Gaza is part of Palestine, not a separate place. The territory known as Palestine consists of two physically separated pieces of land: the Gaza Strip along the Mediterranean coast and the West Bank further inland to the east. These two territories, though governed as parts of one Palestinian entity, are divided by roughly 30 miles of Israeli territory with no direct connection between them.
How the Two Territories Fit Together
The Gaza Strip is a narrow coastal territory about 25 miles long and 4 to 5 miles wide, sitting along the Mediterranean Sea just northeast of Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. It covers about 140 square miles. The West Bank, the larger of the two Palestinian territories, lies roughly 50 kilometers (30 miles) to the east at the closest point, near the city of Hebron. Israel sits entirely between them.
Together, Gaza and the West Bank make up what is internationally recognized as the occupied Palestinian territories. When people refer to “Palestine” as a place, they generally mean both of these areas combined. The West Bank borders Jordan to the east, while Gaza borders Egypt to the southwest and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Despite being parts of the same national entity, the two territories have no shared border and no direct road, rail, or corridor linking them.
Why Palestine Is Split in Two
The division dates back to the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. After fighting ended in 1949, armistice agreements drew new boundary lines. Egypt retained control of the Gaza Strip, and Jordan took control of the West Bank. These armistice lines, often called the Green Line, held until 1967, when Israel captured both territories during the Six-Day War.
In the 1990s, the Oslo Accords created the Palestinian Authority to govern parts of both territories. Israel began transferring some governmental authority in Gaza to the Palestinian Authority in 1994 and completed a full withdrawal of settlers and soldiers from Gaza in 2005. But in 2007, the two territories split politically: Hamas took control of the Gaza Strip, while the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority maintained control in the West Bank. Palestinian presidential and legislative elections have not been held since 2006.
Traveling Between Gaza and the West Bank
Palestinians cannot freely move between Gaza and the West Bank. Because Israel lies between the two territories, any travel requires passing through Israeli-controlled crossings. The Erez crossing on Gaza’s northern border is the only land route connecting Gaza to Israel and, by extension, to the West Bank. Since the early 1990s, Palestinian residents of Gaza have needed an Israeli-issued exit permit to leave through Erez.
Only people in specific categories are eligible for permits: patients referred for medical treatment, traders, staff of international organizations, and exceptional humanitarian cases. Even for medical patients, the process is difficult. Approval rates for patient permit applications dropped from 93 percent in 2012 to 54 percent in 2017, with about one in ten applications denied outright and nearly a third delayed past the patient’s scheduled hospital appointment. Most medical referrals from Gaza are to hospitals in East Jerusalem and other West Bank cities that offer specialized care unavailable in Gaza.
Gaza’s only other exit point is the Rafah crossing into Egypt, on the territory’s southern border. This became the primary way for most Gazans to reach the outside world due to the severe restrictions at Erez.
Two Territories, Two Governments
Although Palestine is recognized internationally as a single entity, the day-to-day reality is that Gaza and the West Bank operate under different authorities. The Palestinian Authority, led by President Mahmoud Abbas (who has remained in office well past the expiration of his term in 2009), governs parts of the West Bank with its own security forces. Hamas runs a largely parallel government structure in Gaza, with its own police, intelligence services, and military wing.
This political split reinforces the physical separation. Residents of Gaza and the West Bank live under different administrations, face different border controls, and have limited ability to visit each other. For practical purposes, a Palestinian in Gaza City and a Palestinian in Ramallah (the administrative center of the West Bank) live in the same nation but in deeply disconnected realities.
Gaza’s Coastal Geography
One feature that distinguishes Gaza from the West Bank is its 40-kilometer Mediterranean coastline. Palestine joined the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea in 2015, which in principle grants it the right to establish offshore maritime zones. In practice, an Israeli naval blockade has prevented Gaza from developing its port, fishing industry, or offshore natural resources. The West Bank, by contrast, is entirely landlocked, bordered by Israel to the west and Jordan to the east.