'This is Rafah now': Motaz Azaiza exposes remnants of Gazan city

Following global 'All Eyes on Rafah' campaign in May, photojournalist posts what remains in desolate wasteland

Rafah has been razed following Israel's bombing campaign. Motaz Azaiza / Instagram

Palestinian war photographer Motaz Azaiza posted a picture on Instagram showing Rafah in rubble alongside a caption that reads: “Remember All Eyes on Rafah? This is Rafah now."

Azaiza is referring to the Instagram Story that went viral in May, which aimed to draw attention to the city during Israel's continued bombing campaign. Created by a user in Malaysia named shahv4012, the AI-generated image shows tents in a camp arranged to spell out “All Eyes on Rafah”.

The template was first posted after a deadly strike on a refugee camp in Rafah, just two days after the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to halt its operations in the southern Gaza city. The template was shared by more than 40 million users including Hollywood celebrities.

Azaiza's post on Sunday has received more than 600,000 likes.

Once a bustling city in Gaza, Rafah is now marked by devastation with little left standing. Continuous Israeli air strikes, ground assaults and demolitions have forced tens of thousands of people to flee – and those who remain live in fear of what will happen next.

In September, the Israeli army acknowledged the destruction of about 96,000 homes in Gaza, claiming they were booby-trapped. The tally included about 14,000 homes in Rafah.

Taysir Muhaysin, spokesman for the Government Media Office in Gaza, told The National last month that Rafah had become "a city unfit for habitation".

“The Israeli war on Gaza has devastated most buildings and infrastructure in Rafah," Muhaysin said. "The destruction is relentless, with air and ground strikes coupled with continuous bulldozing operations that don’t pause."

Azaiza, who became known on social media for his daily reporting of the war, left Gaza in February for treatment. “I used to be the photographer of the beauty of Gaza, I was always fighting to make beautiful pictures of my home town," he said in May at an event in London to mark the 1948 Nakba.

“I lost the people that I captured in my pictures, lots of places I used to hang out there and take pictures there, I lost my access to my city, I lost the days I spent in my home."

Despite its popularity, the “All Eyes on Rafah” post was also criticised, with some claiming that it promoted a sanitised reality in Rafah.

Saint Hoax, the popular pseudonym of a Syrian artist, satirist and sociopolitical activist on Instagram, compared it to the black squares posted during the #BlackoutTuesday movement in 2020. The collective action to protest racism and police brutality in the US, a response to the murder of George Floyd, was also criticised for not efficiently supporting the Black Lives Matter movement.

“While the image has been shared over 40 million times and helps spread the word, it would be much more effective if it were followed up with a statistic, infographic, or fund-raiser to contextualise the severity of this genocide,” Saint Hoax, who has more than 3.4 million followers, wrote in a post.

“Though well-intentioned, the post ends up overshadowing Palestinian journalists and activists who are deeply engaged in the work.”