Fifteen years have passed since Israel imposed a total siege on the Gaza Strip, subjecting nearly two million Palestinians to one of the longest and most cruel politically-motivated blockades in history. Back then, the Israeli government justified its siege as the only way to protect Israel from Palestinian “terrorism and rocket attacks”. This is the occupation state’s official line to this day, and yet not many Israelis — certainly not in government, the media or even ordinary people — would argue that Israel today is safer than it was prior to June 2007.
It is widely understood that Israel imposed the siege as a response to the Hamas takeover of the Strip, following a brief, violent confrontation between the movement, which is the current de facto government in Gaza, and its main political rival Fatah, which dominates the Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank. However, the isolation of Gaza was planned years before the Hamas-Fatah clash, or even the legislative election victory of Hamas in January 2006.
In fact, the late Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was determined to redeploy Israeli forces out of Gaza long before these dates, making the siege possible. Culminating in the Israeli disengagement from Gaza in August-September 2005, the plan was proposed by Sharon in 2003, approved by his government in 2004 and finally adopted by the Knesset in February 2005.
The “disengagement” was an Israeli tactic intended to remove a few thousand illegal Jewish settlers from occupied Gaza — to go to other illegal Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank — while redeploying the Israeli army from crowded population centres in the Gaza Strip to the nominal border areas. This was the actual start of the Gaza siege.
The above assertion was even clear to James Wolfensohn, who was appointed by the Middle East Quartet as the Special Envoy for Gaza Disengagement. In 2010, he reached a similar conclusion: “Gaza had been effectively sealed off from the outside world since the Israeli disengagement… and the humanitarian and economic consequences for the Palestinian population were profound.”
The ultimate motive behind the “disengagement” was not Israel’s security, or even to starve the Palestinians in Gaza as a form of collective punishment. The latter was a natural outcome of a much more sinister political plot, as communicated by Sharon’s own senior advisor at the time, Dov Weisglass. In an interview with the Israeli newspaper Haaretz in October 2004, Weisglass put it plainly: “The significance of the disengagement plan is the freezing of the peace process.” How? “When you freeze [the peace] process, you prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, and you prevent a discussion on the refugees, the borders and Jerusalem.”
Not only was this Israel’s ultimate motive behind the disengagement and subsequent siege of Gaza, but also, according to the seasoned Israeli politician, it was all done “with a presidential blessing and the ratification of both houses of [the US] Congress.” The US president at the time was none other than George W. Bush.
All of this took place before Palestine’s legislative election, Hamas’s victory and the Hamas-Fatah clash. The latter merely served as a convenient justification for what had already been discussed, “ratified” by Washington and implemented.
For Israel, the siege was a political ploy which acquired additional meaning and value as time passed. In response to the accusation that Israel was starving Palestinians in Gaza, Weisglass was very quick to reply: “The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger.”
What was then understood as a facetious, albeit thoughtless statement, turned out to be actual Israeli policy, as revealed in a 2008 report which was made available in 2012. Thanks to the Israeli human rights organization Gisha, the “redlines [for] food consumption in the Gaza Strip” — composed by the Israeli Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories — were made known. It emerged that Israel was calculating the minimum number of calories necessary to keep Gaza’s population alive, a number that is “adjusted to culture and experience” in the Strip.
The rest is history. Gaza’s suffering is absolute, with 98 per cent of the Strip’s water undrinkable; hospitals lacking essential supplies and life-saving medications; and movement in and out of the territory more or less prohibited, with relatively few minor exceptions.
Even so, Israel has failed miserably, with none of its objectives achieved. Tel Aviv hoped that the “disengagement” would compel the international community to redefine the legal status of the Israeli occupation of Gaza. Despite pressure from Washington, that never happened. Gaza remains part of the Occupied Palestinian Territories as defined in international law.
Furthermore, Israel’s September 2007 designation of Gaza as an “enemy entity” and a “hostile territory” changed little, apart from allowing the Israeli government to carry out several devastating wars against the Palestinians in the enclave, starting in late 2008.
None of these wars have served a long-term Israeli strategy successfully. Instead, Gaza continues to fight back on a much larger scale than ever before, frustrating the calculations of Israeli leaders, a fact which became clear in the befuddled, disturbing language to which they resorted. During one of the deadliest Israeli wars on Gaza, in July 2014, right-wing Knesset member Ayelet Shaked wrote on Facebook that the war was “not a war against terror, and not a war against extremists, and not even a war against the Palestinian Authority.” Instead, according to Shaked, who a year later became Israel’s Minister of Justice, this was “a war between two people. Who is the enemy? The Palestinian people.”
In the final analysis, the governments of Sharon, Tzipi Livni, Ehud Olmert, Benjamin Netanyahu and Naftali Bennett all failed to isolate Gaza from the greater Palestinian body; break the will of the Palestinians in the Strip; or ensure Israeli security at the expense of the Palestinians.
