The Financial Times estimated that Israel seized 1,000 square kilometers of land in Gaza, Syria and Lebanon.
In a report prepared by Alan Smith, James Shuter and Raya Chalabi, they said that since the October 7 attacks, Israel has seized 1,000 square kilometers under the new doctrine implemented by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, following Israel’s worst security failure.
The newspaper says that, according to its calculations, the Israeli army has consolidated its positions in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria , and has seized territory equivalent to about 5% of Israel’s 1949 borders.
Israel seized 1,000 square kilometers of land from Gaza, Syria and Lebanon.
She said that while the approach of Netanyahu’s far-right government has been welcomed by extremist settlers, who have long sought to expand Israel’s borders, these attacks have displaced millions, devastated urban areas, and caused deep anxiety in the region. More than half of this area is in southern Lebanon, where Israeli forces have penetrated as far as 12 kilometers into the country to create what officials call a “security zone.” Their aim is to defeat Hezbollah and prevent it from launching anti-tank missiles at Israeli border settlements.
“This buffer zone completely removes the danger of direct invasion and anti-tank artillery fire,” Netanyahu said last month. “They wanted to surround us with a ring of fire; so we created a ring of security.”
The Financial Times reports that the remaining occupied territory is divided between Gaza and Syria, where Israeli forces currently occupy more than half of the Palestinian territory. In Syria, Israeli forces exploited the collapse of Bashar al-Assad's regime to establish positions kilometers inside the country. Unlike in Gaza and Lebanon, where Israel has published maps, neither Israeli nor Syrian officials have disclosed the locations of Israeli forces within Syria.
The newspaper adds that Israeli forces control additional areas of land in each of these three regions through airstrikes, artillery shelling, raids and arrests.
In Gaza, Israeli forces are creating an additional buffer zone beyond the so-called Yellow Line. A UN official said the additional zone is between 50 and 100 meters deep, further shrinking the Gaza Strip. As a result, Gaza's two million residents now live in only about 40% of the territory it was in before the war.
In southern Lebanon, Israel continued its raids and ordered the Lebanese to leave the areas north of its soldiers' positions, and Defense Minister Yisrael Katz vowed to impose its control in this way over the territory up to the Litani River.
In Syria, Israeli forces launched raids beyond their positions near the border, including one that reached 50 kilometers inside Syrian territory. The Financial Times calculated the extent of the ongoing Israeli military presence by mapping confirmed Israeli army bases in the area, which covers approximately 233 square kilometers.
The newspaper added that the Israeli army declined to comment on these accounts, but said that forces are “deployed in areas adjacent to the border and across various operational zones.” It added: “They are deployed according to the directives of the political leadership and ongoing operational assessments.”
The area controlled by the Israeli army in Syria covers an area of approximately 233 square kilometers.
Israeli officials have also expressed their intention to establish a permanent buffer zone in Gaza and have leveled large swaths of land along the border with Israel. However, they have sent mixed messages to different audiences regarding Lebanon.
In his remarks last month, Netanyahu said that Israeli forces “will not withdraw,” and in recent weeks, the army has leveled entire villages near the border in an operation that Katz likened to “the model used in Gaza.”
Diplomats were quoted as saying that Israeli officials, including Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar, have privately asserted that Israel has no territorial ambitions in Lebanon.
Yaakov Amidror, Netanyahu’s former national security adviser and now a researcher at the Jens Amidror think tank in Washington, said he expects Israel to permanently maintain a buffer zone “between one mile and two kilometers” in Gaza.
He added that Israeli forces would remain in Lebanon “at least until Hezbollah is disarmed,” a scenario that Lebanese officials and analysts doubt will happen anytime soon.
Amidror added that Israel could be “more flexible” in Syria, noting that Israel established a buffer zone to prevent hostile elements from establishing a presence near the border, not to counter an existing threat. He said, “It largely depends on the agreements we will reach” with the new regime.
Syrian officials said that Israel and Syria had tried to negotiate a security agreement throughout the past year, but the talks stalled because of Israel's insistence on remaining inside Syrian territory.
Observers believe much hinges on President Donald Trump's mood. Michael Milstein, a former military intelligence officer now at Tel Aviv University, commented, "If Netanyahu were ordered to withdraw from southern Lebanon, Syria, or even Gaza, I think he would have to comply." Regional officials have publicly reiterated their firm rejection of the continued Israeli occupation of their territories. Lebanese President Joseph Aoun stated last month, following direct talks between his country and Israel, "Our goal is clear: to achieve an Israeli withdrawal."
However, in private, they acknowledge the risk of these arrangements becoming permanent. A Lebanese official stated, “Israel continues its incursions into our territory with impunity. They want to stay indefinitely, treating southern Lebanon as their backyard, and they can do so as long as no one objects.”
These concerns were exacerbated by statements from far-right figures in the Israeli government and prominent members of the settlement movement, who expressed territorial ambitions extending beyond Israel's current borders. Settler leaders, including the extremist Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, called on Israel to rebuild Jewish settlements in Gaza, while nearly a third of Netanyahu's cabinet ministers attended a conference on the subject in 2024. Settlers have also repeatedly attempted to enter Gaza, Syria, and Lebanon to establish a permanent presence there.
Smotrich also called on Israel to make the Litani River, which at its deepest point extends up to 30 kilometers north of the de facto border between Israel and Lebanon, the “new border” between the two countries. Last month, a group of 20 members of parliament, led by a member of Netanyahu’s Likud party, called on the government to occupy the entire area south of the Litani River and expel its Lebanese residents.
An Arab diplomat said: “Of course, [pushing towards the establishment of settlements in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria] is an extreme and unlikely position. But what Israel is doing now in the West Bank, we would have considered 20 years ago an extreme and impossible position, but it shows the trajectory of this society.”
