The clearing of the remnants of war, under which lie buried lives, memories and unexploded Israeli bombs, is one of the largest cleanup operations in modern history.
It took all day to clear a section of road in the Tel al-Hawa neighborhood of Gaza City. By the end of the day, Ahmed Alyan, a UN engineer, was exhausted, surrounded by mountains of rubble despite the hard work he had done all day. “It feels like we are holding a spoon and trying to empty the sea,” Alyan said, sweat dripping down his forehead after a long, hot summer day. Alyan is part of a World Food Program (WFP) team that has been working on Beirut Street, once one of the city’s main arteries, filled with shops, offices and homes, as well as cars and people. But now it is almost deserted.
The road was blocked by piles of rubble, stones and the remains of destroyed shops. Nearby, a tower leaned as its concrete foundations were damaged, while displaced families continued to live inside. In some parts of the road, sewage flowed from the ground, as the sewage system was damaged and blocked by Israeli shelling.
The UN estimates that removing most of the rubble in the Gaza Strip could take at least seven to 10 years and cost billions of dollars. That would make the removal of war debris in Gaza one of the largest rubble-clearing operations in modern history.
“The total amount of rubble in Gaza is estimated to be around 61 million tons. This is approximately 20 times more than the amount of rubble created by all the wars around the world over the past 18 years,” said Jaco Cilliers, the special representative of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Palestine. The task is being carried out in extremely difficult and dangerous conditions. Clearance teams are working through rubble containing countless dead bodies and unexploded bombs. So far, 580 kilometers of roads have been cleared, allowing the movement of aid trucks, aid teams and residents. However, rebuilding Gaza is a major challenge for international and local organizations. After more than two years of work, some 907 tons of rubble have been removed and more than 300 tons have been recycled and reused. But this represents only about 1.5% of the total amount of rubble.
To make the situation even more difficult, Israeli authorities have banned the entry of necessary equipment into Gaza, arguing that almost any aid that is not food or medicine can be considered “dual-use” and could in some way benefit Hamas.
ISRAELI ATTACKS CONTINUE
Initially, WFP’s work was limited to clearing debris from the roads and pushing it aside to create a passage for trucks. But the sheer volume of rubble was overwhelming, and the constant Israeli bombardment during the nearly year-long ceasefire continued to complicate this mammoth task. Some roads had to be reopened several times.
The widespread destruction across Gaza had generated more than 61 million tons of rubble by July 2025. Meanwhile, the so-called Yellow Line, a demarcation line established at the start of the ceasefire in October last year, continues to expand as Israeli troops take control of more territory. The area still accessible to people and aid workers accounts for barely 30% of the entire Gaza Strip, making the question of what to do with the rubble even more urgent. “One of the ways we have tried to address this problem is by recycling and reusing the rubble in different ways,” said Cilliers. UNDP has started managing five rubble-crushing plants across Gaza, where waste collected from damaged roads and critical infrastructure is processed for reuse. The rubble is first sorted to remove non-concrete materials, including metal and steel bars. The concrete is then crushed into smaller pieces, down to the size of a marble grain or a very small stone.
UNDP relies on seven crushing machines across Gaza, all of which were present in the territory before the war. Two of the seven machines have been rebuilt by local engineers in Gaza over the past year, based on models they had available, as they have been unable to bring new machines to the territory. At one of the crushing plants, a large space that previously served as a UN warehouse, piles of rubble are scattered across the yard.
Trucks arriving with large quantities of waste stop at a scale before unloading their load onto piles. The area is constantly filled with the loud noise of the mechanism that breaks the concrete into smaller pieces, while the air is filled with dust. The condition of the machinery poses a major challenge for the teams carrying out the work. Most of the equipment available in Gaza is severely worn out. The machinery often breaks down during operations, partly due to a severe shortage of spare parts, engine oil and other resources needed to maintain and operate it.
While severe restrictions on the entry of construction materials remain in place, engineers are repurposing the crushed rubble for a variety of essential purposes. Much of it is being used to repair roads and fill potholes, while some is being placed under tents and shelters to raise them above the level of rainwater and sewage.
“These materials cannot be compared to the natural materials that are usually used for road construction. Their quality is lower and they are difficult to work with. But there is no alternative. These solutions are imposed on us by the reality we are living in,” said Nehal Abu Hassan, a member of the WFP team. The removal of some of the rubble has already had a major impact. “The road has become wider, the problem with rodents and insects has decreased, and cars can pass more easily,” said Ibrahim Daradona, a displaced man from Jabalia, who lives in the Tel al-Hawa area of Gaza City. “The rubble was even a danger to children who were playing here,” he added.
More than 2.1 million displaced people live in tents and makeshift shelters, as dire humanitarian conditions persist after nearly three years. The rubble has become part of their daily living environment.
REVIVAL OF THE LOCAL ECONOMY
The removal of rubble has also helped revive Gaza’s local economy, creating space for people to start new activities and reopen shops and small businesses. “One of the things we’ve seen is that when we clear the rubble in front of damaged shops and businesses, many of them reopen within about 20 days,” said Cilliers. Despite all the efforts to remove the rubble and restore access to residential areas, the remains of houses have a special sensitivity. Every meter of rubble can hide things that cannot be seen from the outside. “The rubble in some areas does not represent just debris for people, it represents their entire lives and memories. In some cases, there may still be bodies under the rubble. So removing it is a very sensitive issue for families and communities,” said Abu Hassan.
The presence of human remains still buried under the rubble remains one of the most pressing humanitarian issues in Gaza. According to estimates cited by the UNDP, between 8,000 and 10,000 bodies may still be buried under the rubble.
UNDP said it is working with organizations, including the International Committee of the Red Cross, to identify sites where human remains may be found and prioritize them during rubble removal and recovery operations. “We are also working on a forensic process to identify the remains, to ensure that they are properly handled and that religious rights for burial are respected, and to provide the necessary documentation and certificates to the families. This is extremely important for families in Gaza,” Cilliers said. Unexploded ordnance in the rubble and on the roads poses a serious challenge for teams clearing the debris. UNDP and WFP teams coordinate with the UN Mine Action Service, UNMAS, the British charity Halo Trust and other organizations before the start of the clearance work, to identify unexploded ordnance and to protect returning workers and families.
Given the limited capacity for explosive ordnance disposal in Gaza, these organizations cannot deactivate or remove all unexploded ordnance. But they can identify dangerous areas and mark them.
In addition to the risk from explosives, the rubble may contain other hazardous materials, including asbestos, which can pose a serious health risk when its fibres are inhaled. Damaged buildings that are still partially standing pose another risk. Some families return to their homes believing they are safe, only to have the structures collapse unexpectedly. Therefore, assessing the safety of damaged buildings before residents return is an important part of the recovery process. “Progress in the early stages of recovery is slow. We are trying to do what we can, despite the restrictions on bringing in the equipment and services we need,” Cilliers said. (The Guardian)