Timeline: Key events that shaped 470 days of Israeli genocidal war on Gaza

By Alireza Akbari

After 470 days of Israeli genocide in the Gaza Strip, a ceasefire was finally reached between the Gaza-based resistance movement Hamas and the Israeli regime, which took effect on Sunday.

Following the announcement, Hamas said the agreement was a result of the “legendary resilience” of the Palestinian people and the “valiant resistance” in the Gaza Strip over more than 15 months.

"The agreement to stop the aggression on Gaza is an achievement for our people, our resistance, the Ummah [Islamic nation], and the free world. The agreement is a milestone in the conflict with the enemy, on the path to achieving our people's goals of liberation and return," the statement read.

The statement also noted that the agreement was driven by the popular Gaza-based resistance movement's responsibility towards the steadfast people in the Gaza Strip to stop the Zionist aggression against the oppressed Palestinians in the fully besieged strip.

Between Wednesday evening, when the ceasefire deal was reached and Sunday morning, when it came into effect, Israeli airstrikes across Gaza killed at least 120 Palestinians, including 32 women and 30 children, and injured 266 others, according to an official tally by the Gaza Civil Defense.

The pre-ceasefire escalation saw more death and devastation in the bruised and besieged territory.

During the past 15 months, since October 2023, the Israeli regime conducted an all-out genocidal campaign in the Gaza Strip, which claimed the lives of at least 46, 800 and injured more than 110,600.

The Zionist regime carried out 10,015 massacres in the besieged territory, wiping out 1,600 Palestinian families. At least seven mass graves have so far been reported in Gaza hospitals alone.

The regime also expanded its genocidal aggression to Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen during this period after failing to achieve any of its stated military goals in Gaza.

In Lebanon, the Benjamin Netanyahu regime assassinated top-ranking Hezbollah leaders and conducted massive airstrikes against Lebanese civilians. Despite the onslaught, the Lebanese resistance stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the oppressed people in Gaza.

After 15 months of wanton aggression, the Tel Aviv regime failed to achieve its most important military objective -- the dismantling of Hamas and other resistance groups in Gaza.

We look back at the timeline of events that defined the Israeli genocidal war on Gaza.

October 7, 2023: Palestinian resistance in Gaza led by Hamas launched a historic military operation against the Zionist entity in response to decades of occupation and apartheid.

The unprecedented operation shocked the Israeli regime and its Western backers, resulting in significant damage and shattering the myth of the Israeli army's invincibility.

October 17, 2023: The Israeli regime attacked the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City in the first major genocidal aggression. The attack killed at least 500 people, mostly children and women.

October 27, 2023: Israel announced a full siege of Gaza. The siege involved a combination of airstrikes, ground offensives, and the evacuation of Palestinian residents from northern Gaza to the south in a bid to ethnically cleanse the local population.

November 3, 2023: Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, in his first speech after the outbreak of Israeli genocide in Gaza said America was "entirely responsible for the ongoing war on Gaza and its people, and Israel is simply a tool of execution."

November 4, 2023: The Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza came under multiple Israeli airstrikes, which caused significant casualties, most of them children and women.

November 11, 2024: An Israeli attack targeted a tent sheltering a displaced family within the Nuseirat camp, killing at least three people, including the parents of 10-year-old twins who sustained serious injuries. Approximately 24 others were wounded and transported to the Awda Hospital in Nuseirat.

November 15, 2023: Israeli occupation troops barged inside Gaza's biggest hospital, Al Shifa, in Gaza City, after a siege lasting several days during which medical staff reported that patients, including newborn babies, died from a lack of power and supplies.

December 4, 2023: Israeli occupation forces launched their first major ground assault in southern Gaza, towards the main southern city, Khan Younis.

January 2, 2024: Saleh al-Arouri, a top strategist and the deputy chief of the Gaza-based resistance movement Hamas, was assassinated in an Israeli drone strike on Beirut’s southern suburb of Dahiyeh.

The strike also killed his resistance comrades Samir Afandi (Abu ‘Amer), Azzam al-Aqra’, Zaki Shahin, Mohammed al-Reis, Mohammed Bshasha, and Ahmed Hamoud.

January 12, 2024: The US and UK launched a series of cruise missiles, codenamed Operation Poseidon Archer, against civilian targets in Yemen in response to Yemeni solidarity with Gaza.

