Israel-Hamas ceasefire: What’s left of Gaza and its people?

A ceasefire between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas is set to take effect on Sunday, January 19, after an agreement was announced on Wednesday to end Israel’s devastating 15-month assault on the Gaza Strip.

The three-phase agreement includes a temporary ceasefire, the release of Israeli captives and Palestinian prisoners, and the return of displaced Palestinians, though many homes in Gaza have been destroyed.

What is left of Gaza’s population?

Since October 7, 2023, Israel has killed at least 46,707 Palestinians and injured 110,265 – an average of 100 Palestinians killed every day over the past 467 days.

Gaza has an estimated population of around 2.3 million people, half of whom are children. There has been a six percent reduction from that population since the war began.Over the past 15 months, Israeli attacks have killed two out of every 100 people in Gaza and injured five out of every 100. Some 11,160 people are missing, meaning one in every 200 Palestinians in Gaza are unaccounted for – many buried under the more than 42 million tonnes of rubble. And 100,000 Palestinians have left Gaza.

Some 9 out of 10 Gazans have been displaced – and many of them have had to move multiple times since the war began.

But what do the displaced have to return to?

According to analysis by US-based researchers Jamon Van Den Hoek and Corey Scher, overall at least 60 percent percent of all buildings in the Gaza Strip have been destroyed.