Moreover, Israel has fallen victim to its own hubris. While prolonging the siege will achieve no short or long-term strategic value, lifting the siege, from Israel’s viewpoint, would be tantamount to an admission of defeat, and could empower Palestinians in the West Bank to emulate the Gaza model. This lack of certainty further accentuates the political crisis and lack of strategic vision that has defined all Israeli governments for nearly two decades.
Israel’s political experiment in Gaza has backfired, inevitably so. The only way out is for the siege of Gaza to be lifted completely. Not eased; lifted. Completely. And this time, for good.
The Palestinian resistance managed to seize control of the Israeli surveillance balloon early on Friday after it was shot down in the town of Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip.
Palestinian sources confirmed to Quds Press that the Israeli surveillance balloon seized by the Palestinian resistance was not the first it had seized. It has previously seized several balloons, as well as advanced drones.
Israeli sources revealed fears of dangerous information leaks and the resistance obtaining high-quality imaging equipment.
Palestinian writer and political analyst Mustafa Al-Sawaf believes: “What is important is that the resistance was able to seize this surveillance balloon, regardless of what method is used to shoot it down,” describing the incident as “serious”.
Al-Sawaf told Quds Press: “The occupation believes that the resistance is unaware and does not monitor its movements, so it tried to penetrate the Gaza Strip from the north and present a special force, but the resistance men were on the lookout, confronting the occupation and preventing them from entering the Gaza Strip.”
He pointed out: “The matter almost reached the level of a clash, but a reconnaissance aircraft intervened by firing two missiles, thus preventing this and securing the withdrawal of the special force.”
He added: “The occurrence of three incidents in Jenin and Gaza gives quick and dangerous indications that confrontation between the resistance and the occupation is fast approaching, and we must monitor the situation with high accuracy because the coming hours will carry a lot.”
It is worth noting that the Israeli army radio station, Doron Kadosh, announced: “The army’s initial investigation revealed that the surveillance balloon that fell in Gaza had fallen due to technical difficulty and that the army said there is no fear of significant information leakage, although the army tried to open warning fire near it, Hamas still managed to seize the balloon.”
There are roughly 2.3 million people in the Gaza Strip and they consume 500 tons of flour a day. For years, they have relied on exports from Russia and Ukraine but the outbreak of Moscow’s special military operation has disrupted these supplies sending prices to unprecedented heights. Wheat has long been a staple of Palestinian cuisine.
The outbreak of hostilities between Russia and Ukraine, however, and the subsequent shortage of wheat has led to Gazans tightening their belts.
Adham Al-Basiouny, the official spokesman for the Hamas-run Ministry of Agriculture in Gaza, says the enclave’s small quantities of wheat will barely last weeks.
“What we are seeing now is a serious crisis. We are struggling to obtain wheat and its derivatives. And what we have at present does not exceed 30 percent of our citizens’ needs,” he says.
The Gaza Strip does produce its own wheat – the region has 12,000 dunams (approximately 3,000 acres) of fields producing 4,300 tons annually. But that only answers the needs of three to four percent of the 2.3 million inhabitants. Put another way, if the locals consume 500 tons a day, each year the region produces enough to last only nine days.
Unable to rely on their own production, Gazans have turned to Russia and Ukraine, both of which account for nearly a third of global grain production. The outbreak of hostilities in Ukraine have not only disrupted much-needed wheat supplies – it has also put a rocket under prices, squeezing the already impoverished Gazans, who have been living for years under dire economic conditions, further.
Reports suggest that in recent weeks the Gaza Strip has seen a price spike of 20 percent on wheat and its derivatives. In an area, where nearly 60 percent live below poverty line, that rise has not gone unnoticed.
Al-Basiouny says he doesn’t believe the crisis will reach the levels of unrest and clashes which existed in Egypt back in the Seventies. But he acknowledges the situation is acute and that his government needs to do “everything in its power” to cater for the needs of the population.
One of the measures Hamas – that has been running the enclave since 2007 – has already taken is to approach other wheat-producing countries, such as Canada and Australia, to make good the shortfall. Their prices, however, turned out to be higher than those demanded by Russia and Ukraine so the government, whose annual budget is normally no greater than $1 billion, is still struggling to find grain.
Hamas has also threatened local millers and bakery owners with fines and punishments if they are caught manipulating prices.
However, that move has run into certain obstacles, not least because those local merchants who have been importing wheat from the West at inflated prices are reluctant to operate at a loss. They, therefore, are angry with the government for forcing them to work for what they consider to be peanuts.
Once again, Hamas needs to find a solution, and Al-Basiouny says the organisation has no choice but to lobby support from rich donors.
“Right now, we are communicating with a number of donor countries such as Qatar, who would provide us with financial assistance to buy flour,” he says. “We also get flour from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) that provides bread to Palestinian refugees in the enclave, who account for about 85 percent of all residents.”
