Jabalya Refugee Camp, One of the World's Most Densely Populated Areas, Is Now a Ghost Town - Israel News - Haaretz.com
JABALYA — As far as the eye can see lie miles and miles of destroyed homes. It's hard to look away from the devastated remains of Jabalya's refugee camp in northern Gaza.
When looking at the giant Hezbollah compounds that the army blew up in Shi'ite villages in southern Lebanon, the expanded Philadelphi corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border, or the heart of the Jenin refugee camp during the Second Intifada's Operation Defensive Shield after Israeli bulldozers turned it into a wasteland – none of these can compare, in the scale of the destruction, to what has happened over the last two and a half months in one of the world's most densely populated places.
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The current military operation in Jabalya began this past October 6 and Palestinian resistance there is gradually dying down (there's also a village south of Jabalya, but military operations there were minor). The IDF is estimating that 70 percent of the refugee camp's buildings were completely destroyed. During a brief visit to the camp Friday afternoon, I could see that even the few buildings that are still standing were badly damaged.
According to IDF data, some 96,000 Palestinian civilians were forcibly evacuated from the camp. More than 2,000 Palestinians – most of them armed, according to the army – have been killed and roughly 1,500 suspected terrorists were arrested.
Around 100 terrorists and a similar number of civilians still remain in the destroyed camp, hiding amid the rubble. Jabalya has become a ghost town. Outside, you mainly see pack after pack of stray dogs roaming around and hunting for scraps of food.
Destruction in Jabalya, north Gaza seen this week.Credit: Amos Harel
Hamas' collapse in Jabalya is almost complete. The IDF operated here twice before, in December 2023 and May 2024. But this time, the camp was taken apart. The 162nd Division deployed four combat brigade teams in Jabalya and the nearby towns of Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahia.
Iz al-Din Khader, commander of Hamas' military wing in northern Gaza, is overseeing efforts to harass the IDF from a distance. Hamas has mainly been sending in small cells of four or five men armed with guns, rocket-propelled grenades and explosives. They are always accompanied by a videographer (the footage is as important to Hamas as the action).
Since the start of the recent operation on October 6, there have been 35 IDF soldiers killed in the fighting in and around Jabalya and hundreds more wounded. After Israeli troops suffered many casualties, mainly due to entering booby-trapped houses, a different modus operandi was adopted – slower, more cautious movement that leaves behind enormous destruction but reduces the number of soldiers that are killed or wounded. Much of the operation is based on intelligence gained by interrogating prisoners.
On Friday morning, armed Palestinians tried to sneak out of Jabalya to the south by exploiting the heavy fog. They ran into IDF ambushes, who were able to kill some of the militants. Next to one of the bodies, soldiers found two hand grenades with the pins already pulled; the man had apparently planned to blow himself up with the soldiers.
Jabalya, north Gaza.Credit: Amos Harel
Friction between the IDF and the civilian population is minimal because the vast majority have left southward. Dozens of civilians however, have found shelter in a hospital north of the camp. On Friday, a small supply convoy reached the hospital, and the army is assuming there are militants hiding among the civilians.
During the operation's first two weeks, residents hesitated to leave the camp. The army says Hamas terrorized them by shooting the legs of civilians who tried leaving. The IDF then intensified its pressure, including the use of heavy fire in close proximity to the civilians. Hamas was unable to stand it and the civilians left quickly.
All this is happening against the background of the "Generals' Plan" – a proposal by retired generals to move Palestinian civilians from northern Gaza to south of the Netzarim Corridor. The General Staff opposed it, but in the army's Southern Command and the field commanders, some officers are flirting dangerously with it.
Nevertheless, the reality doesn't match the plan in full. The northern quarter of Gaza – which includes Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahia and Jabalya – has been emptied of civilians through force and threats. But there are still more than 100,000 people in Gaza City, in the five-kilometer-wide stretch between the 162nd Division in Jabalya and the 99th Division in the Netzarim corridor.
Most of the population actually left the north during the early months of the war. Yet back then, Israel was being accused of disproportionately killing civilians, not of ethnic cleansing.
IDF troops operating in Jabalya, north Gaza earlier this week.Credit: Amos Harel
The systematic crushing of Hamas' resistance has created broad freedom of action for the IDF, whose soldiers mainly move through the camp in Namer armored personnel carriers and tanks. The Jabalya operation is supposed to end in a few weeks, after one underground complex is dealt with.
Revenge, which played a prominent role in Yaniv Kubovich's investigative report in Haaretz last week about the IDF's conduct in the Netzarim corridor, doesn't arise in conversations with or between officers here.
Someone mentioned that following Hamas' attack on October 7, 2023, two stolen IDF jeeps were brought to a mosque here carrying the bodies of seven Israelis, and a mob of Palestinians trampled on their bodies. One IDF assault in Jabalya killed two Hamas company commanders who were suspected of commanding the massacre on the road near Kibbutz Mefalsim, where dozens of people who had managed to flee the Nova rave were killed in their cars.
During the current operation, no signs of the hostages were found in Jabalya. The assumption is that Hamas had already removed them from the camp. During an operation by the 162nd Division in Rafah this past August, one hostage (Kaid Farhan al-Qadi) was rescued and the bodies of 12 others were found.
The division, commanded by Brig. Gen. Itzik Cohen, has been fighting in Gaza continuously for 14 and a half months, ever since they were called there following the events of October 7, 2023. The division has had 235 of its soldiers killed (74 of them from the Givati Brigade) and roughly 5,000 wounded, of whom 3,700 returned to fight.
