The Washington Post revealed that Israeli forces are fortifying a strategic corridor dividing Gaza in two, building bases, seizing civilian buildings and destroying homes, according to satellite images and other visual evidence — an effort that Israeli military analysts and experts say is part of a broader project. To reshape the Gaza Strip and consolidate the Israeli military presence there.

The Netzarim Corridor is a four-mile road south of Gaza City that runs east to west, extending from the Israeli border to the Mediterranean Sea. The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has made Israeli withdrawal from the region a central condition in the ceasefire negotiations.

According to the Washington Post report: “But even as talks have continued over the past two months, Israeli forces have been digging in and positioning themselves. Three forward operating bases have been established in the corridor since March, as satellite images examined by the Washington Post show.” They provide clues about Israel's plans. At sea, the road meets a new seven-acre unloading point for a floating dock, a US project to bring more aid to Gaza.

Israel insists it has no intention of permanently reoccupying Gaza, where its forces controlled for 38 years until their withdrawal in 2005. But the construction of roads, outposts and buffer zones in recent months suggests an increasing role for the Israeli military as alternative visions for post-war Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has issued few concrete plans for the “day after” — a source of frustration for his generals and for Washington — but has repeatedly pledged to maintain “indefinite” security control over the Strip. In addition to launching future raids from abroad, Israeli occupation forces may need to “be present inside” Gaza “to ensure the demilitarization of Hamas, Netanyahu said in a podcast interview earlier this week,” according to the newspaper.

In addition to leverage in negotiations, control of the corridor gives the Israeli occupation army valuable flexibility, allowing the Israeli occupation forces to deploy quickly throughout the Strip, and it also allows the (Israeli) army the ability to maintain control over the flow of aid and the movement of displaced Palestinians, which is what It says it is necessary "to prevent Hamas fighters from regrouping."

At least 750 buildings were destroyed in what appears to be a systematic effort to create a “buffer zone” extending at least 500 meters on either side of the road, according to an analysis by Adi Ben-Nun of Hebrew University, which compiled geographic data and added that an additional 250 buildings were destroyed. In the American Pier area, according to the newspaper.

The Israeli military declined The Washington Post's request for comment on the clearing of buildings surrounding the corridor, saying it could not answer operational questions during the ongoing war.

Military experts say that this move is part of a broad and long-term reshaping of Gaza's geography, reminiscent of previous Israeli plans to divide Gaza into easily controlled cantons.

The newspaper attributed to Amir Avivi, reserve brigadier general and former deputy commander of the Gaza Division of Israeli forces: “What we need is complete freedom of action for the Israeli army everywhere in Gaza.”

"Welcome to Netzarim Base"

According to the newspaper: “The Netzarim Corridor was named after an Israeli settlement that was located on the coastal road - the second “finger” of the “Five Fingers” strategy adopted by then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, which envisioned dividing Gaza into parts, all under Israeli security control. The plan was only partially implemented before Sharon - once a champion of the settlements - ordered an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza in 2005. Israel is establishing this as a new corridor, since the terrain is the most suitable there and is suitable for military purposes.”

The Netzarim axis was among the first targets of the Israeli forces after their invasion of Gaza following the unprecedented Hamas attacks last October 7, to move forward to divide the Strip into two parts.

According to the newspaper, by November 6, Israeli army forces had cut an unofficial winding road to the sea that allowed armored vehicles to reach Al-Rashid Road, a main north-south road that runs along the Gaza coast. In February and March, Israeli forces formalized the corridor by building a straight road a few hundred meters to the south. Satellite images showed that the last section of the road, closest to the coast, was completed between March 5 and 9.

The Israeli occupation army says that the road allows military vehicles to move from one side of the Strip to the other in just seven minutes, allowing soldiers to quickly and unhindered access to northern and central Gaza. An Israeli military official told the newspaper, (who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with Israeli army protocol), that it had been used as an operating base for recent Israeli army attacks in Zaytoun, north of Gaza.

The corridor divides the only two main north-south roads in Gaza – Salah al-Din Road, in the center of the area, and Al-Rashid Road along the coast. The Israeli army began building forward operating bases at both points in early March.

The bases provide evidence that the IDF could prepare at some point for an orderly return of civilians to the north. The newspaper attributed Sean O'Connor, senior satellite imagery analyst at the security company Jane's, as saying that next to the two bases, on the roads leading north, there are structures that look like "long parallel corridors" leading to a central complex.

The United States said that Gazans who fled to Rafah and other points south should be allowed to return to their homes in the north. UN experts said preventing them could amount to a “forced transfer” of population, a crime against humanity.

The newspaper attributes Gazan citizen Juma Abu Hasira, 37, as saying that soldiers fired into the air when he approached the corridor last month during a lull in the fighting, when rumors spread that families could head north again. He said he was then arrested – blindfolded, beaten with a rifle butt, beaten and interrogated for eight hours.

The Israeli military acknowledged that soldiers used "warning fire" as Gazans, including "armed terrorists," approached the corridor, but did not respond to questions about Abu Hasira's alleged arrest.

