Aletho News

Israeli troops kill Palestinians seeking return to north Gaza

The Cradle | January 1, 2024

The Israeli army killed ten Gazans who insisted on returning from the south to the north of the Gaza Strip, contrary to the army’s instructions, Israeli journalist Avishai Grinzaig of the Kan public broadcaster reported on 1 January.

Grinzaig wrote on X that, “Anyone who crossed a certain line, the soldiers shot to kill. After ten bodies, the Gazans understood the hint and retraced their steps.”

In November, Palestinians who had fled south to escape the fighting in northern Gaza used the four-day truce to try to return to their homes but were similarly shot by Israeli forces as they attempted the trip.

Israel had warned people that they will not be allowed to return to the north of the war-torn enclave.

Al-Jazeera published video showing Palestinians returning to their homes in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip, despite the Israeli army’s insistence that it is a combat zone.

The Qatari news outlet reported that Israeli troops killed two Palestinians and wounded 11 as they attempted the trip to northern Gaza.

Israel dropped leaflets over southern Gaza, warning the hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians who sought refuge there not to return north amid its ground offensive, reported the Associated Press.

But hundreds nevertheless attempted to walk north during the truce.

An Israeli military spokesperson, Avichay Adraee, released a statement in Arabic on X saying, “Residents of Gaza, the movement of the population from the south of the Strip to the north will not be allowed in any way, but only from the north to the south,” it read.

“We invite you not to approach the military forces and the areas north of the Gaza Valley. Take advantage of the time to replenish your needs and arrange your affairs,” he said.

Israeli politicians continue to make statements indicating they seek to ethnically cleanse Gaza by forcing its 2.3 million inhabitants to flee first to southern Gaza, then to Egypt or other countries. Israeli politicians have lobbied Egypt and European nations to accept Palestinians from Gaza as refugees, under the pretext of solving the humanitarian crisis resulting from Israel’s own bombing campaign.

On 30 November, The Wall Street Journal reported “The war in the Gaza Strip is generating destruction comparable in scale to the most devastating urban warfare in the modern record.”

“By mid-December, Israel had dropped 29,000 bombs, munitions and shells on the strip. Nearly 70% of Gaza’s 439,000 homes and about half of its buildings have been damaged or destroyed. The bombing has damaged Byzantine churches and ancient mosques, factories and apartment buildings, shopping malls and luxury hotels, theaters and schools. Much of the water, electrical, communications and healthcare infrastructure that made Gaza function is beyond repair. Most of the strip’s 36 hospitals are shut down, and only eight are accepting patients,” the US newspaper explained.

The destruction resembles that left by US bombing of German cities during World War II. “The word ‘Gaza’ is going to go down in history along with Dresden and other famous cities that have been bombed,” said Robert Pape, a political scientist at the University of Chicago and the author of a history of aerial bombing. “What you’re seeing in Gaza is in the top 25% of the most intense punishment campaigns in history.”

Israel’s bombing of Gaza has killed over 21,000 people, the majority women and children, since the start of the war on 7 October.

January 1, 2024 - Posted by aletho | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | Gaza, Human rights, Israel, Palestine, Zionism