Gaza Briefing: Friday 2 October to Thursday 8 October 2026 / Page Updated:  10 October 2026

The NCF’s weekly overview of developments in and related to Gaza, including the humanitarian situation, aid, peace efforts and related developments.

In This Update

• Deaths as a Consequence of War
• Humanitarian Aid and other civilian crossings
• Key Gaza related Developments
• Gaza Governance
• Upcoming Elections
• West Bank Key Developments
• West Bank Governance

Gaza related Deaths as a consequence of war

A note on this week’s reporting window: This week covers Friday 2 October to Thursday 8 October 2026 inclusive.

Since 7th October 2023

Since the ceasefire on October 10 2025

This week (2-8 October):

Sources: Gaza Ministry of Health as carried by Palestine Information Center, Al Jazeera and PLF. Israel: no new fatalities or injuries (Times of Israel/Al Arabiya-sourced totals).

Notes on this week’s figures

Gaza: the “since 7 October 2023” topline rose by 214 (74,040 to 74,254), while the “since ceasefire” counter rose by only 32 (1,439 to 1,471). The gap of 182 is far larger than usual and is consistent with the recurring mechanism documented in OCHA’s sitreps: the Ministry of Health periodically adds fatalities retroactively once their identification details are approved (OCHA recorded 81 such additions in the previous reporting week, which accounted for the gap in last week’s figures), and bodies recovered from rubble, mostly from deaths before the ceasefire, enter the cumulative total without entering the since-ceasefire counter. I could not find a published figure for this week’s retroactive additions, so the 182 gap is derived by subtraction and not independently itemised; the 214 headline should be read as roughly 32 deaths in the period plus a large retroactive correction to the cumulative count. Injuries rose by 138 on the topline and 137 since the ceasefire, which are consistent with each other.

Israel: no new Israeli fatalities or injuries were found in reporting for 2–8 October, so all four Israeli figures (since 7 October 2023: 1,806 fatalities, 3,004 injuries; since the ceasefire: 7 fatalities, 20 injuries) are carried over unchanged. The 7 October anniversary fell within this window; the named-basis total is not revised for it.

Humanitarian Aid for the week of 2–8 October

NCF Exclusive: Gaza Crossings Authority Weekly Report

This section is built entirely from the Gaza Crossings and Borders Authority’s own official weekly bulletin, obtained directly by NCF’s Head for Gaza, Adel Al Zanoon, through his personal contact with the Director General of the Authority. NCF is grateful to both for this access.

Crossing operational status, 2–8 October (7-day period):

Passenger movement, 2–8 October: both passenger crossings were closed for all seven days, and the Authority’s bulletin this week contains no passenger-movement section. No departures or returns are therefore recorded (this is our reading of the closure figures rather than a stated zero from the Authority). Last week, by comparison, 332 people left Gaza (153 patients and 179 companions) and 271 returned.

Truck movement, 2–8 October (all via Kerem Shalom):

Fuel breakdown (48 tankers): Diesel 33, Cooking gas 15, Petrol 0.

Truck contents by category: Food/provisions 576, Consumer goods/household items 137, Shelter/relief supplies 56, Medical/health supplies 7, Fuel 48, Fodder/seeds 5 (total 829).

Source: Crossings and Borders Authority – Gaza, weekly bulletin for 2–8 October 2026, via Adel Al Zanoon and the Director General.

Week-on-week context: total truck volume fell 43%, from last week’s 1,446 to 829, after last week’s sharp rise. Commercial trucks fell from 1,002 to 532 (down 47%), aid trucks from 384 to 249 (down 35%) and fuel tankers from 60 to 48. Kerem Shalom was open for goods five days rather than seven, so the drop is only partly explained by closure days. The week’s volume is close to that of 18–24 September (822). The most significant change is that Rafah, which was open three days last week, and Kerem Shalom’s passenger route, which was open two days, were both closed for the full week, halting all recorded passenger movement. The bulletin gives no reason for the closures.

