In Gaza, 95 Percent of Farmland Is in Ruins

As a tenuous ceasefire takes hold in the Gaza Strip, an analysis of satellite imagery reveals 95 percent of cropland has been damaged in the course of the war.

The Israeli campaign has inflicted massive civilian casualties, with some 67,000 Palestinians dead, including more than 20,000 children. Some 84 percent of buildings in Gaza have been destroyed in the fighting, the U.N. estimates, and fields and orchards have been devastated.

He Yin, a geographer at Kent State University, has tracked the loss of vegetation as Israeli forces razed, bombed, and shelled farms, destroyed irrigation works, polluted soils, and forcibly displaced or killed farmers, leaving fields abandoned. 

In two years of war, he told Yale Environment 360, 89 percent of annual crops and 98 percent of tree crops have been damaged. As most farms in Gaza span less than two acres, Yin said earlier this year, “the loss of a single tree can be devastating.”

The U.N. Environment Programme says that uprooting by military equipment “has moved, mixed, and thinned the topsoil cover over large areas,” while “soil has been contaminated by munitions, solid waste, and untreated sewage.” According to the agency, “Production of food is not possible at scale.”

Before the war, farming accounted for 11 percent of Gaza’s economy and nearly half of its exports. According to UNEP, “Restoration of tree cover, soil and land will be critical for recovering food security, health, and resilience for people in Gaza.”

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