Israel’s Gaza offensive pushes hundreds of thousands of Palestinians into an ever-shrinking bubble

The Israeli military is extending its ground operations deep into Gaza, creating a large buffer zone between the Strip and Israeli territory and pushing hundreds of thousands of civilians into an ever-smaller area on the Mediterranean coast.

The Israeli military is extending its ground operations deep into Gaza, creating a large buffer zone between the Strip and Israeli territory and pushing hundreds of thousands of civilians into an ever-smaller area on the Mediterranean coast. By CNN’s tally, the Israel Defense Forces has issued 20 evacuation orders since March 18, encompassing large parts of Gaza, including all of Rafah in the south. In all, according to the United Nations, some 400,000 people have been told to move over the past three weeks, as the Israeli military intensifies efforts to force Hamas to free Israeli hostages. In the process much of Gaza has become uninhabitable or out of bounds. The streets of Gaza City were crammed with waves of fleeing civilians Friday, carrying what they could as they left other parts of central and northern Gaza. One displaced man, Raed Radwan, watched as hundreds more people entered the neighborhood of Sheikh Radwan, describing it as “completely filled with tents and displaced families.” “I see tents and people lining both sides of the road in heartbreaking conditions.Bulldozers are clearing the rubble of bombed homes to make space for more tents,” he told CNN.