Caveats

• Single-source (Gaza-side authority), not independently cross-verified by an international body.
• Prepared from the Arabic text of the bulletin; all totals check internally (532 + 249 + 48 = 829; fuel 33 + 15 + 0 = 48; category breakdown sums to 829).
• Groups 1/2/3 (Chamber of Commerce, UN2720, bilateral) remain deprioritized per the standing methodology.
• COGAT (gaza-aid-data.gov.il) remains unusable as a current source.

Key Developments: 2–8 October

3 October: An Israeli air strike on an apartment building in the Remal district of Gaza City kills at least five people, including two Christian women, a mother and daughter. The Israeli military says it was targeting Ali al-Amoudi, described as deputy chairman of Hamas’s political bureau in Gaza, but has not confirmed whether he was killed.

7 October: World leaders, among them Macron, Burnham, Carney, Trump and UN Secretary-General Guterres, mark the third anniversary of the 7 October attack with tributes to the victims. Protests take place around the world using the anniversary to demand an end to Israeli attacks on Gaza and the West Bank.

7 October: Three years on, Netanyahu faces a reckoning over 7 October in the run-up to the 27 October Knesset election. Most polls show Likud falling to 20–22 seats from 32 and his coalition at 50–54 seats, short of the 61 needed for a majority, while the opposition says he has refused to take responsibility for Gaza and has blocked an independent inquiry.

8 October: On the eve of the ceasefire’s first anniversary, Islamic Relief reports that the “Yellow Line” now gives Israel control of about 65% of Gaza, with nearly 2.1 million people crowded into the remaining 35%.

9 October: The IOM warns that almost all of Gaza’s population needs shelter before winter, with El Niño expected to bring heavier rainfall and flooding. Only about 17% of winter shelter needs have been met, and Israel has not allowed about 8,600 emergency shelter kits into Gaza, classing them as dual-use. About 1.8 million people live in displacement sites, most in flood-risk areas.

Gaza Governance

Transitional Administration:

The National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG) is designated as the Palestinian civilian administration for Gaza under the Gaza peace framework.

Head: Ali Shaath, Chief Commissioner of the NCAG.

International Oversight: The Board of Peace

The Board of Peace was established by UN Security Council Resolution 2803, adopted 17 November 2025, which gave it international legal personality and transitional administrative authority over Gaza. Its mandate runs to 31 December 2027 and requires further Security Council action to continue beyond that date.

• Chair: President Donald Trump, who heads the Board and its Executive Board/Committee — the Board’s primary strategic and decision-making body — with other members and heads of state to be announced (Tony Blair among those named).
• High Representative for Gaza: Nickolay Mladenov, the Bulgarian diplomat serving as the Board’s operational envoy on the ground, reporting to the Board.
• Gaza Executive Board, Board of Peace.
• Palestinian role: Resolution 2803 provides for a “technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee” of qualified Palestinians and international experts to handle Gaza’s day-to-day governance — but this committee operates under the Board’s transitional authority and oversight, rather than sitting on the Board itself. Hamas and other factions are explicitly barred under the resolution from any role in Gaza’s governance, direct or indirect.
• Handover condition: the Board’s authority is to end once the Palestinian Authority “has satisfactorily completed” its reform programme and can securely and effectively retake control of Gaza — a judgement the resolution leaves to the Board itself.
• Britain and France voted for Resolution 2803 but have not joined the Board.

Current state of implementation (as of 10 October 2026): the transition remains stalled. Hamas has agreed to disarm on condition that Israeli forces withdraw, but Israel has not withdrawn; the technocratic Palestinian committee intended to administer Gaza under the Board’s oversight remains outside the Strip, in Cairo, after Israel denied it entry; and a group of Palestinian police recruits already vetted by Israel for training abroad have also been barred from leaving Gaza. High Representative Mladenov has said mediators have a “framework” to rebuild but that Hamas’s disarmament remains the precondition, and that the Board is “not bound by a calendar.” Separately, the Board unveiled a $2.4–2.45bn, six-month reconstruction blueprint in late September (see Key Developments).

Hamas:

In July 2026, Hamas announced it will transfer civilian and security governing authority to the NCAG. The transfer remains in progress, with the implementation of Hamas’ disarmament and the full establishment of NCAG authority still unresolved.