So far, reliance on what UNRWA provides has kept things stable. But with more and more donors to the organisation cutting back on spending, a situation where Gazans are starving for bread could just be a matter of time.
In its May 2021 war with Gaza militants, Israel used American weapons to destroy U.S. humanitarian projects and damage an American-owned Coca-Cola bottling plant, according to a report by The Intercept.
Damaged or destroyed facilities included:
Hospitals, water treatment and sanitation facilities funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)
A dozen factories built with USAID money
Dozens of schools operated by the U.S. State Department-backed United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA)
More than a hundred UNRWA facilities were struck, causing more than a million dollars in damage.
The impact is far more than financial. As TheIntercept‘s Daniel Boguslaw elaborates:
In Khan Yunis, Rafa, and Beit Lahia, wastewater treatment infrastructure and water reservoirs funded by USAID, which the U.S. government spent millions to construct, were destroyed by aerial attacks that affected more than 300,000 civilians. Ninety-seven percent of the water in Gaza is contaminated, resulting in a widespread public health crisis, rendered even worse by the destruction of U.S.-funded water infrastructure.
The May 2021 war took a steep toll on Gaza, with more than 240 Palestinians killed and nearly 2,000 wounded. Four thousand rocket attacks from Gaza on Israel killed 12.
Israel’s periodic devastation of Gaza is often characterized as “mowing the grass.” Yoav Galant, a former Israeli military commander, embraced the philosophy in a radio interview: “This sort of maintenance needs to be carried out from time to time, perhaps even more often.”
Though Galant and others would suggest such “mowing” is focused on Palestinian military power, Israel’s routine destruction of hospitals, water treatment facilities and other civilian infrastructure suggests Israel strives to keep Gaza in a state of perpetual economic devastation.
A Coca-Cola factory also came under 2021 Israeli bombardment. Its owner, U.S. citizen Zahi Khouri, said, “We had thousands of pallets burned, and there was damage to the logistics area. There was damage in the industrial estate, but what was also damaged was the investment of Coca-Cola in a project through Mercy Corps where we built a water purification station for a refugee camp.”
In a dark twist, the destruction of U.S.-funded civilian infrastructure is accomplished with American-made and/or -funded weapons. The United States and Israel are currently operating within a memorandum of understanding by which Americans are on the hook for $38 billion in military aid over a 10-year period ending in 2028.
That’s just a minimum. Congress is free to throw more money at Israel along the way—such as the $1 billion for Iron Dome missile defense it approved in March by a 420-9 vote in the House.
Per The Intercept, there’s more to the “special relationship”:
The aid system also provides cash-flow financing, a system resembling layaway, that allows Israel to purchase weapons in the present using money from the future. And it contains an offshore procurement exemption—offered to no other country—that allows Israel to spend U.S. tax dollars on its own weapons industry without disclosing how it spent the money to Congress or the American public.
Israel’s bombardment of the biggest agrochemical warehouse in the besieged Gaza Strip by incendiary artillery shells last year amounts to chemical warfare, a rights group report finds.
On May 15, 2021, the Israeli military launched an artillery attack on the Khudair Pharmaceuticals and Agricultural Tools Company, considered as the largest agrochemical warehouse in the north of the blockaded enclave, setting fire to tons of pesticides, fertilizers, plastics and nylons.
The shelling attack occurred in the midst of the 11-day Israeli war against Gaza Strip, after weeks of violence against Palestinians in Al-Quds and a brutal crackdown on worshipers at the al-Aqsa Mosque, as well as attempts to steal their land in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.
The results of a new investigation in the attack and its consequences by the West Bank-based Palestinian human rights NGO Al-Haq showed that Israel deliberately employed highly flammable munitions in the targeted attack, which burned tons of dangerous pesticides and set off an unfolding environmental disaster.
The FAI Unit built a 3D model of the warehouse after interviewing the locals, consulting international experts and analyzing data obtained from dozens of videos, including CCTV and drone footage, in a bid to establish the circumstances of the blaze, and determine the effects of the release of toxic chemicals.
“Our findings reveal that Israeli forces illegally employed highly flammable munitions in a targeted attack on the warehouse, whose location and contents are known to Israel, setting on fire over 50 tons of hazardous chemicals stored on the site,” said al-Haq.
The report is the first publication by Al-Haq’s newly-established Forensic Architecture Investigation Unit (FAI Unit), a first-of-its-kind collaboration in the Middle East with Forensic Architecture, a research agency based at Goldsmiths, University of London, which conducts spatial and media analysis for NGOs and in international human rights cases.
The shelling created a toxic plume, which engulfed an area of nearly six sq km, leaving local residents struggling with health problems.
“Within the first hour, the toxic plume had affected an area of approximately 5.7 square kilometers — spanning Beit Lahiya and its agricultural zones, as well as the densely populated Jabaliya refugee camp — placing approximately 3,000 homes in its shadow,” the report said, adding that the six-hour-long fire at the warehouse destroyed most of the facility and consuming the majority of its contents.