There are officers who were wounded in combat three times and are now back in Jabalya. The division's fatalities include two brigade commanders – Col. Yonatan Steinberg of the Nahal Brigade, who was killed on the first day of the war, and Col. Ehsan Daxa, commander of the 401st armored brigade, who was killed two months ago by a bomb in Rafah.
Jabalya was the cradle of the First Intifada, a symbol of the Palestinian struggle. The clash that set the West Bank and Gaza on fire, and later led to the Madrid peace talks and the Oslo Accords, erupted here on December 9, 1987.
That riot began after an Israeli truck driver accidentally ran over four Palestinian workers at the Erez Checkpoint on the Israeli-Gazan border. Rumors spread in Gaza that the accident was deliberate revenge for an Israeli merchant who had been stabbed to death in Gaza two days earlier, and a mob poured into Jabalya's alleys.
Then, when the violence erupted, the IDF had one reservist company in Jabalya. Today, several brigades are stationed there. Between 1994 until last year's massacre in southern Israel, virtually no Israeli soldier had set foot there.
From the turret of the Namer APC holding the Givati Brigade's commander, Col. Liron Batito, deep inside Jabalya, it's easy to see the high-rises of Sderot and Ashkelon. The camp's dense houses and alleys, which used to block that sight, have been systematically blown up in recent weeks.
Jabalya, north Gaza earlier this week.Credit: Amos Harel
From Jabalya, the debate over Palestinian residents' return to northern Gaza as part of a hostage and cease-fire deal looks disconnected from reality. It will take many years – some estimates say an entire decade – to clear all the rubble and rebuild the neighborhoods.
Batito is convinced that what the army did in Jabalya was necessary. Without the destruction, he said, the risk to his soldiers would have been immeasurably greater. Having fought with his men in Gaza City, Khan Yunis and Rafah, he said the battle that is still taking place in Jabalya was the most complex of all.
During his few visits home, located in a community in the Negev, Batito noticed two things. They "hit you the moment you cross the fence – the colors and the smells," he said. "Here, inside, it's as if all trace of color and smell had been erased."
An attentive ear to Netanyahu
The Wall Street Journal published an interesting, wide-ranging and very sympathetic interview with Prime Minister Benajmin Netanyahu on Saturday. The man who for years has avoided all interviews with the Israeli media (aside from propaganda outlets on the side) found an attentive ear in the American interviewer.
It's true, he admitted, that someone forgot to wake him up on the morning of October 7, 2023, but since then, under his leadership, Israel has recovered and has been going from success to success. Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran itself have been weakened and the Assad regime in Syria fell. Iran's regional axis has suffered defeat after defeat.
To the interviewer's surprise, Netanyahu refused to discuss the possibility of bombing Iran's nuclear facilities. The journalist concluded that this may indicate the idea is once again on the table.
As for a hostage deal, Netanyahu repeated his familiar refrain, saying he won't agree to a deal that ends the war without ending Hamas' rule in Gaza. This contradicts the moderate optimism that has taken over media reports about negotiations on a deal in light of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's demand that it be concluded before he takes office on January 20.
The talks have indeed sped up recently. Last week an Israeli delegation was in Qatarfor serious talks about questions like how many hostages would be freed in the deal's first, "humanitarian," phase, how many Palestinian prisoners Israel would free in exchange and which Palestinian prisoners would be included in the deal.
But Netanyahu once again publicly signaled Hamas that he only intends to implement the humanitarian phase, in which female, elderly and sick hostages would be released (there is still disagreement about which hostages will be deemed sick). After that, he intends to resume fighting and freeze the deal's second phase, which would have seen the remaining hostages and the bodies of slain hostages freed in exchange for the IDF's full withdrawal from Gaza.
This maneuver is familiar from previous iterations. Netanyahu's remarks followed attacks on the emerging deal from far-right ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir.
Now, Hamas will be afraid to walk into Netanyahu's trap and demand American guarantees that Israel won't resume the fighting. And there's a significant chance that the talks will once again break down. It's impossible to avoid the impression that Netanyahu's fear of his government collapsing trumps his concern for the hostages.
The likely alternative scenario for implementing the deal is the political crisis. The ultra-Orthodox parties are pressuring Netanyahu to pass a conscription law that would exempt their constituents from military service. If he can't, the governing coalition might fall apart, and Netanyahu might then seek salvation by approving the deal before the ensuing election. At the moment, the much-heralded "Trump effect" doesn't seem to be enough to force Netanyahu into a hostage deal.
Waiting for Trump
Early Saturday morning, the Houthis launched another ballistic missile from Yemen – the third in five days – at central Israel. The Arrow antiballistic missile system failed to intercept it, for the second time in a row, and other interceptors provided no salvation.
The Houthi missile landed in Jaffa, causing 16 minor injuries and a lot of destruction. In much of central Israel, the warning siren sounded only shortly before the missile hit, so many people didn't manage to reach their shelters.
The IDF said this failure would be "investigated thoroughly." The Houthis boasted that the Iranian-made missile was equipped with special maneuvering capabilities. The defense establishment still hasn't said whether that is the source of the problem.
The bigger problem however, is strategic. Once again, it turns out that the Houthis are very hard to deter. They are an independent operator; though Iran arms them, it doesn't dictate their policy. Presumably, it's convenient for Tehran to have the Houthis continue their war of attrition with Israel without Iran being directly involved.
Last week, the air force attacked Yemen for the third time, causing massive damage to port facilities. The government and army were proud of the scope of the attacks, but it won't stop the Houthis from launching missiles and drones at Israel or harassing shipping in the Red Sea. The port of Eilat will remain closed.
For anything to change, significant U.S. military intervention will apparently be needed. That looks like another burning issue that will have to wait for the Trump administration.