Journalists from the New York Times get a glimpse into the devastated Gaza.

For a few fleeting moments, the two-storey house on the outskirts of Bureij, a destroyed city in central Gazastill felt like a Palestinian house.

Bottles of nail polish, perfume and hair gel sat untouched on a shelf. A collection of refrigerator magnets decorated the frame of a mirror. Through a window you could see the laundry hanging on the neighbor’s clothesline, swaying in the gentle breeze.

But despite the trappings of a house, the house now has a new function: as a makeshift Israeli military barracks.

Since Israeli ground forces recently fought their way into this part of central Gaza, a unit of the 188th Military Brigade has taken over the building and used it as a dormitory, storage space and vantage point.

On Monday, some soldiers waited for orders in the living room on the ground floor, or stood guard on the terrace above. One bedroom was full of the soldiers’ backpacks and equipment.

The walls of the house were marred with Hebrew graffiti. “The people of Israel,” read one message, written in black spray paint.

The people of Gaza were nowhere to be seen.

The house was emblematic of the devastated wasteland that two journalists from The New York Times witnessed Monday morning during a three-hour tour with Israeli soldiers through Gaza.