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Forums - Politics Discussion - Israel-Hamas war, Gaza genocide

SvennoJ on 18 March 2024

Knesset member: Marwan Barghouti’s life in danger in Israeli prison

Palestinian-Israeli politician and Israeli parliament member Ahmad Tibi says the life of prominent Palestinian prisoner Marwan Barghouti is in danger inside the country’s prison system.

He told a press briefing that Barghouti has been beaten at least twice this month in solitary confinement, once on March 6 and again on March 12. He also said several Palestinian prisoners have died behind bars recently, with families and judges saying their bodies bore marks of torture.

“If Marwan Barghouti and all the prisoners are harmed, the responsibility will be on the Israeli government,” Tibi said. “The responsibility will be on the Israeli government and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The prison manager is also responsible for everything that happens to him, as is [Israeli Prison Service] Shabak.”




‘History will never forget this’

Tamer Qarmout, reacting to the new Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report, says famine was imminent in Gaza and is “more embarrassment for Israel on the international stage”.

We’ve been reporting on a UN-backed report by the IPC, which found that hunger has reached “catastrophic” levels for 1.1 million people in Gaza with the most dire conditions in the Strip’s north.

“History will never forget this. We take records of all these actions for humanity to know and not forget or forgive,” Qarmout, a professor of Public Policy at the Doha Institute of Graduate Studies, told Al Jazeera. “Israel is acting like a pariah state. It’s above international law and it can afford doing this because there is no punishment. It’s not accountable to anyone, thanks to the United States.”

WHO reports aid deliveries to Gaza ‘often blocked or refused’

The World Health Organization (WHO) says the Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report about famine in Gaza, which we reported on earlier, shows in detail what the organisation and other aid groups have been witnessing and reporting for months.

The “WHO and partners have been carrying out high-risk missions to deliver medicines, fuel and food for health workers and their patients, but our requests to deliver supplies are often blocked or refused”, it says in a statement.

“Damaged roads and continuous fighting, including in and close to hospitals, mean deliveries are few and slow,” the statement continues. “When our missions reach hospitals, we meet exhausted and hungry health workers who ask us for food and water.”

Aid trucks still backed up behind Gaza border as children die of starvation

James Elder, spokesperson for UNICEF, the UN’s agency for children, explains in this clip how a large number of trucks carrying food, water and other life-saving supplies are stuck behind the Gaza border and unable to get in, even as infants are dying of starvation.

“Outrages. How many lifesaving supplies are so desperately close to those who need them?” he says.

“These are the supplies that so urgently need to get across to the civilians of Gaza and the most efficient way, the only way we are going to save the lives of the numbers of children who are so desperately in need, is by these roads.”

A handful of aid trucks began reaching northern Gaza over the weekend without coming under Israeli attack in what is the first time that humanitarian convoys have reached the area without incident since the beginning of Israel’s war on Gaza.


US ‘complicit in starvation of Palestinians,’ says UN expert

Michael Fakri, the UN special rapporteur for the right to food, has urged the US to do more to end the ongoing hunger and starvation crisis in Gaza. “If the US was very serious about preventing famine, it would pressure Israel for a ceasefire. It would no longer supply weapons and financial support to Israel,” he told Al Jazeera.

“The United States is complicit in this starvation of the Palestinian people in Gaza.” Fakhri said the US airdrops and plans to build a temporary pier on the coast of Gaza were largely a political move.

“It might alleviate hunger for a small number of people and for a very short amount of time but in the grand scheme of things, these are political performances done for political purposes,” he added.



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SvennoJ on 18 March 2024

EU Declares Israel Deliberately Starving Gaza




What Is Genocide?


 



SvennoJ on 19 March 2024

UNICEF official slams world’s ‘shocking inaction’ on impending famine in Gaza

Adele Khodr, UNICEF’s regional director for Middle East and North Africa, has called for the opening of all crossings into Gaza after a UN-backed report warned of imminent famine in northern parts of the enclave.

“The IPC findings on #Gaza confirm what we have been warning about of impending famine for months now,” she said in a post on X.

“The world’s inaction is shocking as more children succumb to a slow death. All border crossings must open now to allow unfettered access of humanitarian aid.”




The West is giving Israel weapons while discussing delivering aid to Gaza

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/3/18/the-west-is-giving-israel-weapons-while-discussing-delivering-aid-to-gaza

As lawmakers across much of the West debate the extent to which Israel may be hampering the passage of life-saving aid into Gaza, the weapons exports that underpin much of Israel’s war on the besieged enclave continue to flow.

