Gaza, 22 April 2025 – On the evening of Monday, 21 April, and into the early hours of Tuesday, 22 April 2025, Israeli forces launched a series of targeted airstrikes in Khan Younis, Gaza City, and the North Gaza Governorate. The strikes specifically targeted the remaining civil engineering machinery and heavy equipment—such as bulldozers, loaders, and water and fuel tankers—essential to carry out life-saving humanitarian operations. These machineries were used to clear rubble, rescue the wounded, recover bodies trapped beneath destroyed buildings, and rehabilitate roads. They also played a key role in addressing the catastrophic health and environmental crisis caused by Israel’s ongoing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

According to field information, Israeli warplanes fired multiple missiles at heavy machinery and equipment belonging to the Gaza Municipality and several private companies. Among the destroyed equipment were: three bulldozers owned by the Abed Contracting Company, parked behind the Garden Building in central Gaza City; three loaders and an excavator owned by Loader Company; and three loaders donated by Egypt—delivered via the Rafah crossing during the temporary ceasefire—parked near the municipal park on Omar Al-Mukhtar Street in central Gaza City. Additionally, three loaders owned by Sabra Contracting Company were destroyed on Al-Thalatheeni Street, in the Al-Sabra neighborhood of Gaza City.

In North Gaza Governorate, Israeli warplanes struck a garage belonging to the Jabaliya Al-Nazla Municipality, destroying ten bulldozers donated by Egypt during the temporary ceasefire, as well as a water tanker, a fuel tanker, a sewer jetting truck, a sewage vacuum truck, and a garbage collection tractor.

In Khan Younis, Israeli airstrikes targeted bulldozers and heavy machinery owned by the George Company in Al-Qarara town. Other strikes hit a loader and heavy vehicles near the Bank of Palestine in central Khan Younis, setting them ablaze.

The targeted equipment was primarily used for humanitarian and public service purposes, including recovering bodies from beneath the rubble, clearing roads to facilitate emergency response efforts, and preparing land to shelter internally displaced persons. It also played a critical role in transporting remains from mass graves near Kamal Adwan Hospital.

Gaza has long suffered from a shortage of engineering equipment due to Israel's restrictions on importing modern machinery and spare parts. Furthermore, the 18-month-long genocide and the destruction of dozens of machines have drastically reduced the available equipment, rendering it scarce and insufficient. This shortage has critically undermined the humanitarian response and contributed to the deaths of thousands of Palestinians who remain trapped under the debris of their bombed homes. With Israel’s recent deliberate attacks on this essential machinery, rescue operations have been paralyzed, leaving civil defense teams unable to retrieve trapped individuals or bodies from under the rubble.

Additionally, the targeted equipment was essential for removing thousands of tons of waste from residential streets—an urgent need given Gaza’s dire sanitation conditions. With summer approaching, the accumulation of uncollected waste in public areas, coupled with the decomposing bodies of over 10,000 people still believed to be buried under rubble (according to the Ministry of Health), poses an imminent risk of a large-scale public health and humanitarian disaster.

During the temporary ceasefire, arrangements were made—through Qatari and Egyptian mediation—to allow Egypt to deliver much-needed equipment into Gaza. Yet Israel has now destroyed much of that machinery, further obstructing emergency and municipal services vital for civilian survival.

Al Mezan strongly condemns Israel’s deliberate destruction of life-saving equipment and its continued targeting of vital infrastructure indispensable to the survival of the civilian population. These acts constitute part of a deliberate strategy to exacerbate the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, obstruct emergency services, and maximize civilian casualties, further rendering Gaza uninhabitable.

Al Mezan reiterates its urgent call on the international community to intervene immediately to halt Israel's ongoing genocide, protect Palestinian lives, humanitarian workers and first responders, and critical infrastructure, and ensure the immediate and unhindered entry of equipment needed for rescue, recovery, and essential municipal services amid the total collapse of Gaza’s civilian infrastructure. The international community must also ensure accountability for the ongoing crimes committed by Israel during this genocide against the Palestinian people.

Al Mezan stresses once again that the international community’s silence in the face of these crimes provides cover for their continuation, undermines international justice mechanisms, and encourages impunity.