It has been two years since Hamas launched its October 7, 2023 assault on Israel, killing around 1,200 people and taking more than 250 others hostage. Israel’s response — a relentless military campaign in Gaza — has since killed more than 67,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, and reduced entire neighborhoods to rubble.
The United Nations and humanitarian agencies say Gaza has been pushed to the brink of famine, with hundreds of thousands facing starvation and disease.
An independent UN inquiry last month concluded that Israel has committed genocide against the Palestinian people — a finding echoed by genocide scholars and human rights groups, though rejected by Israel.
Two years on, 48 hostages remain in Gaza, of whom 20 are believed to be alive. Yet for Gaza’s population of 2.3 million, the war’s toll is measured not just in numbers — but in hunger, displacement, and loss.
Gaza’s Suffering and the Global Response
The war has created one of the gravest humanitarian crises of the century. Gaza’s hospitals have been destroyed or rendered inoperable; maternity wards bombed, refugee camps flattened, and aid convoys blocked. The UN World Food Programme warns that large parts of the enclave are already in “full-scale famine.”
UN Secretary-General António Guterres called the situation “a humanitarian catastrophe on a scale that defies comprehension,” urging an immediate ceasefire and the unconditional release of all hostages. “End the suffering for all,” he said, calling on global leaders to stop actions that make civilians “pay with their lives and their futures.”
Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump’s proposed ceasefire plan has entered its second day of negotiations in Egypt, where delegations from Hamas and Israel are holding indirect talks mediated by Egypt, Qatar, Turkey and the US.
Ceasefire Talks and Political Shifts
Negotiators are working to finalize a hostage-prisoner exchange and agree on a timeline for Israel’s military withdrawal from Gaza. The plan also calls for the formation of an International Stabilization Force to manage humanitarian relief and reconstruction efforts.
Trump said Hamas was “agreeing to things that are very important” and expressed optimism that “we will get a deal done.” Mediators describe the talks as “positive,” though deep mistrust remains. Hamas has emphasized that any sustainable peace must include a complete end to the occupation and international guarantees for Palestinian statehood.
In Australia, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called for a two-state solution. In New Zealand, Foreign Minister Winston Peters condemned Israel’s “overwhelming military response,” saying civilians had paid a “disproportionate price for the sins of Hamas.”
The Human Cost and the Question of Accountability
According to Gaza’s health ministry, at least 67,160 Palestinians have been killed and 169,000 wounded since the start of Israel’s war. The UN estimates that thousands more lie beneath the rubble.
Israel’s campaign, which has targeted densely populated civilian areas, has drawn global condemnation. Despite repeated calls for restraint, Israeli airstrikes continue to pound the enclave, with at least 104 people killed since Friday, the day Trump urged Israel to halt its bombing.
Rights groups and UN experts warn that without accountability and a genuine political solution, the cycle of violence will persist. “After two years of trauma, we must choose hope,” Guterres said.
On the humanitarian side, the toll on the humanitarian community is staggering, with the enclave becoming a graveyard for those who sought to ease suffering.
United Nations and humanitarian aid organizations have reported that over 560 aid workers were killed in Gaza between October 2023 and early October 2025. This unprecedented death toll makes the occupied Palestinian territory the most dangerous place in the world for aid workers.
That included 376 UN staff members – men and women who delivered food, treated the wounded, ran schools, and managed shelters.
In a tightly controlled visit this weekend, Israel allowed a small group of foreign journalists into Gaza City for the first time in months — but only under strict military escort, offering what observers described as a staged and censored view of the destruction caused by nearly two years of war.
Entire neighbourhoods lie in ruins, hospitals are barely functioning, and humanitarian agencies warn that famine has taken hold due to Israel’s siege and restrictions on aid. Reporters Without Borders and other media watchdogs have condemned Israel’s limits on press access as an attempt to conceal the full scale of civilian suffering.
Human rights groups accuse Israel of collective punishment and deliberate targeting of civilians, while its justification of the devastation as “self-defence” continues to draw global criticism.
As Gaza’s infrastructure collapses and its people remain trapped, the story of the war is being dictated not by its victims, but by the occupying power — controlling access, shaping perception, and silencing the voices of those living through the devastation.
