As artillery and bombs pound around Gaza's largest city and Israel promises a punishing new offensive, Palestinians in the city are paralyzed with fear unsure where to go, when to leave and if they will ever return.

Israel has declared Gaza City, in the north of the territory, to be a combat zone while the military moves forward with plans to overtake it in a campaign to push Hamas into submission. Parts of the city are already considered “red zones,” where Palestinians have been ordered to evacuate ahead of expected heavy fighting.

That has left residents — many of whom returned after fleeing the city in the initial stages of the Israel-Hamas war — on edge. With Israeli bulldozers razing the ground in occupied neighborhoods and Israeli leaders supporting the mass relocation of Palestinians from Gaza, departing the city now could mean leaving for good. Moving costs thousands of dollars and finding space in the overcrowded south to pitch a tent feels impossible. But staying behind, they say, could be deadly.

“The Israeli forces, when they mark any area by red color and they request the people to leave, they really will destroy it,” said Mohammed Al-Kurdi, who is sheltering in Gaza City along with hundreds of thousands of other Palestinians.

“So it’s like you decide whether to live or die. It’s very simple like that.”

An impossible choice

Since Israel declared the area a combat zone on Friday, a small fraction — some 14,840 Palestinians of the nearly 1 million the UN estimates are in Gaza City — have left their homes in the city as of Monday, most to flee south, according to the Site Management Cluster, a joint humanitarian body that coordinates assistance for people in displacement sites.

A fraction of them, about 2,200, have moved to new places within Gaza City after being displaced by Israeli attacks.

Al-Kurdi, a project manager and consultant, said he can hear Israeli forces from the apartment where he's sheltering as they “erase the area completely.”

Zeitoun was once Gaza City’s largest neighborhood, filled with markets, schools and clinics. Over the last month, large swaths of it and the neighboring area of Sabra have been flattened, according to satellite photos reviewed by The Associated Press from early August and early September. The photos show that entire blocks that have been pummeled or bulldozed into empty, sandy lots.

“It’s not something partial like before. It’s 100%,” he said. “The house, I’m telling my friends, it keeps dancing all the day. It keeps dancing, going right and left like an earthquake.”

Many of the people in the city moved back to the north during a ceasefire in January, hoping to find their homes intact. Al-Kurdi's home was completely destroyed, so he's now living alone in a western area of the city. His children and wife were able to leave Gaza last year. He said he would flee south if his home fell under an evacuation order.

Amjad Shawa, the director of the Palestinian NGO network, left his home in the upscale Rimal neighborhood in the early days of the war and also returned there with his family in January. He, like Al-Kurdi, said his family would likely leave Gaza City if their area receives an evacuation order.

But leaving this time would be different, he said. “Gaza will be leveled and destroyed. Last time, I had my car. There was fuel. Everyone had his income, his money."

Back then, the cities of Rafah and Khan Younis still stood in southern Gaza.

Now, after months of bombardment, “there is no Rafah. Almost no Khan Younis,” Shawa said.

Leaving is nearly impossible for some

For others — medical workers, older and sick people — leaving Gaza City is nearly impossible.

“The elders, they're saying we will die here,” Shawa said. “This has pushed the other members of the family to stay, not to leave.”

“My aunt is elderly and can’t walk, and my mother also struggles with mobility. We have so many belongings and no way to manage them. It feels unthinkable,” said Norhan Almuzaini, medical program officer in northern Gaza for the group Medical Aid for Palestinians.

Amal Seyam is the general director of the Women’s Affairs Center in Gaza. Originally from the Tuffah neighborhood in eastern Gaza City, her home was destroyed by bombardment. For nearly four months, she has been sheltering in the Nasr neighborhood in the city's west, where she stays alongside her colleagues inside the women’s center.

Seyam has been displaced five times since the war began — three times within the city and twice to the south, in Rafah and Khan Younis. Each time, she fled with nothing.

When asked if she would consider leaving Gaza City, she said: “I will only leave when everyone who needs me here leaves. As long as there’s a woman who needs me, I am staying. All of Gaza feels like it’s in the red zone now anyway. The bombing is happening meters from us, not kilometers.”

She paused, her voice breaking into tears.

“Many people have started packing. Many have already left. Do you know what displacement means? It means moving once again, building your life once again, buying new things, blankets, tents, all over again.”

Dire conditions persist throughout Gaza

Those who have left Gaza City over the past few months have found dire conditions elsewhere in Gaza. Their arrival has crowded already overflowing tent camps and sent prices of basic goods up.

Iman El-Naya, from Khan Younis, fled Gaza City three months ago. “The beach is crowded. Everywhere is crowded. There’s no hygiene. It’s a struggle to get water and food.”

“I go and stand in line for water. Getting bread is a struggle. Everything is even more expensive after the people from the north came here.”

Shorouk Abu Eid, a pregnant woman from Gaza City, was displaced to Khan Younis four months ago. She said the arrival of more people from the north is creating an even more tragic situation.

“There is no privacy, no peace of mind. Places I used to walk to in five or 10 minutes are taking me around an hour now because of the congestion. There’s barely 10 centimeters between tents.”

Jamal Abu Reily lamented that the bathrooms are overflowing and that there's so little room for new arrivals.

“How are we going to all fit here? he asked. “Where are they going to stay? In the sea?”

The Syrian government is quietly pursuing steps aimed at easing tensions in the predominantly Sweida province after months of unrest and demands for greater autonomy.

A senior local source in Sweida told Asharq Al-Awsat that Damascus has appointed Brig. Gen. Hossam al-Tahan as the new head of internal security in the province, replacing Brig. Gen. Ahmed al-Dalati, who was transferred to Damascus countryside.

