The Israeli military is turning the yellow line that demarcates the more than half of the Gaza Strip it occupies and controls into a physical border. Analysis of satellite imagery by Forensic Architecture shows that the Israeli military has begun constructing earth berms—large, raised mounds of earth—in areas along the yellow line to create a physical separation between the Palestinian population forced to live in the western half of the enclave, and Israeli forces who occupy the eastern half.
Israeli troops withdrew to the yellow line after the so-called ceasefire agreement went into effect on October 10. Since then, they have engaged in a combination of construction of military infrastructure and roads in the over 53% of the territory that it controls—alongside the systematic destruction of existing buildings.
Previously, the yellow line was only drawn in Israeli maps or delineated by the military’s placement of physical yellow blocks—a total of 38 counted by Forensic Architecture—some of which have been moved hundreds of meters further into Gaza in some places, taking over even more Palestinian land.
This is the case in Jabaliya, for example, where the berms follow the path of the yellow blocks that Israel has been extending into the area under its control, but beyond the line marked on its own maps. Some of the berms have been constructed across roads, cutting them in half.