Since the war began, the volume of weapons entering Israel has increased as huge volumes of ordinance are used to flatten areas of Gaza as well as kill, maim and displace its civilian population.

“On the one hand, we have this dire humanitarian need, on the other hand, we have this continual supply of weapons to the country Israel, [which is] creating that need,” Akshaya Kumar, director of crisis advocacy at Human Rights Watch (HRW), said.

While “Western states have recently been going to great lengths to have Israel recognise its role in creating the suffering we’re seeing in Gaza”, she said, “we’re not seeing any corresponding reduction in the flow of weapons from states such as the US, Germany and beyond”.


Gaza has become ‘open-air graveyard’

Speaking following a meeting of EU ministers in Brussels, the bloc’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said that Gaza has become a “graveyard for the many of the most important principles of humanitarian law”.

“Gaza was before the war the greatest open-air prison. Today, it is the greatest open-air graveyard,” he told reporters.



 



SvennoJ on 19 March 2024

What happened when Israel pounded areas around al-Shifa Hospital

Israeli attacks on residential buildings in the vicinity of al-Shifa Hospital have resulted in further killings and injuries, Al Jazeera’s Anas al-Sharif reports. One building on Jalaa Street was reduced to rubble, with Israeli jets and drones hovering overhead. One of the victims killed as a result of the air strikes was a young girl.

Residents and neighbours used their bare hands to try and pull out the victims from under the rubble. “For God’s sake, I have nowhere to go… all my family were killed,” a young boy is heard crying. “I have nowhere to go, for God’s sake.”

Al-Shifa Hospital and the surrounding area remain besieged by Israeli forces, resulting in a complete lack of medical assistance or activity from civil defence teams, as no ambulance or rescue teams are able to reach the area.

Israeli army says operations in central Gaza continuing

The Israeli army says it is continuing its operations in and around al-Shifa Hospital in central Gaza. It says its forces arrested 200 people suspected of acting against them and killed 20, including a person it claimed to be a senior operations director for Hamas’s internal security.

People we talked to in Gaza, however, say that he was a law reinforcement officer. No doubt he was a part of the Hamas structure, but he was essentially a policeman.

The say he played a critical role over the last few weeks, making sure that aid convoys could pass through Gaza safely and unhindered. We will have to see what his death will mean for law enforcement and for that kind of support for the aid convoys in the days ahead.


Israeli army withdraws from al-Shifa Hospital, but surrounding areas still under attack

The Israeli military withdrew from inside al-Shifa Medical Complex after storming the hospital, bulldozing the courtyard, and conducting an aggressive and extensive detailed search.

We’re getting reports of about 150 people detained from inside the hospital. At least 20 people were killed, including a top security commander who had been coordinating the efforts between Gaza clans and the UNRWA and successfully secured the delivery of aid trucks within the past two days to Gaza City and northern Gaza.

Killing this security commander will result in chaos. This has shattered the sense of safety and security for other people to continue coordinating this kind of work to deliver aid to these areas.

Air strikes continue in the vicinity. Residential buildings are being relentlessly bombed. We’ve heard of two buildings at the northern gate of al-Shifa Hospital being completely destroyed. We’ve also heard from the southern part of the complex of one more residential building attacked, and a mosque to its west.

New Israeli air raid on Gaza City

Israeli air strikes have hit Gaza City’s Yarmouk neighbourhood. The area is crowded with residential homes and buildings. The targeted location has not yet been determined. Footage verified by Al Jazeera shows plumes of smoke rising above numerous high-rise buildings in the area in the aftermath of the strikes.


Director of police investigations in northern Gaza killed

An Israeli air attack has killed the director of police investigations in northern Gaza along with his wife after their house was targeted this morning. Raed al-Banna was responsible for securing and facilitating the entry of aid trucks into northern Gaza.

On Monday, Israeli forces killed the head of the police force, Faiq Mabhouh, who was also responsible for coordinating aid trucks into northern Gaza. The killings come after a failed attempt by Israel to force heads of clans in Gaza to take up that responsibility.

Israeli military says it killed over 50 fighters in al-Shifa Hospital

In its latest update, the Israeli military says its troops are still operating within al-Shifa Hospital, where they claim to have killed more than 50 fighters, confiscated weapons and detained 180 people.

The military says it caused no “harm to civilians, medical staff, and medical equipment” in the process. The Wafa news agency reports the latest round of Israeli attacks throughout Gaza have also killed and injured dozens of Palestinian civilians.

This includes a young girl in the vicinity of al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, according to Al Jazeera’s Anas al-Sharif. Al Jazeera Arabic correspondent Ismail al-Ghoul was detained for 12 hours and severely beaten up by Israeli forces after being arrested at the hospital.