The Al-Rashid site also includes observation posts and a possible guard post, said William Goodhind, an open source researcher at Contested Ground, a research project that tracks military movements in satellite images.

The forward operating base is located on Al-Rashid Road, next to a jetty that was constructed in mid-March to receive aid for distribution by the World Central Kitchen charitable foundation. The American floating dock, which began operations last Friday, is located in the same area, “where Israeli army forces provide security for shipments by sea,” according to official American statements.

“Welcome to the Netzarim base,” says the newspaper, the blue writing on the concrete barriers outside (according to a photo identified by The Washington Post and posted on the “X” website by an Israeli journalist who said his brother painted it with quick-drying paint at night.) The bright white floodlights can be seen for miles.

A 29-year-old (Palestinian) woman who lives directly south of the base, and spoke by phone on the condition of anonymity for fear of her safety, said: “It is the only lighted place in Gaza.” “They usually go to an area and then leave,” she said of Israeli forces, adding that in Netzarim they seemed willing to stay.

The fact that the pier lands at the end of the corridor controlled by the IDF “suggests that the IDF wants to control the flow of aid,” Michael Horowitz, head of intelligence at Low Peak International, told the newspaper. The corridor also connects to Gate 96, a new access point on Israel's border with central Gaza that was recently opened for aid trucks, according to the military official.

“You wait for three to four hours, you could be sent back, you could be arrested,” Mohamed Abu Mughaisib, deputy medical coordinator for Doctors Without Borders, said of the aid trucks trying to cross the corridor.

The UN said Israel's repeated refusal to allow humanitarian convoys to the north had exacerbated the hunger crisis there - which the head of the World Food Program described as a "massive famine".

Doron Kadosh, a military correspondent for the Israeli military-run radio station, who visited the Salah al-Din outpost last month, told the newspaper that radar and surveillance capabilities had been installed at the new outposts. His photos show blue and white mobile toilets, electric generators, and red and white telecommunications towers.

“There was nothing,” he said of his first visit along the corridor in October, when it was still just a tank track. The bases now include sleeping areas, showers, a mobile canteen and hard-cover shelters, Kadosh said.

It also appears that Israeli forces seized nearby civilian buildings and turned them into military sites. One of them is a former school in the village of Juhr al-Dik, about a mile from the border with Israel. Protective sand berms appeared at the site between March 15 and 30, according to satellite images. The rest of the village was destroyed.

The newspaper says: “Abdel Nasser (45 years old) fled his farm in Juhr al-Dik with his wife and five children in October. He said: “It was a refuge for me and my family... where we spent countless beautiful moments together.”

He added, "About two weeks ago, my neighbors informed me that the entire area had been destroyed, and all the surrounding agricultural land had been bulldozed." He couldn't bring himself to tell his wife yet.

Israeli forces also appear to be using the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital, which specialized in treating cancer patients, as a base of operations. The hospital closed in the first week of November due to nearby air raids and fuel shortages, leaving thousands of cancer patients without care. Sand barriers appeared around the hospital in late November.

An Israeli soldier filmed himself demolishing large parts of the hospital using a bulldozer in February. Photos published online by Palestinian journalist Younis Al-Tirawi on May 8, and geolocated by The Washington Post, show Israeli soldiers using the hospital as a sniper position.

By March, Israeli forces had cleared hundreds of dunams surrounding the hospital, demolished greenhouses and blew up Al-Isra University and the Palace of Justice, which houses Gaza's supreme courts.

It is noteworthy that Volker Türk, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, said last February: “Israel did not provide convincing reasons for such a large-scale destruction of civilian infrastructure.”

In all, the cleared area around the walkway and sidewalk is at least four square miles, or just over 10,000 dunams, although extensive damage to buildings and farmland extends far beyond that, according to an analysis by Ben-Nun of the Hebrew University. .

"Everything is being demolished along the road; it's completely demolished," he said.

Satellite images taken six months apart show the construction of the Netzarim Corridor south of Gaza City

Advantage of the corridor:

Israel has indicated that it may be prepared to withdraw from the corridor in the short term. The ceasefire agreement agreed to by Hamas two weeks ago stipulates a gradual withdrawal from the area, according to a copy of the document obtained by the newspaper and verified by a person close to the negotiations.

On the twenty-second day, the Israeli occupation army must completely withdraw from the Netzarim Corridor area and “completely dismantle military sites and installations,” as stated in the text of the resolution.

But the IDF likely received guarantees that it could return to Netzarim, even if it had to leave for a few months during the ceasefire, Horowitz said. He said the construction of multiple outposts, roads and large-scale clearing operations "suggest that this may become permanent."

Military analysts say that a long period of military occupation appears increasingly likely in the absence of other plans for governance in Gaza post-war. Israel has opposed the American proposal for the return of the Palestinian Authority, and there appears to be little regional acceptance of Arab security forces.

The newspaper says: “The long-term presence of Israeli forces will not be very popular in Gaza, and Hamas and other armed groups, including the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, have launched more than six rocket and mortar attacks on Israeli forces in the corridor in a week.” the past".

But with Hamas returning to northern areas already cleared by the Israeli army, military occupation - once an unthinkable proposition inside Israel - is now openly discussed.