefire that took effect in January collapsed almost a month ago.
In a new statement on Saturday, the Health Ministry in Gaza said Israeli attacks had killed at least 21 people in the latest 24-hour reporting period, bringing the overall number of fatalities since Israel resumed its bombardment of Gaza on March 18 to 1,563. Hundreds of them were children, according to rescuers.
A total of 50,933 people have been killed and 116,045 wounded since the start of the war in October 2023, the ministry added in its latest daily update.
On Saturday, an Israeli attack on Gaza’s Tuffah neighbourhood killed at least people and wounded two children. Two other Palestinians were killed in al-Atatra district of Beit Lahiya, in the northern part of Gaza, with another killed in an Israeli drone attack on the Qizan an-Najjar area, south of Khan Younis.
Several casualties were also reported following Israeli air raids on the tent shelters of civilians in the al-Mawasi area, west of Khan Younis, which Israel had designated a so-called “safe zone”.
Reporting from outside al-Ahli Hospital in Deir el-Balah, central Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary said a newborn named Sham had succumbed to her wounds after her family was hit in an attack.
“She was in very critical condition where her arm was amputated and she died a couple of hours later, because her injury was very critical and doctors were unable to help her situation,” she said.
Khoudary reported that the ambulances arriving daily to the hospital have mostly been carrying children and women.
“Due to the lack of medical supplies, most of these Palestinian children and women are witnessing a very deteriorating situation,” she added.
‘Post-apocalyptic’
On Friday, Ravina Shamdasani, spokeswoman for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, reported that 36 of the 224 documented Israeli strikes in Gaza, between March 18 and April 9, involved killings of women and children.
In a statement, the Palestinian rights group Al-Haq said the findings by the UN further confirmed a pattern it previously identified.
“Such a calculated effort to exterminate women, boys, girls & even infants, has not been witnessed in any other modern conflict,” Al-Haq said in a post on social media.
In an interview with Al Jazeera’s Upfront, UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) chief Philippe Lazzarini described the situation in Gaza as a “post-apocalyptic” killing zone.
Speaking at the Antalya Diplomacy Forum in Turkiye on Friday, Lazzarini also reiterated that Israel has been preventing the entry of food, fuel, medicine and other vital humanitarian supplies into Gaza since early March, contravening international law.
In a separate post on X on Saturday, UNRWA Director of Communications Juliette Touma warned that all basic supplies “are running out” in Gaza.
“It means babies, children are going to bed hungry.”
Israel has pledged to press on with its military offensive, with officials in recent days outlining plans to seize new swaths of territory in southern Gaza and issuing a series of forced displacement orders.
“Palestinians do not know where to go,” Khoudary said, after the latest Israeli orders on Saturday for Shujayea and Khan Younis.
According to UNRWA, some 400,000 Palestinians have been forcibly displaced across Gaza since the fragile ceasefire that took effect in January collapsed almost a month ago.
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