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Yellow Line expands
Israel’s “Yellow Line” expansion in Gaza has pushed a “million Palestinians” into forced displacement, according to an Al-Jazeera report that describes families living near the line in tents in Al-Zaytoun under what it calls unrelenting fire.
The report says the Palestinian woman “Um Ismail” lives in a tent and “sleeps and wakes up in fear that nearby soldiers will kill her children with shrapnel that falls on the tents,” while bullets “collide with the rubble which she has come to regard as a shield from death.”
Al-Jazeera says local authorities put the expansion’s reach at “surpassed 60%,” while Benjamin Netanyahu’s government pledges to expand control to 70 percent.
The same Al-Jazeera account ties the expansion to a ceasefire agreement signed in October 2025, saying Israel would remain in only 53% of the Gaza Strip’s area during the initial phase but “did not comply with what was agreed and began expanding its presence and reach.”
Gaza Civil Defense spokesperson Mahmoud Basal said the occupation crossed the square adjacent to the Yellow Line, requiring “intervention by mediators to stop this expansion at the expense of defenseless civilians.”
Hamas and Netanyahu clash
Hamas accused Benjamin Netanyahu of a “flagrant violation” of the October 2025 ceasefire after the army ordered the seizure of more land in the Gaza Strip, with Basem Na’im telling AFP that Netanyahu announced expansion “in tandem with ongoing killings and starvation.”
Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem denounced what he called the “utter silence” of the Peace Council and Nikolai Miladinov toward “the dangerous statements by the occupation government about controlling 70 percent of the Gaza Strip.”
Sky News Arabia reported that Netanyahu said on Thursday he intended to expand the army’s control from 60 percent to 70 percent, adding that “My directive is to transition to... 70 percent.”
The same Sky News Arabia account says the ceasefire agreement stipulated withdrawal of Israeli forces behind the “Yellow Line,” the boundary between areas controlled by Hamas and those under Israeli control, and it notes that Gaza has continued to experience daily violence amid accusations of ceasefire violations.
Sky News Arabia also quoted Netanyahu’s May 15 statement that “Today we control... how much? 60 percent. And tomorrow we will see,” linking the expansion to a stalled move toward a second phase that was supposed to include Hamas disarming and a gradual Israeli withdrawal.
Buffer zone and humanitarian stakes
Al-Jarida al-Quds says Israeli occupation forces escalated field measures in the Gaza Strip by expanding the scope of the “Yellow Line,” with engineering units carrying out extensive demolition operations behind the line that it says destroyed entire neighborhoods and displaced thousands of additional families.
The outlet reports that local sources said the occupation expanded the security zone to engulf about “70% of the total land of the Gaza Strip,” after it constituted 53% in previous stages.
It adds that this systematic expansion has “crammed more than two million Palestinians into very narrow spaces lacking the minimum necessities of life and basic services,” and it describes injuries from bullets and artillery shelling in areas including Faluja west of Jabalia refugee camp and east of Al-Bureij refugee camp.
Al-Jarida al-Quds also cites Al-Dameer Association for Human Rights warning against turning the eastern part of the Strip into a permanent buffer zone, saying the practices amount to “'evacuation engineering' aimed at the forced displacement of Palestinian residents.”
The same report says the United Nations warned that a severe shortage of fuel and specialized equipment hinders efforts to retrieve bodies from under rubble, while it also states that “thousands of people are still missing,” prolonging families’ wait for the fate of children.
