'Gaza's Nakba 2023': Israeli minister likens current exodus to 1948 Palestinian Nakba

An Israeli minister has described the mass displacement of Palestinians due to Israeli strikes and land invasion as "Gaza's Nakba 2023".

Asked by Israeli channel N12 about images of besieged Gaza residents fleeing Israeli bombardment and whether that was a goal of the war, or only temporary, Israeli Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter described the situation on Saturday as being "Gaza's Nakba" — a reference to mass dispossessions of Palestinians after Israel was created in 1948.

"Operationally, there's no way to conduct a war the way the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] wants to conduct it inside Gaza territories while the masses are between the tanks and soldiers," Dichter said.

"I don't know how it will end."

Israel's relentless bombardment of the besieged enclave since October 7 has left over 11,070 Palestinian dead, most of them women and children. Thousands are wounded and some 2,700 are feared trapped or dead under the rubble of flattened buildings and homes.

Nearly a million residents have been displaced from northern Gaza after Israeli ultimatums and incessant strikes on homes, hospitals, churches, mosques and market places.

1948 Nakba

The war of 1948, when Palestinians fled or were expelled from their homes, is seared into their collective memory.

Many have voiced fears that if forced from their homes now, they will, like their ancestors, never be allowed back.

Israeli forces have for weeks warned Palestinians to flee northern Gaza for the south, which it is also bombing, saying they would be allowed back home once its war on the enclave is ended.

Palestinians do no trust far-right Israeli government's promises and fear their displacement is permanent.

The Nakba, the Arabic word for catastrophe, was the result of the Middle East war in 1948, during which Israelis forced hundreds of thousands of Palestinians out of their lands.

It is observed annually on May 15 by both Arabs and Muslims alike as a reminder that Palestinians have been forcefully expelled from their homes on that date.

Most Palestinians in besieged Gaza are registered as refugees after their ancestors were forced out of their homes within Israel's disputed borders in 1948.