Palestinians began a mass exodus from northern Gaza on October 13 after Israel’s military told some 1 million people to evacuate toward the southern part of the besieged territory, an unprecedented order ahead of an expected ground invasion against the ruling Hamas militant group.

Follow Israel-Hamas war, day 7 LIVE updates here

The U.N. warned that so many people fleeing en masse — almost half the Gaza population — would be calamitous, and it urged Israel to reverse the order. Families in cars, trucks and donkey carts packed with blankets and possessions streamed down a main road out of Gaza City, the biggest city, even as Israeli strikes hammered neighborhoods in southern Gaza.

Hamas, which staged a shocking and brutal attack on Israel nearly a week ago and has fired thousands of rockets since, called on people to stay in their homes, saying the order was “psychological warfare” to break their solidarity.

Many hesitated to leave, mostly because safety was uncertain everywhere in the tiny territory under constant bombardment by Israeli airstrikes. Gaza is sealed off from food, water and medical supplies and under a virtual total power blackout.

“Forget about food, forget about electricity, forget about fuel. The only concern now is just if you’ll make it, if you’re going to live,” said Nebal Farsakh, a spokesperson for the Palestinian Red Crescent in Gaza City, as she broke into heaving sobs.

The Palestinian Health Ministry Friday said that roughly 1,800 people have been killed in the territory — more than half of them under the age of 18, or women. Hamas’ assault last Saturday killed more than 1,300 Israelis, most of whom were civilians, and roughly 1,500 Hamas militants were killed during the fighting, the Israeli government said.

The week-old war has sent tensions soaring across the region. Israel has traded fire in recent days with Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group, sparking fears of an ever wider conflict, though that frontier is currently calm.

Thousands protest after Muslim prayers across Mideast

Weekly Muslim prayers brought protests across the Middle East, and tensions ran high in Jerusalem’s Old City. The Islamic endowment that manages a flashpoint holy site in the city, the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, said Israeli authorities barred all Palestinian men under the age of 50 from entering.

Israel has bombarded Gaza round-the-clock since Hamas’ attack, in which its fighters massacred hundreds in southern Israel and snatched some 150 people to Gaza as hostages.

Hamas said Israel’s airstrikes killed 13 of the hostages in the past day. It said the dead included foreigners but did not give their nationalities.

Israeli military spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari denied that, telling Al-Jazeera Arabic that “we have our own information and do not believe the lies of Hamas.”

Israel said Thursday it would allow no supplies into Gaza until Hamas frees the hostages.

The military urged civilians in Gaza’s north to move south — an order that the U.N. said affects 1.1 million people. If carried out, that would mean the territory’s entire population cramming into roughly the southern half of the 40 kilometer (25 mile) long strip.

Israel said it needed to target Hamas’ military infrastructure, much of which is buried deep underground. Another spokesperson, Jonathan Conricus, said the military would take “extensive efforts to avoid harming civilians” and that residents would be allowed to return when the war is over.

Also read | Hamas practiced in plain sight, posting video of mock attack weeks before border breach

Hamas militants operate in civilian areas, where Israel has long accused them of using Palestinians as human shields.

“The camouflage of the terrorists is the civil population,” Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said at a news conference with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. “Therefore, we need to separate them. So those who want to save their life, please go south.”

But U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said it would be impossible to stage such an evacuation without “devastating humanitarian consequences.” He called on Israel to rescind any such orders, saying they could “transform what is already a tragedy into a calamitous situation.”

‘Where do we go?’, Gazans ask after Israel’s evacuation warning

Many Palestinians in Gaza still struggled with indecision, not knowing whether to leave or stay.

Gaza City resident Khaled Abu Sultan at first didn’t believe the evacuation order was real, and now isn’t sure whether to evacuate his family to the south. “We don’t know if there are safe areas there,” he said. “We don’t know anything.”

Another family contacted friends and relatives in southern Gaza seeking shelter, but then changed their minds. Many expressed concern they would not be able to return or be gradually displaced to Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.

More than half of the Palestinians in Gaza are the descendants of refugees from the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation, when hundreds of thousands fled or were expelled from what is now Israel. For many, the mass evacuation order dredged up fears of a second expulsion. Already, at least 423,000 people — nearly one in five Gazans — have been forced from their homes by Israeli airstrikes, the U.N. said Thursday.

Where is the sense of security in Gaza? Is this what Hamas is offering us?” said one resident, Tarek Mraish, standing by an avenue as vehicles flowed by. “What has Hamas done to us? It brought us catastophe,” he said, using the same Arabic word “nakba” used for the 1948 displacement.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said it was impossible to evacuate the many wounded from hospitals — already struggling with high numbers of dead and injured. “We cannot evacuate hospitals and leave the wounded and sick to die,” spokesperson Ashraf al-Qidra said.

Ms. Farsakh, of the Palestinian Red Crescent, said some medics were refusing to leave and abandon patients and were instead calling colleagues to say goodbye.

“What will happen to our patients?” she asked. “We have wounded, we have elderly, we have children who are in hospitals.”

The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, also said it would not evacuate its schools, where hundreds of thousands have taken shelter. But it relocated its headquarters to southern Gaza, according to spokesperson Juliette Touma.

