Gaza Strip

Gaza
غَزَّة
Gaza غَزَّة
	Location of Gaza within Palestine
Status	Under the Palestinian National Authority according to the Oslo Accords; De facto administered by Hamas since July 2007; Claimed by the State of Palestine; Regarded as occupied by the Israeli regime due to the Israeli blockade of Gaza according to the United Nations;
Capital and largest city	Gaza City; 31°30′53″N 34°27′15″E / 31.51472°N 34.45417°E
Official languages	Arabic
Ethnic groups	Palestinian
Religion	99% Sunni Islam (official); <1% Christianity;
Demonym(s)	Palestinian
Government	State of Palestine
Area
• Total	Lua error in Module:Convert at line 1850: attempt to index local 'en_value' (a nil value).
Population
• 2022 estimate	2,375,259
• Density	Lua error in Module:Convert at line 1850: attempt to index local 'en_value' (a nil value).
Currency	Israeli new shekel; Egyptian pound
Calling code	+970
ISO 3166 code	PS
	↑ The State of Palestine is recognized by 147 members of the United Nations as well as the Holy See. ;

Template:Gaza Strip

Gaza (also called the Gaza Strip) is a polity along the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. It is one of two territories that make up the State of Palestine. (The other is the West Bank).

Gaza City is its main city. The Palestinian National Authority governed Gaza until 2006, and before 2007, Harakat At-Tahriri Al-Filistiniya administered the territory.

Geography

Size

Gaza is a small area:

It is 41 kilometers (25 miles) long
It ranges from just 6 to 12 kilometers (3.7 to 7.5 mi) wide
Its total area is 365 square kilometers (141 sq mi)
It has an 11-km (7-mi) border with Egypt, near the city of Rafah.

According to one article:^[4]

The whole of Gaza (aka the Gaza Strip) is about twice the size of Washington, D.C. and three times the population. [...] The Gaza Strip is geographically about the size of Philadelphia, Detroit or the country of Grenada. The Gaza Strip has the same land area as Las Vegas but more than three times the population. There are approximately 2.23 million residents of the small territory.

Features

Three mountain ridges run alongside Gaza's coastline. These ridges are very important to Gaza's topography.

Gaza's major river is Wadi Gaza. The Wadi Gaza Nature Reserve was established to protect the country's only coastal wetland.

Gaza's major cities include:

Khan Yunis is located 7 km (4.3 mi) northeast of Rafah
Several towns around Deir el-Balah are located along the coast between Rafah and Gaza City
Beit Lahia north of Gaza City
Beit Hanoun northeast of Gaza City

Al Deira beach is popular for surfers.^[5]

Climate

Gaza has a hot semi-arid climate (Köppen BSh). Summers are hot and dry. Winters are warm, and the country gets almost all of its rain during this season. Despite the dryness, humidity is high throughout the year.

Annual rainfall is higher than in any part of Egypt: between 225 mm (9 in) in the south and 400 mm (16 in) in the north. However, almost all of this rain falls between November and February.

The country has various environmental problems, including soil degradation and salination of fresh water.

History

Gaza was historically part of Palestine. However, the Ottoman Empire controlled the area from the 16th century through the end of World War I. At that point, the Ottoman Empire was broken up.

Now the British offered to let Egypt govern Gaza. (Previously, in 1906, the Ottomans and the British Empire had set Gaza's international border with Egypt.) Egypt refused, so Britain itself occupied the territory from 1917–1918.

The British also occupied Gaza from 1920 until 1948. Then, in 1948, the League of Nations ordered a "Mandatory Palestine".

1948–1959

During the 1948 conflict (particularly the 1948 War), tens of thousands of Palestinians were forcibly expelled to Gaza by Israeli and Jewish terrorist groups. By the end of the war, 25% of Mandatory Palestine's Arab population was in Gaza, though the area constituted only 1% of the land. The same year, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) was established to administer various refugee programmes.

Palestinians in an outdoor market in Gaza, 1956

Demographics

Children in Gaza City lining up for class, 2009

In 2010, approximately 1.6 million people lived in Gaza.^[6] Almost a million of them were UN-registered refugees.^[7] The majority have parents who were refugees and were forcibly driven out of their homes by Israeli/Jewish terrorist groups during the 1948 War. Gaza's population has increased since then.

Many people living in Gaza are children. Almost half (43.5%) of the population is 14 or younger. In 2014, the median age was 18.

Sunni Muslims make up 99.8% of Gaza's population. Christians make up the other 0.2%; there are between 2,000 to 3,000 of them in Gaza.^[8]

Sports

In 2010, Gaza inaugurated its first Olympic-size swimming pool at the As-Sadaka club. The opening ceremony was held by the Islamic Society. The swimming team of as-Sadaka holds several gold and silver medals from Palestinian swimming competitions.

Gaza Strip Media

A map of the Gaza Strip showing key towns and neighbouring countries.
OCHA OpT September 2023 map of the Gaza Strip
Che Guevara visiting Gaza in 1959
Gaza (Gaza Strip) Photographs
Israeli soldiers in Gaza in 1969
An IDF Caterpillar D9 armored bulldozer demolishing a house in the Gaza Strip during the Second Intifada
Neve Dekalim was Gush Katif's urban center and the largest community