UN official says it could take 14 years to clear rubble from Gaza

By Mehmet Alaca

The extensive amount of rubble left by Israel's devastating war in the Gaza Strip could take about 14 years to remove, a UN official said on Friday.

Pehr Lodhammar, an official with the United Nations Mine Action Service, told a briefing in Geneva that the war had left an estimated 37 million tons of debris in the densely populated territory.

According to the media office in Gaza, Israeli attacks have destroyed as many as 70,000 houses, and damaged 290,000 others, rendering them uninhabitable. The structures hit also include government buildings, hospitals, schools, mosques, churches, and historical sites.

Israel has pounded the Gaza Strip since a cross-border attack by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023 which killed some 1,200 people.

Besides killing more than 34,000 Palestinians since then, the Israeli military campaign has turned much of the enclave of 2.3 million people into ruins, leaving most civilians homeless, hungry, and at risk of disease.

*Writing by Serdar Dincel