February 29, 2024: More than 100 Palestinians were killed in an attack on convoys of humanitarian aid after Israeli forces opened fire on desperate crowds gathered around aid trucks.

April 1, 2024: Israeli strikes killed seven World Central Kitchen workers who were delivering aid in Gaza. The team had previously received security clearance from the Israeli army.

May 2024: The Israeli regime ordered the evacuation of Rafah and launched offensives, displacing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. It bombed the Tel al-Sultan camp in Rafah, which was designated as a safe zone, setting the camp on fire, and killing at least 50 Palestinians.

May 30, 2024: The US and UK jointly carried out a series of airstrikes on Sanaa and Hodeidah, Yemen. The strikes killed 16 people and injured 42.

May 31, 2024: Yemeni military launched a missile attack on the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier in the Red Sea. The attack came in response to US and UK strikes on Hodeidah province, which killed at least 16 people, as well as their support for the Israeli genocide in Gaza.

June 2024: Israel attacked the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza. One of the attacks killed dozens of Palestinians after it targeted a UN-run school sheltering displaced people.

Two days later, Israeli forces killed 274 Palestinians in one of the worst massacres,

July 31, 2024: Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of Hamas, was assassinated in Tehran by the Israeli regime. He was in Iran to attend the inauguration ceremony of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.

July 30, 2024: Fuad Shukr, a top-ranking Hezbollah resistance movement commander, was assassinated in an Israeli airstrike in the suburbs of southern Beirut.

The airstrike targeted a building in a congested neighborhood of Haret Hreik. It was carried out by a drone loaded with three rockets, which struck an apartment building near a hospital.

September 17, 2024: The mass explosion of handheld pagers in Lebanon killed at least 12 people and injured nearly 3,000, sending shockwaves through the region.

Less than 24 hours later, a similar series of explosions hit walkie-talkie radios across the country, widely condemned as a blatant act of terrorism by the Israeli apartheid regime.

September 20, 2024: Ibrahim Aqil, a senior commander in Hezbollah, was assassinated by Israel in an airstrike that targeted an apartment building in the Dahieh suburb of Beirut, Lebanon. The attack killed at least 14 people and injured another 66.

September 27, 2024: Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, was assassinated in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut, Lebanon. The attack involved a series of airstrikes that flattened several buildings in Beirut's southern suburbs.

Ali Karaki, a senior commander of Hezbollah, and Abbas Nilforoushan, a senior Iranian military advisor, were also killed in the dastardly act of terror.

September 29, 2024: The Yemeni military launched a missile targeting Ben Gurion Airport, which evaded multiple air defense systems and shook the regime.

October 13, 2024: Hezbollah launched a drone attack on the Golani Brigade's Zar'it barracks near Binyamina. The attack killed several regime soldiers.

October 16, 2024: Yahya Sinwar, an iconic Hamas resistance movement leader, was killed by the Israeli occupation forces in the Tel al-Sultan neighborhood of Rafah, southern Gaza Strip.

His final act of defiance became immortal and inspired a new generation of resistance fighters. 

October 19, 2024: Hezbollah launched a drone attack targeting the private residence of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Caesarea. The drone hit Netanyahu's house, causing damage.

November 12, 2024: Coinciding with the 40th day of the martyrdom of Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah intensified operations against Israeli strategic and military bases, reaching 145 km inside the occupied territories using various drones and missiles.

November 18, 2024: The Hezbollah resistance movement targeted the private residence of Israeli Air Force Commander Major General Tomer Bar in Tel Aviv in another high-precision strike. 

November 22, 2024: The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Minister of Military Affairs Yoav Gallant.

November 27, 2024: A ceasefire between the Israeli regime and the Lebanon-based resistance movement Hezbollah was announced by Qatar's foreign minister. 

December 31, 2024: Yemen's Armed Forces executed a high-profile operation targeting key Israeli infrastructure. A hypersonic ballistic missile, dubbed Palestine-2, struck Ben Gurion Airport with pinpoint precision, causing significant damage.

January 11, 2025: The US, UK, and Israel launched attacks on the Yemeni provinces of Sana’a, Hudaydah, and Amran. These strikes targeted Yemen's infrastructure and civilian centers, coinciding with massive demonstrations in Yemen in solidarity with Palestine.

January 15, 2025: After 470 days of genocide in the Gaza Strip, a ceasefire agreement between Hamas and the Israeli regime came into effect in the morning hours.

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