Living in Rubble: Gaza as an architectural case study of permanent temporariness

Post-disaster reconstruction is often framed as a linear transition from destruction to planned rebuilding. However, between these two phases lies a “gray zone”: a temporal and spatial condition marked by makeshift solutions, partial reconstruction, and forms of everyday permanence that are overlooked by official plans. This condition of “permanent temporariness” can persist for years, shaping space, relations, and life under prolonged uncertainty. The thesis revolves around two questions: How to inhabit rubble? And, What can architecture learn from these improvised ways of inhabiting? The research focuses on Gaza, where destruction is not the consequence of a single catastrophic event, but of continuous cycles of bombing, displacement, and re-habitation. Here, reconstruction is not a return to order, but an ongoing negotiation with instability. Given the scarcity of formal literature on long-term inhabitation of ruins, this study proposes a methodology based on critical visual analysis, moving from a visual archive of over 2000 images collected between 2023 and 2025 from social media and first-hand testimonies, primarily in Jabalia, and investigating how Gazans live their present through visual traces of daily life. Due to privacy and copyright concerns, the archive is not made public: the archive is an analytical tool. Images were categorized according to spatial use, degrees of privacy and publicness, and use of materials. Re-drawing spatial situations allowed the extraction of embedded architectural knowledge and identification of recurring spatial patterns: redefined domestic spaces, fluid public-intimate boundaries, the adaptation of services, and the transformation of how space is used and shared. An analysis of local and international media complemented this visual work, enriching the narrative dimension. The second question concerns the meaning of “project” within this gray zone. While existing literature often focuses on the materiality of rubble and technological approaches to reconstruction, this study proposes a broader framework for designing in the gray zone. Architecture is thus reframed not as a technical universal answer but as a situated response to complex economic, social, cultural, and political dynamics. Key issues of the framework come from the analysis of the Gaza case and include at least: Economy, Stakeholders, Risks, Materiality, Uses and functions, Culture and memory. To articulate this framework, the research follows a dual strategy. First, it conducts a comparative analysis of reconstruction efforts in the 20th-century - Post WW2 Germany and Poland, Bosnia and Syria - as analytical tools to unpack the constraints, processes, and strategies shaping rebuilding efforts. Second, it confronts such a framework with the specific case of Gaza and the critical analysis previously carried out: an exercise in rethinking design through the spatial practices and embedded knowledge of communities living in rubble. Ultimately, the thesis does not offer prescriptive solutions but proposes a conceptual and technical framework that allows architecture to respond with humility, flexibility, and attentiveness to emerging needs.