Al-Haq said that a toxic plume produced by the attack is tantamount to the indirect deploying of chemical weapons.
“Israeli occupation forces’ shelling of the Khudair Agrochemical Warehouse, with knowledge of the presence of toxic chemicals stored therein, is tantamount to chemical weapons through indirect means. Such acts are clearly prohibited… and prosecutable under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court,” the group said in a legal report based on the findings of the investigation.
The probe determined that the Israeli military used several M150 Smoke HC 155mm shells in its attack against the warehouse.
“The dimensions and the smoke tail match the M150 Smoke HC 155mm ammunition developed by the Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems: an ‘advanced smoke projectile’ and a new type of shell designed to splinter into five separate canisters, all of which emit high-density smoke,” the report said.
It also stressed that the attack on the Khudair agrochemical warehouse was the first in an apparent string of similar attacks by the Tel Aviv regime, intentionally hitting civilian economic infrastructure and the industrial sector.
“On 17 May, two days after the Khudair Warehouse was destroyed, the Fomco Sponge Factory near Jabaliya camp was attacked in a similar manner, causing a large-scale fire. On the same day, over half a dozen other factories and warehouses, located in the industrial zone east of Gaza’s Shejaiyyeh neighborhood, were also bombed,” it stated.
In the latest bombardment campaign of Gaza by Israel in May last year, at least 260 Palestinians, including over 60 children, were killed in a time span of 11 days that began on May 10. The Gaza-based resistance movements retaliated.
The regime was eventually forced to announce a ceasefire, brokered by Egypt, which came into force in the early hours of May 21.
The Gaza Strip, home to some two million people, has been under a blockade imposed by Israel since June 2007.
A European Parliament delegation cancelled a trip to the occupied Palestinian territories yesterday after the group’s chairperson, Manu Pineda, was denied entry to Israel, reported Wafa news agency.
The Spanish member of the European Parliament and chair of the parliament’s delegation for relations with Palestine was scheduled to travel to the occupied Palestinian territories with a group of European lawmakers to review the situation on the ground following the assassination of Palestinian Al Jazeera journalist, Shireen Abu Akleh.
However, at late notice the group was informed that the mission would not be able to go ahead as planned due to what has been described as a “unilateral decision” taken by Israeli authorities.
“Israel is blocking the work of the European Parliament,” said Pineda, adding that the delegation had also been denied access to the besieged Gaza Strip.
He shared the letter that the Israeli Foreign Ministry, which states occupation forces “cannot allow the visit to Gaza of delegations with political affiliation and legislators.”
In response, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola, who is currently in Israel to meet President Isaac Herzog and Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, said on Twitter, she regretted Israel’s decision to refuse entry to Pineda and would raise the decision directly with the Israeli authorities during her visit.
“Respect for MEPs and the European Parliament is essential for good relations,” she said.
Pineda thanked Metsola for her remarks and called on her to “apply reciprocity in our institution until the decision is reversed.”
“It is important that we are united to defend the European Parliament,” he said.
The European Parliament’s delegation for relations with Palestine has 18 members and informs the European Union legislature about political, economic and human rights developments in the occupied territories.
The Israeli regime used weapons made and funded by the United States to destroy American projects and businesses in the Gaza Strip during its devastating 11-day war on the besieged enclave last year, according to a report.
In an article published on Thursday, The Intercept said it reviewed documents and reports that showed hospitals, water treatment facilities, and schools funded by US agencies destroyed during the Israeli regime’s incessant bombardment of Gaza in May 2021.
“Also impacted were the Foamco mattress factory — the main producer of mattresses for Gaza — the Abu Iskandar plastic factory, the Clever detergent factory, the Siksik plastic pipes factory, and the Al-Wadi food plant, resulting in tens of millions of dollars in damage. The factories employed 1,500 Palestinians and were severely impacted by the shelling in the early morning hours on May 17 and 18, 2021,” the report said.
It added that a Coca-Cola factory, built by a US citizen, served as yet another casualty of Israeli shelling during the May onslaught, in a “highly symbolic display of just how far Israel’s disregard for US material interests in Gaza extends.”
“Coca-Cola is also a shareholder, not just a licensor, and I am a shareholder as a US citizen, so this affected many US citizens,” Zahi Khouri, the factory’s owner, told The Intercept. “We had thousands of pallets burned, and there was damage to the logistics area. There was damage in the industrial estate, but what was also damaged was the investment of Coca-Cola in a project through Mercy Corps where we built a water purification station for a refugee camp.”
The Israeli war on Gaza, which commenced on May 10 last year and lasted until May 21, killed at least 250 Palestinians, including 66 children, and injured more than 1,900 others. The Israeli airstrikes also displaced tens of thousands of people and demolished, completely or partially, dozens of buildings, schools, and hospitals.