Pressed by reporters on whether the army would protect hospitals, U.N. shelters and other civilian locations, Mr. Hagari, the Israeli military spokesperson, warned, “It’s a war zone.”

He added: “If Hamas prevents residents from evacuating, the responsibility lies with them.” The U.N. had said the evacuation order it received gave Palestinians 24 hours to move, but the military told the AP there was no formal deadline.

Clive Baldwin a senior legal adviser at the New York-based Human Rights Watch, said “ordering a million people in Gaza to evacuate, when there’s no safe place to go, is not an effective warning.”

“The roads are rubble, fuel is scarce, and the main hospital is in the evacuation zone,” he said. “World leaders should speak up now before it is too late.”

Egypt has been alarmed by the potential of tens of thousands of Palestinians flooding out of Gaza into its Sinai Peninsula. It has moved thousands of security forces toward the border to prevent a breach, a senior Egyptian security official said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief reporters. At the same time, it is trying to negotiate entry of humanitarian aid to Gaza. Egypt’s Rafah crossing, the only entry not controlled by Israel, has been closed because of airstrikes.

The evacuation order was taken as a further signal of an already expected Israeli ground offensive, though no such decision has been announced.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to “crush” Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007. His government is under intense public pressure to topple the group rather than merely bottle it up in Gaza as it has for years.

A visit by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday, along with shipments of weapons, offered a powerful green light for Israel to drive ahead with its retaliation. Defense Secretary Austin, who met with Israeli leaders Friday, reiterated the United States’ ironclad support for Israel, saying military assistance would flow in “at the speed of war.”

Still, a ground offensive in densely populated and impoverished Gaza would likely bring even higher casualties on both sides in brutal house-to-house fighting.

Hamas on Friday rejected an Israeli order to evacuate 1.1 million civilians south from northern Gaza within 24 hours, ahead of an expected ground incursion that will likely turn the overcrowded Palestinian territory into one of the world’s bloodiest war zones.

“Our people reject the threat of the occupation (by Israeli) leaders and (the) call to flee to the south or Egypt,” the group said. “We are steadfast on our land and in our homes and our cities. There will be no displacement.”

However, the demand to move over a million people at short notice, during a war, has been criticised by the United Nations, which warned Israel of “devastating consequences”. “… impossible for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences,” the UN said.

READ | Israel Asks Gaza City Civilians To Evacuate, UN Calls Order “Impossible”

The big (and very obvious) concern for aid agencies is – where? And how do you move 1.1 million men, women and children, as well as injured and infirm, while being bombarded by Israeli forces?

Israel has already indicated its willingness to inflict collateral damage, including killing civilians.

READ | “There Will Be Collateral Damage…”: Ex-Israel PM’s Warning To Hamas

The Gaza Strip

Gaza is 41 km long and between six and 12 km wide. It is divided into five areas – North Gaza, Gaza, the Middle Area, Khan Younis, and Rafah. The Strip has two land borders – Israel on its north and east, and Egypt on its south. Both are closed. To its west is the Mediterranean Sea, also closed.

Gazan airspace is controlled by Israel; their airport was destroyed by the Israelis in 2022.

It is, therefore, completely cut off from the world; the narrow 365 sq km patch of land, which is among the most densely populated on the world, relies (almost) entirely on Israel for food, fuel, medicines, drinking water and other essentials, and, to a lesser extent, on international aid agencies.

Israel’s Demand

Israel has demanded 1.1 million Gazans move from North Gaza to southern areas, potentially a 40 km journey in 24 hours, and as far down as Rafah and the border with Egypt.

There are two main entry/exit points on Gaza’s land border through which people are allowed – the Erez Crossing in the north that is controlled by Israel, and the Rafah Crossing controlled by Egypt.

Both have been closed to Gazans looking to flee the fighting. There is a third crossing – Kerem Shalom – which is controlled by Israel also but is normally only used to move goods.

The Gaza side of the Rafah Crossing was bombed even as civilians were looking to flee, raising questions over how serious Israel is about not deliberately targeting non-combatants.

Evacuation Options

There are none, for now.

Israel has already ruled out opening Gazan airspace or allowing aid agencies access via land or sea routes, and with the border crossings controlled by Israeli military, the Gazans are penned in.

READ | Israel Asks Gaza Residents To Flee War Against Hamas, Where’s The Exit?

One (perhaps the only) option are humanitarian corridors to allow civilians an escape route.

Israel has shown no indication it will permit this on its side, which leaves only Egypt. Cairo has so far rejected any move to set up such corridors, security sources in that country said Wednesday.

One of the sources, who asked not to be identified, said this was to “protect the right of Palestinians to hold on to their cause and their land”. Egypt has long restricted Gazans access to its territory.

The Israel – Hamas War

Israel’s expected ground attacks will follow a week of relentless aerial strikes, which have killed over 1,500 people so far, as Tel Aviv extracts revenge for Hamas killing more than 1,200 on October 7.

That those ground attacks are moving closer was reinforced this afternoon after an NDTV exclusive ground report showed tanks and armoured vehicles massing at the Gaza border.

READ | Ground Report: Israeli Tanks Roll Up To Border As Gazans Asked To Move South

These include Namer Infantry Fighting Vehicles, the most heavily armoured in the world, and Merkava IV tanks that have defence systems that can destroy incoming anti-tank missiles.