Fed Up With Israeli Displacement Orders, Palestinians in Gaza City Refuse to Leave

Over two thirds of Gaza is now either under active displacement orders or within a no-go zone. With no safety or shelter elsewhere, some Palestinians are refusing to leave.

Adel Murad, 43, works to clear rubble from his home in Shujaiya, Gaza City. April 12, 2025. (Photo by Rasha Abu Jalal)

GAZA CITY—On April 11, the Israeli military issued orders to tens of thousands of Palestinians in eastern Gaza City—including the neighborhoods of Shujaiya, Zeitoun, and Tuffah— forcing them to relocate to areas on the western side of the city. The orders were the latest salvo in a scorched earth military campaign that Israel resumed on March 18 that has killed over 1,600 Palestinians, including over 500 children.

Since March 18, Israel has issued at least twenty-four displacement orders in cities and towns across Gaza, including in areas of Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahia, Gaza City, Deir al-Balah, al-Nuseirat, and Khan Younis. On March 31, Israel issued an order for almost all of Rafah, the southernmost governorate. Over 400,000 Palestinians have been newly displaced in less than a month.

As it stands, over two thirds of Gaza is either under active displacement orders or within a no-go zone—sometimes referred to as a kill zone. Yet, in some neighborhoods under displacement orders, some residents are refusing to leave, opting to remain in their homes and face the assault instead of being displaced again to areas that lack shelter and which nonetheless continue to be targeted by the Israeli military.

That morning on April 11, Adel Murad, a 43-year-old public school teacher, fled Shujaiya with nine of his family members to the western Al-Nasr neighborhood to escape Israel’s intense aerial bombardment. But they did not stay long; the following day, the family decided to defy the Israeli orders and return to their home. Murad’s family made their way through the smoke and rubble until they reached their house in Shujaiya, and they immediately began clearing away the debris.

"I am fed up with displacement,” Murad told Drop Site from his home on April 12. “There is no shelter, no temporary housing. All the evacuation centers are full, and the only alternative is sleeping on the streets without water or even a toilet. Displacement is humiliation."

He bent over the rubble. His tired eyes scanned for anything salvageable from his destroyed home. He picked up a wooden board, dusted it off, and stared at the remains of his house, estimating whether the wood could serve as part of a new wall. This was the third time Murad was rebuilding his home; it was first partially destroyed in February 2024.

"I will not leave my home, even if I have to live amid the rubble,” Murad said. “This is my land, and I will not be displaced again.”

Murad was constructing a makeshift shelter atop the ruins of his house. Using plastic sheeting and wood, he erected rudimentary walls with one side left open to let in air and light. Inside, he laid old blankets on the floor beside a small firewood stove. There was no electricity or running water. In one corner, he dug a deep hole, covered it with a metal sheet, and placed a plastic basin above it to use as a toilet.

"President Donald Trump wants us to migrate, to leave our homes, to become refugees in the Sinai desert or somewhere else, but we are here,” he said, while hammering a nail into a wooden plank to patch a crack in the crumbling cement wall. “We rebuild what they destroy again and again, and we will live here despite them.”

Israel’s aerial assault has been relentless. According to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, between March 18 and April 9, there were some 224 incidents of Israeli strikes on residential buildings and tents for the displaced. In thirty-six of these strikes, the only fatalities recorded were women and children.

“The increasing issuance by Israeli Forces of ‘evacuation orders’—which are, in effect, displacement orders—have resulted in the forcible transfer of Palestinians in Gaza into ever shrinking spaces where they have little or no access to life-saving services, including water, food and shelter, and where they continue to be subject to attacks,” Ravina Shamdasani, the spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said in a statement last week.

Israeli troops have completed construction of a new “security corridor,” cutting off Rafah from the rest of Gaza, referred to as Morag—the name of a Jewish settlement that once existed between Rafah and Khan Younis. Israeli forces have also retaken control of the Netzarim corridor that cuts off the northern third of Gaza from the rest of the enclave.

Mahmoud Sarhan, 48, works with local residents to try and dig a well in Zeitoun, Gaza City. April 12, 2025. (Photo by Rasha Abu Jalal)

Mahmoud Sarhan, a 48-year-old, and his six children are among dozens of families in the Zeitoun neighborhood in eastern Gaza City that refused to heed the Israeli military’s April 11 displacement orders.

“We have no other choice,” Sarhan told Drop Site, adding that the areas in western Gaza where they were ordered to displace are overcrowded and lack basic services. “I decided with my neighbors, we won’t flee again.”

Sarhan spoke as he helped others dig a well on the street to try and get access to water for the families who remained. Earlier this month, supplies from Israel’s water utility company stopped functioning during the offensive, Gaza’s municipal authorities said in a statement, effectively cutting off 50 percent of the total water supply to the north of the enclave.

UNICEF estimates that access to drinking water for one million people, including 400,000 children, dropped from sixteen litres per person per day during the ceasefire to just six.

“We dig with our bare hands and primitive tools, but we work together because we know no one will come to save us,” Sarhan said.

Israel has prevented all aid from entering Gaza since March 2, the longest enclosure of the 18-month war. In addition to the humanitarian catastrophe caused by a blockade on all food, safe drinking water, medicines, and other essential aid or supplies, rebuilding efforts have become near impossible.

Basic construction materials have skyrocketed over the past six weeks as a result of the blockade and the resumption of the war. Mohammed Abu Jayyab, editor-in-chief of Al-Eqtesadia (The Economy) newspaper in Gaza, told Drop Site that a 30-kilogram (66-pound) bag of cement now costs 900 shekels ($250), up from 20 shekels ($5) from before the war. The price of a single stone slab rose from 1 shekel ($0.30) to 20 shekels ($5), making reconstruction completely unaffordable.

Residents resort to plastic sheeting and wood to rebuild. "They have no choice but to patch up their partially destroyed homes and live in them, despite renewed fighting and the risk of collapse, due to the lack of shelter and the lack of tents coming in since the border closure," Abu Jayyab said.

For Sarhan, the decision to stay in his home neighborhood of Zeitoun was straightforward. “Trump and Netanyahu want us to leave our homeland, to give up, to migrate. But we are staying. Even if staying means digging with our hands just to find water,” he said. “The renewed war puts us in front of an uncertain future. But we cannot stop living just because we fear what might happen tomorrow.”