In mid-July, Israel announced completion of the Magen Oz corridor in Gaza, a 15-kilometre military route that fundamentally reshapes the battlefield by splitting Khan Younis, the besieged territory’s second-largest city, into two distinct zones. 

This controversial infrastructure represents a significant escalation in Israel's territorial control strategy, cutting off all residential areas east of Khan Younis from those to the west.

Magen Oz joins an expanding network of Israeli-controlled corridors across Gaza, carving the enclave into five distinct sections, and enabling comprehensive Israeli monitoring and movement control throughout the territory.

Presented as an alternative to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “humanitarian city" proposal for Rafah, a project that proposed confining Gaza’s civilian population to a constructed zone in the south, the corridor approach focuses on gradual territorial acquisition and sustained pressure tactics.

Analysts say Magen Oz has military, security, and political implications on the tactical and strategic levels, impacting the future of Gaza after the war.

Experts say the new corridor has a long-term strategic objective: sustained Israeli military presence in Gaza, the creation of security buffer zones adjacent to Israeli territory, and the facilitation of Israeli military movement.

Unlike the longitudinal axes that run from Gaza’s eastern border with Israel to the Mediterranean Sea and are mainly intended to aid military division and control, Magen Oz is lateral. 

Cutting Khan Younis into eastern and western sections, the corridor has deeper, more dangerous long-term implications: the planned forced displacement of Gaza residents.

“The name ‘Magen Oz’ itself holds symbolic and military significance (for Israel),” says Munir Al-Ghoul, an expert on Israeli affairs.

“Made up of two Hebrew words - Magen (shield) and Oz (strength, determination, or courage)— it represents Israel’s aim to continue pursuing its strategic goals through this axis and the broader war,” Al-Ghoul tells TRT World.

Since the start of its genocidal war – which has killed more than 59,000 people in Gaza – Israel has been systematically carving up territories in the besieged enclave into distinct military-controlled areas,  pushing hundreds of thousands of people into tiny civilian areas. 

Al-Ghoul attributes the creation of the new axis as part of Israel’s desire to maintain military control over any area where the army operates. 

“Its potential future use is in facilitating forced displacement and population transfers,” says Al-Ghoul. 

He emphasises that the corridor is being used to pressure Hamas on the terms of prisoner exchange and temporary ceasefires. 

The Israeli affairs expert notes that if the negotiations fail, the corridor will be the path to long-term military occupation. 

“It is directly tied to displacement,” says Al-Ghoul, “pushing people to relocate behind the axis in preparation for their expulsion.”

The Israeli government led by Netanyahu – the most far-right in history – has made the forced expulsion of people from all Palestinian territories the central argument of its war. 

Despite severe global condemnation, Israel has put forward different plans for the forced displacement of Palestinians from their ancestral lands and resettling them in the deserts of Egypt and Jordan.

US President Donald Trump has even proposed to force out all Palestinians from Gaza and turn it into a seafront resort-city like the French Riviera, a controversial project that has faced widespread criticism.  

From ‘voluntary departure’ to forced displacement

In March, Israel’s security cabinet approved the formation of a directorate to encourage what it termed the “voluntary departure” of Palestinians from Gaza. 

Defence Minister Israel Katz announced that the new administration would establish movement routes, operate checkpoints, and coordinate infrastructure for land, sea, and air passage to third countries, and added that Israel would “allow any Gaza resident who wants to move to a third state to do so”.

The initiative aligned with Trump’s vision for the enclave after the “takeover” of Gaza, yet behind the diplomatic language of “voluntary migration” and “humanitarian considerations” lies what critics identify as a systematic campaign of forced displacement operating under coercive, inhumane conditions that make normal life impossible.

Political analyst Hani Al-Aqad views Israel’s so-called humanitarian corridors as precursors to mass displacement, describing a “process of filtering and then deportation”. 

“The strategy,” Al-Aqad tells TRT World, “involves eliminating armed fighters through death or arrest while opening pathways to displace the remaining population. This is the goal of their policies and ideology.”

This analysis gains credence when examined alongside the stalled ceasefire negotiations. 

Last week, Trump blamed Hamas for the collapse of talks mediated by Egypt and Qatar, claiming the group fears what happens after the remaining Israeli hostages are released.

Hamas leader Khalil Al-Hayya countered that negotiations became pointless as Gaza faces deliberate starvation, and demanded “immediate and dignified entry of food and medicine” before any further talks.

The World Health Organisation reported at least 63 malnutrition-related deaths in Gaza in July alone, a crisis precipitated by Israel’s blockade on supplies, relying instead on the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation’s (GHF) distribution points, around which nearly 1,100 people have been killed while trying to get food.

The starvation crisis serves Israel’s displacement strategy – the deliberate creation of uninhabitable conditions that make departures appear voluntary when it is coerced.

The Magen Oz corridor, as well as the similar infrastructure, serves a broader strategic vision. 

Al-Aqad predicts that if ceasefire talks fail, Israel will have completed six longitudinal axes across Gaza: Philadelphi, severing Gaza from Egypt; Morag, dividing Khan Younis from Rafah; Kisufim, dividing Khan Younis from Deir al-Balah and central Gaza; Netzarim, dividing the centre and south from the north; Mefalsim, separating Gaza City from the northern enclave; and Magen Oz, the only lateral axis, splitting Khan Younis.

Al-Aqad anticipates areas east of Magen Oz will be incorporated into buffer zones around the Gaza Envelope settlements, potentially expanding further as displacement succeeds. 

“Israel wants to reduce Gaza’s size, annex parts of it, and drastically cut its population.”

His analysis appears to be spot on. On Monday, media reports said that Netanyahu has put forward a plan to annex parts of Gaza, apparently to prevent the resignation of far-right finance minister Bezalel Smotrich.

The ultimate goal?

Political researcher Talal Abu Rokba offers a complementary perspective, viewing current operations as serving broader national objectives centred on the occupied West Bank. 

While acknowledging that corridors like Magen Oz pressure Hamas during negotiations, he sees them as temporary tools serving strategic goals until war outcomes are achieved.

“Israel seeks to re-engineer Gaza’s geography and demography,” Abu Rokba tells TRT World, “geographically, by creating a security belt around Gaza’s northern, eastern, and southern perimeters, and demographically, by pushing Gaza’s population westward and displacing hundreds of thousands.”

This connects to Israel's intensified operations in the occupied West Bank, where the ongoing Iron Wall military operation has forcibly displaced over 42,000 people since January 2025. 

Abu Rokba argues that Gaza operations serve West Bank annexation goals.

“To secure the West Bank, Israel must offer concessions in Gaza, so it is establishing new facts on the ground, like this web of corridors, to later present them as concessions in return for annexing the West Bank, which it plans to fragment into disconnected enclaves.”

Abu Rokba identifies Israel’s war objectives as threefold: establishing a buffer zone along Gaza’s entire border for full Israeli control; enabling mass displacement; and eliminating Palestinian statehood by creating alternative governance models like village leagues, isolated enclaves, or micro-emirates.

The international community’s weak response has enabled this strategy, he says. 

As critics note, Israel has succeeded in revealing the weakness of international law protections while reshaping narratives to portray mass expulsion as voluntary migration, a blatant rebranding of ethnic cleansing using dishonest humanitarian language.

“Israel is establishing new facts on the ground in Gaza to use them as bargaining chips,” Abu Rokba concludes. 

“Their ultimate battle is for the West Bank. That is Israel’s core strategic priority. Gaza is only a security concern… something to control, destroy, or empty….”

This article is published in collaboration with Egab.