Operation Gideon's Chariots: Forced Displacement of Gaza's Residents
- ACRI
- May 11
- 2 min read
On May 5, 2025, the Security Cabinet approved a plan to evacuate most of the civilian population in the Gaza Strip, concentrate them in a designated area in the Rafah region, and distribute humanitarian aid in this area only. According to the plan, this move will allow for the escalation of fighting in the rest of the Strip, based on the assumption that there would be no civilians remaining. Based on news reports and statements by Cabinet ministers, it appears that the goals of the plan also include "encouraging immigration,” and permanent occupation of the evacuated areas for Israeli settlements. Aerial photographs of activities in the Strip, as well as reports from humanitarian organizations operating in Gaza, indicate that practical preparations for implementing the plan have already begun. Reports have also started coming in about messages being sent to Palestinian residents via social media, inviting them to contact military authorities if they wish to leave Gaza.
On May 11, 2025, ACRI appealed to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yisrael Katz, and IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir, demanding that the Cabinet withdraw the plan. In the appeal, Attorney Reut Shaer, director of ACRI's Occupied Territories Human Rights Department, warned that the plan violates a long list of statutes under international law, including the prohibition against the forceful seizure of sovereignty over territories, the prohibition against starvation and collective punishment, and the prohibition against the forced displacement of civilian populations. Shaer noted that the plan does not address specific security needs such as the return of hostages or defeating Hamas, and that from the published details of the decision and ministers' statements throughout the months of war it is clear that the displacement of approximately two million Gaza Strip residents is not temporary, but part of a plan to "erase everything in the Gaza Strip and settle the Strip with settlements after ethnically cleansing the local population."
The appeal describes the serious shortage of food, water, shelter, and health services in the Gaza Strip, and the restrictions imposed by Israel on the entry of humanitarian aid:
"Israel is now announcing its intention to use the horrific living conditions it has created in the Strip to forcibly uproot its residents and force them to emigrate to any country in the world willing to accept them. Let us state the obvious: creating living conditions that do not allow for survival, freedom, and dignity, and subjecting civilians to them until they say they want to leave – is not a plan for 'encouraging voluntary emigration' but a plan for forced evacuation and expulsion – transfer and ethnic cleansing of the Strip's territory. Forced internal displacement of Gaza’s residents into a 'concentration camp,' starving them, denying access to medical aid and clean water, and adopting an attack policy contrary to customary laws of war, are prohibited and constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity."
Allowing humanitarian aid into Gaza also helps keep the hostages alive. In a March interview, former hostage Liri Albag noted: “When humanitarian aid wasn’t let it, it was felt. It was really felt because you suddenly go down to days of a single pita, there were days of a quarter [pita]...There were days we would talk about food to overcome the hunger...”
ACRI's appeal, May 11, 2025 (Heb)