The move came shortly after authorities reopened the Damascus-Sweida highway, which had been closed due to security concerns. “These are messages from the state that it wants to improve the situation here,” the source said, noting the measures have brought “some relief and hope” to residents.

However, the source stressed that deeper steps are required to restore confidence, including releasing abductees, rebuilding damaged homes, enabling displaced families to return, and providing security guarantees.

“Such actions would be real gestures of goodwill from the state and help rebuild trust between the government and society,” the source added.

Observers say Damascus is handling the Sweida file with caution, seeking a settlement without escalation.

The province has seen heightened tension since violent clashes in July left hundreds dead, including civilians, Druze fighters, Bedouin tribesmen, and government forces.

The violence prompted Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri, one of the Druze community’s top religious figures, to sharpen his criticism of Damascus.

Al-Hijri has long voiced secessionist rhetoric, thanking Israel for supporting Syria’s Druze. In late August, he escalated further, calling not just for Sweida’s independence but for the “independence of southern Syria.”

He has established parallel structures, including a so-called “National Guard,” a “High Legal Committee,” and local administration committees. In early August, he also announced a new executive council for the province.

Yet, according to the local source, these initiatives have yielded little change. “The situation remains the same,” he told Asharq Al-Awsat, predicting infighting among the disparate factions folded into the National Guard, which he argued is led by figures with poor reputations. The leadership includes al-Hijri’s son, Salman, alongside groups described as “criminal gangs.”

On Monday, National Guard commander Firas Hamayel was killed in Sweida. According to the source, he died during clashes while attempting to seize the former home of ex-minister Mansour Azzam in Dahr al-Jabal.

Hamayel’s brother is a leader in the exiled “Syrian Brigade Party,” which advocates Sweida’s secession; its armed wing has also joined the National Guard.

“The secession project is doomed from the start,” the source said, dismissing al-Hijri’s promises of breakthroughs, including reopening an international crossing. “Nothing has materialized, and people are growing frustrated.”

The Israeli military moved deeper into Gaza City on Wednesday, with soldiers and tanks pushing into Sheikh Radwan, one of the urban center's largest and most crowded neighborhoods.

In recent weeks, Israeli forces have advanced through Gaza City's outer suburbs and are now just a few kilometers from the city center despite international calls to halt the offensive.

Gaza City residents said the military had destroyed homes and tent encampments that had housed Palestinians displaced by nearly two years of war. At least 24 Palestinians, some of them children, were killed by the military across Gaza on Wednesday, most of them in Gaza City, according to local health officials.

"Sheikh Radwan is being burnt upside-down. The occupation destroyed houses, burnt tents, and drones played audio messages ordering people to leave the area," said Zakeya Sami, 60, a mother of five, referring to the Israeli military.

"If the takeover of Gaza City isn’t stopped, we might die, and we are not going to forgive anyone who stands and watches without doing anything to prevent our death," she told Reuters.

The military dropped grenades on three schools in the Sheikh Radwan area that had been used to shelter displaced Palestinians, setting tents ablaze, according to residents, who said the Palestinians fled before the bombing, Reuters said.

The military also detonated armored vehicles laden with explosives to destroy homes in Sheikh Radwan's east and bombed a medical clinic, destroying two ambulances, according to witnesses.

The Israeli military said in a statement on Wednesday it would continue to operate against "terrorists organizations" in Gaza and to "remove any threat" posed to the State of Israel.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered the military to take the city, which he describes as the last stronghold of Hamas, whose October 2023 attack on Israel ignited the war.

Netanyahu insists that Hamas, which has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades but now only controls parts of the territory, must be defeated if it will not lay down its arms and surrender.

Israel's military has urged the country's political leadership to instead reach a ceasefire agreement, warning that the assault would endanger hostages held in Gaza and soldiers carrying out the offensive, Israeli officials previously said.

In Israel, public sentiment is largely in favor of ending the war in a deal that would see the release of the remaining hostages. In Jerusalem on Wednesday, protesters climbed the roof of Israel's national library, displaying a banner that read 'You have abandoned and also killed'.

MASS DISPLACEMENT

"We need our soldiers back home. We need our hostages back home now. It's been too long for them to stay there. Stop the war now," said Ravid Vexelbaum, 50, from Tel Aviv.

Tens of thousands of reservists reported for duty on Tuesday to support the offensive, forces that a military official told reporters last month were mostly expected to take on non-combat roles, such as in intelligence, or take over from combat soldiers in places like the West Bank who could then be deployed to Gaza.

The attack on Gaza City threatens to displace one million Palestinians, almost half the population of Gaza. The Israeli military in recent weeks has ordered the civilian population to leave their homes, although there are reports that many families who have already been displaced are refusing.

Over 63,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military since the war started in October 2023, according to local health officials. The war has caused a humanitarian crisis across the territory, with health officials in Gaza reporting that 367 people, including 131 children, have so far died of malnutrition and starvation caused by acute food shortages.

Israeli officials acknowledge there is hunger in parts of Gaza but reject assertions of famine or starvation.

The war in Gaza began on October 7, 2023, when gunmen led by Hamas attacked southern Israeli communities near the border, killing some 1,200 people, and taking 251 hostages, including children, into Gaza. There are 48 hostages still held in Gaza, of which 20 are thought to be alive.

Hamas has offered to release some hostages, living and deceased, in exchange for a temporary ceasefire that Israel has yet to formally respond to. Hamas has also offered to release all hostages in exchange for an immediate end to the war and withdrawal by Israeli officials but has refused to lay down its arms.