What this campaign was
Israel's war in Gaza since 7 October 2023: an air campaign, a ground manoeuvre across the Strip, two ceasefires and the 2025 offensives. The October 2025 ceasefire left Israel behind a Yellow Line that has since moved west, with strikes continuing and phase two stalled.
Every Gaza instrument the module tracks descends from this war: the Board of Peace and the stabilisation force under Resolution 2803, the Yellow Line, the crossing regime and the humanitarian records. The war also tied the Lebanon front to Gaza from 8 October 2023 and shaped the regional war of 2026. Its present phase is the module's clearest case of a ceasefire that is not a settlement: the fighting has largely stopped, the Israeli-held area has grown, and the sequence of disarmament against withdrawal on which the next phase depends remains unagreed.
Confidence: High As of 2026-10Reviewed 2026-10-12
Summary
The Hamas-led attack of 7 October 2023, which Hamas calls "Al-Aqsa Flood", killed about 1,200 people in Israel by Israeli figures and took 251 hostages into Gaza. Israel declared a state of war, which it named "Swords of Iron", and after three weeks of air strikes began ground operations on 27 October with the declared aims of destroying Hamas's military and governing capabilities and returning the hostages. In May 2024 Israel took the Rafah crossing and the Philadelphi corridor on the Egyptian border. A ceasefire from 19 January 2025 exchanged hostages for prisoners and collapsed on 18 March, when Israel resumed large-scale strikes. Two named offensives followed: "Gideon's Chariots", launched in mid-May 2025, and "Gideon's Chariots II", approved in August and directed at Gaza City from September. The ceasefire under the US 20-point plan took effect on 10 October 2025, with Israeli forces pulled back to a "Yellow Line" that left Israel, by reported estimates, just over half the Strip. The cabinet voted in October 2025 to rename the war the "War of Revival". Since the ceasefire Israeli strikes have continued, the line has moved, and the second phase — Hamas's disarmament, further Israeli withdrawal and the arrival of the International Stabilization Force — has not been implemented.
Stated objectives
What the participants say. Each entry cites where the position was stated; Vigil records that it was made, not that it is true.
Israel states its war aims as destroying Hamas's military and governing capabilities, returning all hostages, and ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel.
Recorded as Israel's declared aims. The module does not treat a declared aim as a measure of what has been achieved.
Hamas approved the Board of Peace's disarmament roadmap of 30 July 2026, which links the decommissioning of heavy weapons to Israeli withdrawal in phases; Israel is not a signatory.
Assessed objectives
Vigil's reading, graded. Kept structurally apart from stated positions so an assessment can never be published as someone's declared aim.
Hold ground inside the Strip as the guarantee for the disarmament phase, so that further withdrawal follows verified decommissioning rather than a date.
Consistent with the Board of Peace statement of August 2026 that withdrawal beyond the Yellow Line follows decommissioning, and with the movement of the line since October 2025. Israel's own statements frame the presence as security, not leverage.
Primary forces
- IDF Southern Command Primary force · Confidence: High · as of 2026-10
The IDF regional command responsible for the Gaza front throughout the war.
Opposing forces
- Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades Opposing force · Confidence: High · as of 2026-10
Led the 7 October attack and is the force whose disarmament the 2025–2026 instruments address. Its remaining strength is not established in open sources and no figure is carried.
- al-Quds Brigades (Palestinian Islamic Jihad) Opposing force · Confidence: Moderate · as of 2026-10
Took part in the 7 October attack and held hostages; a smaller force fighting alongside Hamas's armed wing rather than under it.
Supporting & external
- Gaza Division (143rd) Supporting force · Confidence: High · as of 2026-10
The standing territorial division on the Gaza perimeter, overrun in places on 7 October 2023; manoeuvre divisions have rotated through the Strip alongside it.
- 36th Division Supporting force · Confidence: High · as of 2025-09
Named in IDF press releases in northern Gaza in November 2023, in Rafah and Khan Younis from April to May 2025, and entering the Gaza City area in September 2025 under Gideon's Chariots II. Its attachment varies by period.
- 98th Division Supporting force · Confidence: Moderate · as of 2024-08
Named by the IDF as leading the Khan Younis operation until April 2024, and reported back in Khan Younis from July 2024. Later attachments are not authored here.
- 162nd Division Supporting force · Confidence: Moderate · as of 2024-08
Named by the IDF as continuing operations in the Strip in April 2024 and reported leading the Rafah operations through mid-2024. Later attachments are not authored here.
- Israeli Air Force Supporting force · Confidence: High · as of 2026-10
The air campaign preceded the ground manoeuvre and strikes have continued under the October 2025 ceasefire. No strike-target detail is carried.