Hamas has traditionally organised its leadership across four pillars — Gaza, the West Bank, the diaspora/external leadership, and (historically) a prisoners’ portfolio. Israel’s assassination of most of the pre-war leadership has significantly reshaped this structure over the past two years:

• Overall Chairman of the Political Bureau: Khalil al-Hayya, elected 20 July 2026 (35–34 over Khaled Mashal), replacing the five-member collective leadership that governed since Yahya Sinwar’s death in October 2024. Formally based in Doha, Qatar, but widely described as Gaza’s de facto leader and remains Hamas’s lead ceasefire negotiator.
• Political leader inside Gaza: Ali al-Amoudi, a Sinwar ally released in the 2011 Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange, is the figure reported to be managing Hamas’s internal political affairs in Gaza following al-Hayya’s promotion, and was described by Israel as deputy chairman of Hamas’s political bureau in Gaza. Israel targeted him in an air strike on an apartment building in Gaza City’s Remal district on 3 October, which killed at least five people. Israel has not confirmed whether he was killed; senior Hamas official Ghazi Hamad has said that reports reaching Hamas confirm he survived. This is Hamas’s claim only and has not been independently verified. Hamas has not formally confirmed his appointment, deliberately keeping it ambiguous for security reasons.
• Diaspora/external leadership: Khaled Mashal, who lost the July 2026 leadership vote to al-Hayya, continues to lead Hamas’s operations and diplomacy abroad.
• West Bank / prisoners’ portfolio: Zaher Jabarin leads Hamas’s West Bank operations and also formally holds the “Office of Martyrs, Wounded, and Prisoners” portfolio — the closest surviving equivalent of the historic separate prisoners’ leadership.
• Military wing (Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades) commander: Mohammed Odeh — arguably the most operationally significant of these roles, given Hamas’s stated refusal to disarm. Odeh succeeded Izz al-Din al-Haddad after al-Haddad was killed in an Israeli airstrike on 15 May 2026, and previously commanded Hamas’s northern Gaza brigade. (On 29 September 2026, Israel killed Izz al-Din Al-Beik, described as head of Hamas’s armed wing specifically in northern Gaza — a subordinate command to Odeh’s strip-wide leadership of the Qassam Brigades — confirmed killed by both Israel and Hamas.)
• The Shura Council, headed by Muhammad Ismail Darwish (Abu Omar Hassan), functions as Hamas’s overarching consultative, legislative, and decision-making body, responsible for electing the group’s Political Bureau and charting its strategic direction. It is an institution rather than an operational command — its head is not comparable in day-to-day significance to the political and military figures above, and is listed here for completeness rather than as a power centre in its own right.

Palestinian Authority (PA):

The PA is the internationally recognised Palestinian governing authority, with a stated objective of eventually assuming governance responsibilities in Gaza. Under Resolution 2803, the Board of Peace’s handover of authority is explicitly conditioned on the PA “satisfactorily completing” its reform programme. On 10 October President Abbas postponed the Palestinian elections to September 2027 (see below), which will be read as a further test of that reform commitment.

Upcoming Elections

Israel – Knesset Election

Next Scheduled Election: 27 October 2026

Palestine – Legislative and Presidential Elections

Postponed: 11 September 2027 (previously 28 November 2026 for the legislative vote)

On Saturday 10 October, President Mahmoud Abbas issued a decree cancelling the legislative elections scheduled for November 2026 and setting 11 September 2027 as the date for both the legislative and presidential votes, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa. The PLO Executive Committee approved the delay, citing “a lack of security in both the Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank”; sources from several factions said it was also tied to a national dialogue in Egypt aimed at ending the Palestinian division before voting. (Note: this decision post-dates the 2–8 October reporting window and is included so that this section is current at publication.)

The postponement reverses the commitment Abbas repeated in his UN General Assembly address on 24 September to hold the first Palestinian parliamentary vote in 20 years on 28 November, a vote France and Saudi Arabia had pressed for, and for which France had sought EU observers. Doubts had been growing: Fatah’s secretary-general Jibril Rajoub had already said in September that the vote would not go ahead on time, the candidate nomination period closed on 7 October with no major list filed, and Israel had refused to allow ballot materials into Gaza. Hamas had said it would take part and had been forming an electoral alliance with Islamic Jihad and a faction led by Mohammed Dahlan. We have not found a Hamas reaction to the postponement.

