This is misinformation. Although Israel did pull its settlers from most of Gaza in 2005, it retained air, sea, and land border control. That is still a military occupation. The reality is, Israel never ended the occupation in Gaza.
No, the misinformation is yours. Israel pulled out Jews from all of Gaza, going back to the pre-1967 line. Gaza shared a land border with Egypt (Rafah crossing) which Israel did not - and could not - control.
While Israel retained air and sea passage control, the blockade as we know it only came after Hamas was elected as the Gaza government and not before.
(this is the opportunity to note that after the Israeli pullout from Gaza, Gazans could have chosen many different paths but they chose Hamas to lead them into the catastrophe they've become)
Gaza has been considered occupied by the UN, the ICJ, the ICC, the EU, and pretty much any body which studies international law, since 1967. Israel is the only entity who claims they have not been occupying Gaza during this period.
> this is the opportunity to note that after the Israeli pullout from Gaza, Gazans could have chosen many different paths but they chose Hamas to lead them into the catastrophe they've become
Even in 2005, after Israel's removal of their settlers and before Hamas came to power in 2007, Israel was still occupying Gaza, according to an ICJ ruling, based on Israel continuing to exert control over Gaza.
> Israel was still occupying Gaza, according to an ICJ ruling
That's not what the court said. Its language was
> In light of the above, the Court is of the view that Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip has not entirely released it of its obligations under the law of occupation. Israel’s obligations have remained commensurate with the degree of its effective control over the Gaza Strip.
As it often does, the court used intentionally ambiguous language to try to get a majority of judges on board. But the most natural reading seems to be a novel idea that occupation is non-binary, and Gaza lies somewhere on a spectrum of being occupied or not.
No, Gaza was considered definitively occupied again starting in 2007, after Israel instituted air and sea border control, and control of its 2 land borders with influence on its Egypt border as well
UN reports have consistently referred to Gaza is occupied; your point about the ambiguity of the ICJ's 2004 ruling is noted, but it looks like UN's policy was to provisionally consider that a claim that Gaza is still occupied, while in 2022 or early 2023, requesting the ICJ put out a clarifying advisory opinion.
Next came Hamas, then the rockets, then the incursions and finally October 7th.