The 7 October attack and the air campaign
Hamas-led armed groups broke through the Gaza perimeter on 7 October 2023 and attacked communities, military posts and a music festival; Israeli figures put the dead at about 1,200 and the hostages at 251. Israel declared a state of war and began an air campaign across the Strip, with an evacuation order for northern Gaza.
The ground manoeuvre
Ground operations began on 27 October 2023 in the north of the Strip and extended to Khan Younis in the south. A week-long truce in late November 2023 exchanged hostages for prisoners. Most of Gaza's population was displaced in the course of the war.
Rafah and the Philadelphi corridor
Israeli forces took the Gaza side of the Rafah crossing in early May 2024 and controlled the Philadelphi corridor along the Egyptian border by the end of the month — the first Israeli control of that border since 2005, and a recurring term in every later ceasefire negotiation.
The January 2025 ceasefire and its collapse
A three-phase agreement mediated by Qatar, Egypt and the United States took effect on 19 January 2025 and exchanged 33 hostages for Palestinian prisoners in its first phase. The second phase was never agreed, and Israel resumed large-scale strikes on 18 March 2025.
Gideon's Chariots and Gideon's Chariots II
The security cabinet approved "Gideon's Chariots" on 4 May 2025; it opened with a strike wave on 16 May and a ground operation announced on 18 May. "Gideon's Chariots II", directed at Gaza City, was approved on 19 or 20 August (sources differ) and the ground push into the city began in September. The IPC confirmed famine in Gaza Governorate on 22 August, which Israel rejected. The offensive ended with the October ceasefire.
The October 2025 ceasefire and the Yellow Line
The ceasefire under the US 20-point plan took effect on 10 October 2025 as Israeli forces pulled back to a "Yellow Line", an Israeli military designation that by reported estimates left Israel just over half the Strip. All living hostages were released by 13 October. Resolution 2803 endorsed the plan in November. Israeli strikes have continued, both sides allege violations, and the line has moved: Israel's prime minister directed in May 2026 that control reach 70 per cent, and independent estimates put it at around two-thirds. Gaza's crossings were shut at the opening of the Iran war on 28 February 2026, and the Board of Peace published a disarmament roadmap on 30 July 2026 that Israel has not signed.
Outcome and present status
Ongoing under a ceasefire. Since 10 October 2025 the large-scale fighting has stopped, the hostages have been returned, and Israeli forces hold an area behind the Yellow Line that has grown from about half the Strip to around two-thirds by independent estimates, while Israeli strikes continue. The Ministry of Health in Gaza reports more than 70,000 people killed since 7 October 2023 as of 2026, a count that does not distinguish combatants and that Israeli officials dispute. Neither the disarmament of Hamas nor further Israeli withdrawal has begun, and the International Stabilization Force has not deployed.
Observed adaptations
A withdrawal line used as a standing position: the Yellow Line, drawn as a first-phase pullback, has been moved and held as the ceasefire continued rather than serving as a step toward further withdrawal.
Political implications
The second phase falls to the government formed after Israel's election of 27 October 2026, and Gaza's interim administration under the Board of Peace has not yet established itself inside the Strip.
Military implications
The disarmament-for-withdrawal sequence is unagreed, so the Israeli-held area is the settled fact on the ground and the line, not the text, sets the present terms.
Humanitarian implications
OCHA reports about 65 per cent of Gaza's land under access restrictions as of October 2026, and one cargo crossing in operation; reconstruction cannot begin at scale while the line and the access regime stand.
Linked events
Locations
Places this module already publishes as map markers, listed because the campaign is about them. Not an operational area.
Reference layers
What remains unknown
- The Sharm el-Sheikh first-phase protocol and its withdrawal map have not been published; the Yellow Line's extent rests on reported estimates and Israeli statements, and the module does not draw it.
- The exact date of the cabinet vote renaming the war the "War of Revival" in October 2025 is not confirmed.
- Hamas's and Palestinian Islamic Jihad's remaining strength is not established in open sources.
- Fatality figures are carried only as each issuer's own count and are never combined.
Readings the evidence also supports
- The movement of the Yellow Line can be read as leverage for the disarmament negotiation, as a security buffer intended to last, or as the absence of a decided Israeli end-state before the election. The observed conduct is consistent with each.
Listed because the record's own assessment is not the only one its sources permit — not as a hedge on the assessment above.
Watch questions this campaign bears on
Standing analytical questions whose evidence runs through this campaign, each with its latest review. Derived from the Watch object, never restated here.
- PoliticalDo the bodies of Gaza's transition — the Palestinian administrative committee, the stabilisation force, a vetted police — begin operating inside the Strip?
- HumanitarianDoes the regime governing what enters Gaza — the crossings, the dual-use rules, who may deliver — open, hold or tighten?
- MilitaryDoes verified decommissioning of weapons in Gaza begin, and does the line Israeli forces hold move back or forward?
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Assessed as of — 2026-10 Last reviewed — 2026-10-12