West Bank Key Developments: 2–8 October

6 October: Armed Israeli settlers beat Jaafar Ashtiyeh, a 58-year-old Palestinian AFP photographer, and fire guns towards him and a colleague as they cover settler violence against olive farmers near Aqraba, in the northern West Bank. Ashtiyeh, who suffers bruises to the head and torso, is taken to hospital in Nablus and his camera equipment is stolen. His colleague says at least a dozen Israeli soldiers were about 500 metres away and did not intervene. AFP condemns the attack and calls for a full investigation.

8 October: Israel removes the signage from the British consulate in East Jerusalem, declares that it has ceased to function and orders 20 British diplomats, including the consul general, to leave, citing the UK’s recent sanctions on illegal settlements and settlers. The UK says its mission will continue as the “UK Mission, Jerusalem”. Israel allows a task force of seven diplomats to operate there with a very limited scope. The consulate dates back to 1839, and the UK says it will not take reciprocal action while talks continue.

9 October: The Palestinian Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission, a government body operating under the PLO, records at least 19 settler attacks across the West Bank in a single day, many targeting the olive harvest. Settlers uproot more than 50 olive trees in Qusra, with groves also set on fire and harvesters and vehicles attacked. Separately, Israeli forces detain 16 Palestinians in raids, including nine in Hebron, five in Qalqilya and two in Beita.

West Bank Governance

The Palestinian Authority (PA):

The PA is the interim self-governing body for the West Bank (and, in principle, Gaza), established in 1994 under the Oslo Accords. It exercises limited civil authority in parts of the West Bank, while Israel retains overall security control and full control of much of the territory.

• Head of the PA and Chairman of the PLO: Mahmoud Abbas, who succeeded Yasser Arafat as PLO Chairman after Arafat’s death in 2004 and was elected PA president in 2005. He is 90 and also leads Fatah, and so heads all three bodies.
• Legitimacy: Abbas’s four-year term expired in 2009 and he has largely ruled by decree since. The Palestinian Legislative Council has not met since 2007, and there have been no national elections since 2006, when Hamas won the legislative vote.
• Public standing: A Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research poll in August 2026 (1,270 respondents in the West Bank and Gaza) found that 80% want Abbas to resign and that his approval rating is 18%.
• Reform: Abbas pledged at the Fatah congress in May 2026 to reform the PA and hold long-delayed elections. The PA also faces international pressure over corruption and political stagnation, and Resolution 2803 makes the Board of Peace’s handover of Gaza conditional on its reform (see Gaza Governance).

Fatah, the PLO and the PA:

These three are often conflated but are separate bodies. The PLO is the umbrella body recognised internationally as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people. It includes Fatah and smaller factions such as the PFLP and DFLP, but not Hamas or Islamic Jihad. Fatah, founded by Yasser Arafat in the late 1950s, dominates both the PLO and the PA. The PA is the administrative body created under Oslo.

Succession:

• Interim successor: On 27 October 2025 Abbas issued a constitutional declaration naming the vice president of the PLO Executive Committee, Hussein al-Sheikh, as interim president if the post falls vacant. The interim president would serve 90 days while elections are held, with provision for one renewable extension if elections cannot be held. Commentators have said the choice is unlikely to be warmly received.
• Marwan Barghouti: Jailed in Israel since 2002, he retained his Fatah Central Committee seat at the May 2026 congress with the highest number of votes, and the August poll above found him the most popular Palestinian political figure (39% favoured him as Abbas’s successor). Israel has not signalled his release.
• Yasser Abbas: The president’s son was elected to the Fatah Central Committee at the same congress. Analysts say this does not clearly put him on a path to the presidency.
• Mohammed Dahlan: Based in the UAE, expelled from Fatah in 2011, he retains a faction of supporters and is reported to be forming an electoral alliance with Hamas and Islamic Jihad to challenge Fatah.

Image featured above shows a girl in Gaza pouring scarce freshwater. Image by hosny salah from Pixabay