“The vast majority of ammunition used by Israel is manufactured or subsidized by the US,” Raed Jarrar, advocacy director at Democracy for the Arab World Now, or DAWN, told The Intercept. “It’s fair to say that every Israeli munition is subsidized by the US one way or another, by US tax dollars.”
Israel is the largest recipient of US military aid. It has received over $150 billion in assistance from the US government since 1948. Nevertheless, the occupying regime has never been subjected to any inspections in Washington on how it uses weapons made or funded by the US.
Also, under that weapons assistance program, Israel is allowed to spend US tax dollars on its own weapons industry without disclosing how it spent the money to Congress or the American public.
Meanwhile, the first anniversary of the 2021 Israeli war on Gaza has been marked with intensified Israeli aggression against Palestinians in both the occupied West Bank and the besieged Gaza Strip.
The Israeli military’s killing of Al Jazeera Journalist Shireen Abu Akleh earlier this month once again attracted global attention to the Israeli regime’s atrocities.
“A major reason for the perpetuation of the Israeli occupation, and the deaths and suffering which accompany it, is the extraordinary military, diplomatic, and political support given to it, largely without conditions, by the United States,” said Michael Lynk, the recently departed UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories.
“This American military assistance is provided, notwithstanding the fact that congressional laws governing US weapons exports state that recipient countries cannot be engaged in consistent patterns of gross human rights violations,” Lynk added.
Israel’s prosecution requested to extend the detention of Palestinian aid worker Mohammed al-Halabi nearly six years after Israel accused him of diverting tens of millions of dollars from an international charity to Hamas, The New Arab reported.
World Vision — a major Christian charity that operates around the world — as well as independent auditors and the Australian government, have found no evidence of any wrongdoing. Al-Halabi’s lawyer says he has rejected multiple plea bargains that would have allowed him to walk free years ago.
The prosecution has requested another hearing on Monday to extend his detention, he has yet to be convicted in an Israeli court and is still being held in detention.
Al-Halabi has consistently denied the accusations throughout his 167 court hearings. Israel hopes that in time and under duress, the father of five will confess under pressure, activists say.
After al-Halabi’s arrest, World Vision suspended its activities in Gaza, where over 2 million Palestinians live under a crippling 15-year Israeli blockade.
Israel has apparently reprimanded a soldier for firing rounds into Gaza. That’s all very well, but what about the countless other soldiers who have done the same for years, maiming and killing Palestinian civilians?
The soldier, who posted his bravado video to TikTok, reportedly got 10 days in military prison. According to an Israeli army statement, “The soldier’s behavior in the video does not conform with the norms expected of soldiers and commanders.”
His sentencing and the media reporting around the incident is pure theatre, given the reality of how the Israeli army routinely targets Palestinians working on land in Gaza’s east and northern regions. While this one particular soldier received a mild punishment, many others who attack unarmed civilians are not held accountable.
Since pulling the illegal settlers out of Gaza in 2005, Israel has implemented a kill zone – dubbed the “buffer zone” or“no go zone” – where, on a regular basis, its soldiers shoot at Palestinian civilians. Ostensibly, it comprises a band of land 300 metres from the fence encaging Palestinians in Gaza. In reality, Israeli soldiers fire upon civilians well over a kilometre away, or even further, as I have experienced myself.
As I reported some years ago, “According to the United Nations’ Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the 300 metres off-limits area extends in areas to at least 1.5 km. PCHR [the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights] has documented the Israeli army targeting of Palestinian civilians as far as 2 km from the border.”
Between 2008 and 2013, I regularly accompanied farmers and other civilians in border areas, and on many of the occasions that we came under fire, we were 500 metres or more from the fence. Among the disturbing incidents was an attack one morning in February 2009, when I came under prolonged Israeli gunfire while accompanying a group of farm labourers on land roughly 500 metres from the fence. By then, I was accustomed to the routine – I would walk with farmers on their land, the Israeli soldiers would arrive in jeeps, assume sniper position and begin firing at us.
On this occasion, the young men had finished their parsley harvest and were pushing a stalled pickup truck when the Israeli gunfire began. The incident was captured on video, as I was there to document such attacks, and as I wrote at the time, “The lightly-dressed, unarmed farmers were clearly visible to… the several Israeli army jeeps and the Hummer which had patrolled the border fence, stopping for long intervals to watch the farmers work, then moving on.” I noted that the soldiers had observed us for a good half hour before shooting, choosing to fire at precisely the time when the farmers were leaving.
Shooting just beyond where I stood in a fluorescent vest, an Israeli soldier hit 20-year-old Mohammad al-Buraim in his leg, and continued to fire at us for a further 15 minutes. Some weeks prior, an Israeli soldier shot his cousin Anwar in the neck, killing him and leaving his wife, young children, and extended family without a breadwinner. Anwar had been on land 600 metres from the fence, also doing farm labour work.
