I wandered around Rafah, surveying the holes gouged from the ground where tunnels once burrowed their way under the nearby Egyptian border. Israel says the tunnels are used to smuggle weapons into Gaza, and the locals do not deny this. But they also point out that the Israeli bombs have wiped out entire neighbourhoods in densely populated rows of houses.

Glancing over the wasteland, one man said: "Israel has achieved nothing from this".

Nearby a group of noisy children were digging in the rubble of a house, pulling out pieces of shrapnel from Israeli bombs. "Look at this," one boy yelled, waving the large chunk of metal above his head like a trophy.

Back in the centre of Rafah, Abdul Kareem, a young student, standing outside his burnt-out home, was ata loss to explain why the house was targeted. He had nothing to do with Hamas, he insisted; he was a supporter of President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction.

He and his family had fled after the first missile landed; two further missiles followed. Looking at the remains of his bedroom, he began sobbing. "I don't understand it," he said. "I don't understand what I should do now. I cannot do anything. This is life in Gaza."

Everyone I spoke to in Rafah said they felt they were targets during the three-week assault. Many claimed that Israeli attacks were indiscriminate, and not in response to rockets fired from Gaza.

At the UN school in Rafah we found hundreds who had taken refuge after fleeing their homes. The previous night bombs had fallen