Hamas' surprise incursion into Israeli territory, accompanied by a series of violent attacks, has prompted Israel to declare itself at war with the radical Islamist militant group which rules the Gaza Strip.

Hamas is classified as a terrorist organization by the EU, the US, Israel as well as by some Arab states.

Since then, Israel has responded with airstrikes and frequent firepower on Gaza, after whole families were taken hostage by Hamas and more than 1,000 people were killed in Israel, including many civilians. The fate of hundreds of Israelis kidnapped by Hamas terrorists remains unknown.

The death toll continues to mount on both sides, with residents in Israel and Gaza both reportedly engaging in frequent air raids. On the Gazan side, there's an acute sense of broad displacement, as people are still reeling from the severity of the events.

Many residents of Gaza, a densely populated enclave of 2.3 million, are already classified as refugees. They descend from people who suffered displacement around the time when Israel was founded in 1948.

They since have witnessed repeated bouts of violence over the decades, with no lasting peace in sight.

More than 338,000 people displaced

Since the weekend, "more than 338,000* people in Gaza are believed to have fled their homes," said the UN humanitarian agency, OCHA in a statement on Thursday (October 12), reported the French news agency Agence France Presse (AFP).

Among the many displaced are around 220,000 people in Gaza who sought shelter in 88 schools run by the UN agency supporting Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, OCHA said on Tuesday (October 10).

More than 14,500 others fled to 12 government schools, while more than 100,000 were estimated to be staying with family and neighbors or seeking shelter elsewhere.

These numbers are expected to rise, as Israel has called in reservists to fight Hamas. Israel has also cut off fuel and power supplies, water, food deliveries and medical services to Gaza to help regain full control.

Meanwhile, the Energy Ministry in Gaza announced on Wednesday that its only independent power plant had also ran out of fuel after Israel cut off supplies, further exacerbating the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip.

The number of displaced people inside Gaza "represents the highest number of people displaced since the 50-day escalation of hostilities in 2014," OCHA added, stressing that either way, without electricity, "meeting basic needs is becoming increasingly challenging for those who have not been displaced."

Gaza on brink of humanitarian disaster

Ahmed Bayram, the Middle East communications advisor at the Norwegian Refugee Council, warns the humanitarian situation in Gaza is rapidly deteriorating.

"People in Gaza have nowhere to go, and it will be very hard to make any predictions about how the coming period might evolve," Bayram told InfoMigrants on Wednesday.

"We need a ceasefire to take effect immediately," he added, echoing the sentiments of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. Guterres had also issued a warning about an impending humanitarian crisis in Gaza, following what he called Israel's "complete siege" on the Gaza Strip, referring to the total isolation of the territory as part of Israel's response to the Hamas attacks.

This "siege" builds on 16 prior years of a blockade imposed by Israel and Egypt after Hamas first gained control of the territory in 2007.

Saving lives during air raids

Humanitarian groups are pleading for the creation of safety corridors that would allow them to deliver aid to civilians in Gaza. Several organizations have warned that hospitals in Gaza are overwhelmed with injured people, and are running out of supplies.

Meanwhile at Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp, dozens of people were killed and wounded in Israeli air raids, according to the Palestinian health ministry and the official Palestinian news agency WAFA. Israel suspects that Hamas is hiding weapons in these densely populated areas.

Matthias Kannes, MSF's mission head in Gaza, said his teams treated more than 50 people at Al Awda hospital following shelling on Jabalia refugee camp.

"The situation is terrible, with so many wounded Israelis and Palestinians. Our Palestinian colleagues are working day and night to cope with the large influx of wounded," Kannes said, adding that five of the 50 patients had already died.

"Many of our Palestinian colleagues have abandoned their homes for fear of being hit, some of them recounting that the buildings they lived in had been completely destroyed."

Israeli army suggests Palestinians seek refuge in Egypt

Israeli army spokesman Richard Hecht has suggested that Palestinian civilians should seek safety and try to leave the territory via the Gaza border crossing with Egypt.

But that journey is neither straight-forward nor easy: Officials belonging to the Hamas-run authority of Gaza have said that only Gazans who had registered in advance for a border crossing could cross into Egypt.