When someone gets injured in these areas, the injury is compounded by the fact that ambulances cannot reach them, as they are targeted by the Israeli army. So, locals need to somehow get the injured to a point where an ambulance can safely reach them. If this is not done quickly enough, the injured risks bleeding to death.
On another occasion, again with farm workers in Gaza’s southeast, I came under intense Israeli fire lasting over 40 minutes from soldiers roughly 500 metres away. Bullets flew within metres of our hands, heads, and bodies. This proved to be an especially interesting case, as a representative from the Canadian embassy in Tel Aviv – who had been informed of the shooting by other volunteers – called me to express concern for my safety.
This dissipated as soon as she realized I was being fired on by an Israeli soldier, and not a Palestinian. Her superior, the then-attache in the Tel Aviv office, had the gall to state quite clearly that they were fine with Israel’s “security measures” – firing on an unarmed Canadian and unarmed Palestinians and internationals, who in no way posed any threat to the heavily armed Israeli soldiers – and that we should be aware of the risks.
In another example, in February 2009, also in the southeast on land 550 metres from the fence, I accompanied elderly farmers and their families who intended to harvest some of their meagre crops. Shortly after we had arrived on the land, Israeli soldiers started firing very close to us, less than a metre from where we stood.
As I wrote at the time, “We could almost taste Tuesday’s firing, and the distinct ping-whizz sound they make was somehow impossibly loud, so close the shots were. One of the older women was having trouble walking away, stumbling in her fear. As the shots dug in around her she fell to the ground in terror. Positioning ourselves between the elderly farmers and the Israeli snipers, we accompanied them off the field. A few hundred metres away, the Israeli snipers continued to shoot. Another elderly woman had dived in terror behind a rock and adamantly wouldn’t get up. “They’ll kill me, they’ll kill me,” she cried in fear…”
Thankfully we did make it away that day in one piece. But this was just one of many examples of the terror Palestinian farmers face on a daily basis. And it’s not just farmers – at around the same time, a 17-year-old girl standing around 800 metres from the fence, near the ruins of her home (destroyed in the war just a month previously), was shot in the kneecap by an Israeli sniper.
Children going to school in the eastern village of Khoza’a were, at the time, being fired upon by Israeli soldiers at the fence 1km away. Teens and young men gathering scrap metal from demolished homes routinely come under Israeli fire. One example was 15-year-old Said Abdel Aziz Hamdan, who went to an area in Gaza’s north with his 13-year-old brother, to try to earn money for their large family. After finishing his work, an Israeli soldier fired at him, hitting his leg, without warning.
“People go there every day to gather bits of metal and concrete. The Israelis see us and know we are just working, it’s normal,” he told me when I visited him in hospital.
Palestinians don’t only face Israeli sniper fire, but also flechette shelling – dart bombs – which Israel has indiscriminately used against civilians and medics. One victim was 17-year-old Saleh Ahmad al-Medani, whose shoulder and neck were punctured by the two-inch-long, razor-like, dart-shaped bits of metal packed by the thousands into a single shell. He was attacked while walking home after midnight in June 2009, in northwestern Gaza, over 1km from the wall.
As I wrote at the time, “Due to their design, flechettes dig deeply into their target, with their “tails” frequently breaking off, leaving multiple injuries and rendering them nearly impossible to extract without inflicting more injury in the surgical search. In most cases, doctors opt against surgery, leaving the darts inside the victim’s body.”
The routine and very dangerous Israeli policy of harassment, which risks maiming or killing targets, also means farmers frequently stay off their land, meaning plants don’t get watered, and crops don’t get harvested. These are not isolated and random instances. They are part of a policy that aims to cut off any means of self-sufficiency the Palestinians try to engage in. Other Israeli army tactics include burning Palestinian crops, destroying wells and cisterns, and demolishing homes, livestock farms, and trees throughout the border regions.
So, please, let’s not get carried away with the fact that Israel has thrown one soldier in prison for unacceptable behaviour. It is quite clear that Israel doesn’t hold its own soldiers accountable for their crimes, including killing children or firing white phosphorus on heavily populated civilian areas. Neither does the United Nations nor anybody else appear willing to make Israel take responsibility for its decades of crimes against Palestinians.
One headline about one soldier being reprimanded for posting his tough-guy video on TikTok should not fool anyone.
Eva Bartlett is a Canadian independent journalist and activist. She has spent years on the ground covering conflict zones in the Middle East, especially in Syria and Palestine (where she lived for nearly four years).
The Israeli occupation forces have arrested 75 Palestinians in total last year at the Erez Crossing between Gaza and Israel, according to the Palestinian Prisoners Centre for Studies.
The Israeli army bans Palestinians in the Gaza Strip from entering the 300-meter area adjacent to its border with the enclave and shoots or arrests anyone who breaches it.
The Palestinian Prisoners Centre for Studies observed that the number of arrests last year was the same as the year 2020, during which 76 Palestinians were arrested, despite the enclave not being under direct occupation like the occupied West Bank.
