A wedding ceremony in Khan Yunis, Gaza, on December 2, 2025. ABDEL KAREEM HANA / AP
T
he history of Khan Yunis is not measured in millennia, as with Gaza City or Rafah, but in centuries. Before the ongoing Israeli campaign, its governorate had a population of about 400,000. In 1387, Emir Yunes El-Nowruzi founded a caravanserai there – a "khan" bearing his name. At that time, the Gaza region was a strategic crossroads favored by the Mamluk sultans who ruled Egypt and Syria.
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In destroying Rafah, Israel's military is looking to erase millennia of history