Egypt, afraid of an influx of refugees and migrants, has ensured that the number of those allowed to travel in that direction has typically remained small. The Associated Press (AP) reported that there is a backlog resulting in waiting times of days or weeks, even during calmer times.

Furthermore, the only remaining access route to Gaza from Egypt shut down on Tuesday after airstrikes hit close to the border crossing. It remains unclear how long it may be out of use.

Meanwhile, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry held talks on Wednesday with UNRWA about the situation in Gaza – seeking ways to provide "protection for civilians and ensure regular access of services and relief aid to Gaza."

EU ministers express concern – for irregular migration

Many fear that the conflict may not remain contained to the region.

EU migration and interior ministers from Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Malta and Spain expressed concerns at the Med 5 meeting in the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki last weekend that the situation in Israel and Gaza could trigger a new wave of migration to Europe.

Greek Migration and Asylum minister Dimitris Kairidis, who hosted the sixth meeting of the Med 5, noted that already most of the recent migrants crossing into Greece came from Gaza.

"As if the multitude of flashpoints in northern Africa and Syria were not pushing thousands of migrants and refugees to Europe already, now this," the Greek conservative minister commented.

This year, Greece says it has already counted more than double the 18,780 irregular migrant entries that authorities had logged for all of 2022. Palestinians now account for 22% of irregular entries to Greece, according to UN figures.

Last year, scores of Palestinians risked their life crossing the Mediterranean sea, with shipwrecks around Cyprus and near the maritime border of Greece and Turkey costing many lives.

Lebanon also pulled into conflict

But the conflict in Israel and Gaza is also fueling tensions across other parts of the Middle East, as violence already spilled over into southern Lebanon on Thursday after Iran-backed Hezbollah fired rockets at Israeli positions, with Israel retaliating by striking southern Lebanon.

Lebanon already hosts about 250,000 Palestinian refugees in addition to well over a million refugees and migrants from other countries. The country is presently undergoing a severe economic crisis, pushing many Lebanese also to embark on dangerous sea journeys in search of better lives.

If Lebanon were to be pulled further into the crisis in Israel, that exodus might also rise sharply in numbers.

Palestinian arrivals in Greece on the rise

Greek Migration Minister Kairidis has issued a warning, stating that worsening violence in Israel and Gaza would likely add to migration pressure on Greece and the EU as a whole, especially if Iran got further involved in the conflict.

Iran has also been accused of backing various extremist groups in Egypt, Libya, Syria and beyond. Any further escalation of the crisis in the region could lead to retaliatory action which might prompt further migration waves. 

In 2015 and 16, Europe witnessed the arrival of over one million people amid conflict in Syria, where government forces, Kurdish separatists, and terror groups, all propped up by different global players (including Iran), led to unprecedented instability.

Some already fear another similar scenario unfolding, particularly among Europe's conservative politicians. Poland's far-right populist President Andrzej Duda said on Sunday that the war in Israel and Gaza "will unfortunately cause further migration pressure on Europe."

"We will likely have another wave of migrants from the Middle East, which will hit Europe ... Our security, the protection of Poland's borders of course, also the borders of the European Union and the Schengen zone, becomes even more important," he stressed in an interview.

Poland is due to hold elections on October 15, with migration a central theme of the campaign, as irregular crossings into the Eastern European country have risen sharply in recent years.

Too early to speculate on migration flows, say experts

The European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA) says that there is no cause for panic. The agency told InfoMigrants that historically, Palestinians have only represented a very small share of international protection applicants in the EU+ countries (fewer than 1% each month in 2023).

"It is far too early to speculate on the possible protection needs that might emerge because of the current conflict, also due to the physical realities of Gaza," EUAA head of communication Anis Cassar told InfoMigrants on Wednesday.

Both the UN agency for migration, IOM, and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) on Thursday also said it was too early to predict any changes of migration flows from Gaza to Europe as a result of the current conflict.

"At this stage, the situation on the ground is rapidly evolving, making it challenging to speculate on long-term consequences such as the impact on refugees and migration flows to Europe," IFRC Spokesperson Tommaso Della Longa told InfoMigrants.

Similarly, Srdjan Tosic from the IOM office in Berlin told InfoMigrants that the agency is "not able to speculate on potential impact of the conflict on migration to Europe."

*This article was updated on Thursday (October 12) to reflect the latest figures of displacement released by the UN agency OCHA.