Researcher, Riad Al-Ashqar, Director of the Centre, stated that the Israeli occupation forces use the Erez Crossing as a means for collective punishment.
He added that the Israeli forces blackmail Palestinians to work with the occupation by providing information in exchange for allowing them to cross, especially patients and merchants.
Al-Ashqar noted the arrest of 35-year-old Walaa Muhammad Mustafa Al-Rifai, from Maghazi in the Gaza Strip, while accompanying his wife, who is ill with cancer.
They had attempted to reach the Makassed Hospital in occupied Jerusalem, where his wife had previously obtained a medical referral for treatment there and had obtained Israeli permits that allow them to pass through the checkpoint to reach the hospital for treatment.
However, the Israeli forces arrested Walaa and transferred him to Ashkelon Prison for investigation.
Al-Ashqar also expressed concern for Israel’s heavy naval presence, restricting any traffic in and out of the enclave as well as the distance Gaza’s fishermen can travel to fish, severely affecting the livelihoods of some 4,000 fishermen and at least 1,500 more people involved in the fishing industry.
Palestinian fishermen often suffer from multiple Israeli violations, including attempting to sink Palestinian boats in the sea, firing at them, as well as narrowing the fishing area for long periods.
Gaza has been under a strict Israeli siege for 14 years and has been subject to repeated Israeli onslaughts during that period which have led to wide scale damage, high rates of unemployment and poverty.
Any pretext or none at all unjustifiably justifies Israeli aggression against blockaded/defenseless Gazans.
At its discretion, the apartheid state bombs, shells, invades, and otherwise immiserates long-suffering Strip residents.
Despite Israeli state terror repeating with disturbing regularity, the world community yawns and ignores its worst crimes of war and against humanity against Palestinians for the “crime” of not being Jewish.
NGO Gisha supports enforcement of the rule of law and free movement of Palestinians — especially illegally blockaded Gazans, explaining the following:
Since Israel illegally occupied the West Bank and Gaza with intent to steal and develop Palestinian land for exclusive Jewish use, its ruling regimes instituted “a complex system of rules (and) restrictions” in flagrant breach of international law.
Fundamental rights of Palestinians — especially Gazans — are consistently and repeatedly violated.
Israeli regimes deny them “the right to life, the right to access medical care, the right to education, the right to livelihood, the right to family unity and the right to freedom of religion.”
Gisha’s website explains the following:
For nearly 15 years under illegal Jewish state blockade, Gazans suffer from oppressively “high unemployment, long blackouts, and severe shortages of clean water.”
Their basic rights Gazans are denied — with no world community to help reverse what no one should have to tolerate.
“Electricity is only available for about half the day” — on some days for a few hours alone or none at all.
The vast majority of Gazans have no access to clean water.
“More than 70% of Gaza’s population relies on humanitarian aid to meet basic needs.”
“The vast majority of residents do not meet Israel’s (apartheid) criteria for travel permits.”
They have little or no chance to leave the Strip for employment, education, medical care unavailable to them under blockade,
“or to visit or reunite with family members living in Israel, the West Bank, and abroad.”
Israel blocks free land, sea and air movement to or from the Strip.
It “oversees entry of goods into Gaza… demands to know (what) they’re intended for, (who’ll) receive them, and who paid for them.”
Its ruling regimes decide “what goods produced in Gaza can be sold outside the Strip, how much, when and where.”
They also decide how much electricity the Strip is allowed to have — reducing or cutting it off entirely at its discretion.
They repeatedly close “Gaza’s crossings and den(y) access to its sea space as a means of punishing and pressuring the population.”
At all times, Israel enforces severe restrictions on the movement of goods and people.
It “blocks access to opportunities, prevents economic development, and violates basic human rights.”
B’Tselem said Gazans endure made-in-Israel “humanitarian crisis” conditions at all times.
Its ruling regimes “sentenced” two millions Gazans “to a life of abject poverty and… inhuman conditions.”
They control “critical aspects of life” in the blockaded Strip.
“Isolating Gaza from the rest of the world, including separating it from the West Bank,” is part of a longstanding Israeli policy.
What began in the 1990s has grown more oppressive since that time for invented reasons.
Two million Gazans are virtually held captive in the world’s largest open-air prison.
Over 80% of Gazans need humanitarian aid to survive.
Even with what Israel allows into the Strip, nearly two-thirds of its people are food insecure — unsure where their next meal is coming from.
Gazan infrastructure and public services are bare-bones.
Over 95% of Strip water is contaminated and unpotable.
What’s considered normal in Israel and the West is nonexistent in Gaza.
At its discretion for invented reasons, Israel wages war on Gaza.
Any time for any reason or none at all, it terror-bombs, shells, or otherwise strikes Strip targets — including residential buildings, schools, hospitals, mosques, and shops.
Free-fire policy lets IDF soldiers shoot Gazan children, farmers in their fields, and other Strip residents for target practice.
Blockades are acts of war by other means, Law Professor Francis Boyle explained — “because of the(ir) belligerent use of force…”
Gazans pose no threat to Israel.
Blockading the Strip is solely for political reasons, not security ones.
On most issues, Al Jazeera’s reports resemble US/Western propaganda — fake news over the real thing.
All things related to Israeli state terror against Palestinians is an exception to its standard practice on most other issues.
On New Year’s eve, Qatar-based Al Jazeera (AJ) spoke to Gazans injured and disabled from Israeli aggression last May.
“The assault… killed at least 260 people, including 39 women and 67 children, and wounded more than 1,900, according to the health ministry in Gaza,” AJ reported, adding:
“The bombardment also destroyed 1,800 residential units and partially demolished at least 14,300 other units.”
Since that time, the Netanyahu and Bennett regimes blocked entry of many reconstruction materials on the phony pretext of alleging their dual use, including for military purposes (sic).
Israeli aggression last May blinded 7-year-old Mohammed Shaban.
His new year’s wish is to see his mother’s face, he said.
Badly damaged by Israeli terror-bombing last May, his eyes couldn’t be saved and were surgically removed.
“I can’t stop crying whenever I see him,” his mother said, adding:
“He keeps asking his siblings, ‘Why can I only see black darkness? Why can’t I go to my school?’ ”
“Last night, he told me: ‘Mum, I wish I could see your face.’ ”
Recently enrolled in a school for visually challenged children, his mother, Somayya Shaban, expects no positive change in the new year.
“I believe Gaza’s destiny is to face more torture and suffering,” she said.
She wishes her son ,Mohammed, could see again. “I wish I could give him my eyes,” she stressed.
Countless thousands of other Gazans were killed, injured or disabled from multiple Israeli wars and other attacks on the Strip since 2008.
On New Year’s weekend, Israel terror-bombed and shelled Strip targets again.
Its latest aggression came in response to two rockets allegedly fired from the Strip on New Year’s day.
Reportedly, they fell harmlessly into offshore waters, harming no one, doing no damage.
According to an IDF statement, no sirens were sounded for Israelis to take cover.
The Bennett regime’s Iron Dome air defense system wasn’t activated.
In its yearend annual report, Israel said only five rockets were fired from the Strip, injuring no one.
According to the Times of Israel (TOI) on Sunday:
IDF “warplanes and helicopters hit (multiple) Hamas targets” overnight — over virtually nothing, TOI left unexplained.
“Palestinian media first reported airstrikes in the southern part of the Strip shortly before midnight” on Saturday.
“Hamas media claimed ‘resistance fighters’ launched ‘experimental rockets’ toward the sea.”
Gaza’s health ministry said three Palestinians were wounded from strikes on northern Strip targets.
How many others may have been injured or killed is unclear as of early Sunday morning — or the extent of damage to Strip targets.
Life in blockaded Gaza is harsh by any standard.
Israeli inflicted misery on Strip residents followed Hamas’ sweeping January 2006 electoral triumph to become historic Palestine’s legitimate government.
At the dawn of a new year, the message of weekend terror-bombing and shelling of the Strip shows that dirty Israeli business as usual continues unchanged.
Two million Gazans are victimized by apartheid ruthlessness — with no end of it in prospect.
The same goes for all occupied Palestinians.
Largely ignored by the world community, the highest of Israeli high crimes of war and against humanity continue to go unpunished.
The same reality applies to US-dominated NATO’s war on humanity at home and abroad.
Yousef A. from Beit Lahiya in the Gaza Strip survived an Israeli airstrike in May 2021 that killed his father and three of his sisters. He is still recovering from his injuries.
By Mahdi Darius NAZEMROAYA | Strategic Culture Foundation | 30.03.2015
The United States and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia became very uneasy when the Yemenese or Yemenite movement of the Houthi or Ansarallah (meaning the supporters of God in Arabic) gained control of Yemen’s capital, Sanaa/Sana, in September 2014. The US-supported Yemenite President Abd-Rabbuh Manṣour Al-Hadi was humiliatingly forced to share power with the Houthis and the coalition of northern Yemenese tribes that had helped them enter Sana. Al-Hadi declared that negotiations for a Yemeni national unity government would take place and his allies the US and Saudi Arabia tried to use a new national dialogue and mediated talks to co-opt and pacify the Houthis.
The truth has been turned on its head about the war in Yemen. The war and ousting of President Abd-Rabbuh Manṣour Al-Hadi in Yemen are not the results of «Houthi coup» in Yemen. It is the opposite. Al-Hadi was ousted, because with Saudi and US support he tried to backtrack on the power sharing agreements he had made and return Yemen to authoritarian rule. The ousting of President Al-Hadi by the Houthis and their political allies was an unexpected reaction to the takeover Al-Hadi was planning with Washington and the House of Saudi. … continue
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