Setting the building on fire is no harm? Fighters are every male older than 12...


Palestinians await scarce flour deliveries in Gaza City

Footage posted by Wafa news agency shows a large crowd of Palestinians in Gaza City waiting to pick up flour at a UN centre.

More than 70 percent of people in northern Gaza are dealing with “catastrophic hunger”, according to a recent UN-backed report, with some people resorting to eating animal feed or weeds to survive.



Gaza death toll climbs

At least 31,819 people have been killed and 73,934 wounded by Israeli attacks in Gaza since October 7, according to the latest figures shared by the Health Ministry. The statement added that 93 people were killed and 142 wounded in the past 24 hours.



SvennoJ on 19 March 2024

‘Israel has launched Rafah invasion quietly to avoid international reactions’

The Palestinian Foreign Ministry said Israel began its aggression on Rafah without announcing the move to avoid international reactions.

In a statement, the ministry condemned the escalating bombardment and systematic destruction carried out by the Israeli forces in Rafah, saying that by carrying out these attacks, Israel is purposely ignoring international warnings about the danger of invading the city.

The population of Rafah has swelled to about 1.5 million, which includes hundreds of thousands of displaced people from the centre and northern areas of the Gaza Strip.


The aftermath of Israeli strikes in Rafah



 

Israeli minister: No alternative to Rafah invasion

Israel’s Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter says the ground invasion of Rafah must go ahead if Israel wants to fully defeat Hamas. “There is no other way to do it,” Dichter told Israel’s Reshet Bet radio, adding that any other proposed plan is merely a “Hollywood” scenario.

President Biden has called for Israeli PM Netanyahu to reconsider his planned invasion of Rafah, where one million displaced Palestinians are sheltering, calling it a “mistake”. Netanyahu has agreed to send an Israeli delegation to Washington, DC to discuss “alternative approaches” to a Rafah ground invasion.

 

‘One doesn’t defeat Hamas by starving innocent civilians’

Caroline Gennez, Belgian minister of development cooperation, says Israel cannot defeat Hamas “by starving innocent civilians”. “Starvation threatens over a million people in Gaza,” she wrote on X. “Hunger should never be a weapon of war, and one doesn’t defeat Hamas by starving innocent civilians.

“Stop blocking humanitarian aid and open more border crossings.”




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SvennoJ on 19 March 2024

Israeli settlers attack Palestinian home in occupied West Bank

Israeli settlers have attacked a Palestinian home and several cars in the villages of Burin and Madama, south of the occupied West Bank city of Nablus, local sources said, adding that Israeli forces who arrived at the scene did nothing to stop the attack.

According to Wafa news agency, settlers from the Yitzhar settlement – established on Palestinian lands south of Nablus – attacked a house belonging to the Hindi family with stones, and smashed its windows and several cars belonging to Palestinians.

Israeli forces arrived at the site of the attack to provide protection for the settlers, witnesses told Wafa, and fired live bullets and tear gas canisters at Palestinians. No injuries were reported.

The UN has documented more than 650 settler attacks against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank since October 7, an average of four settler attacks every day – the highest since the UN started recording such incidents in 2006.

Palestinian journalist arrested by Israel in Ramallah

Israeli forces have arrested Rula Hassanein, a Palestinian journalist, from her home in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, and confiscated her laptop and phone. Hassanein’s arrest takes the number of journalists detained in the occupied territory since October 7 to about 60.

At least 40 of them remain in jail, and more than half are detained without charges. Hassanein’s family told local media that she had debated whether to take her nine-month-old baby with her as she was still breastfeeding, but ultimately decided not to.

Israeli forces continued to carry out raids across the occupied West Bank, including Nablus, Qalqilya, Bethlehem, Hebron and Jenin.


Israel intent on ‘muzzling’ Palestinian journalists

Omar Nazzal, the deputy head of the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate, says Israel’s latest crackdown on journalists at al-Shifa Hospital is part of a longstanding campaign of intimidation. “The main objective is to deter journalists from speaking the voice of Palestinians,” Nazzal told Al Jazeera in Ramallah. Israeli forces are “intimidating journalists by showing that anyone who speaks out will be their next target”, he said.

As of today, at least 95 journalists and media workers – the overwhelming majority of them Palestinians – have been killed since the start of the war in October, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. In addition to the dangers faced in the line of duty, Nazzal said Palestinian journalists are also at risk of abuse or torture in Israeli jails, where he says 62 are currently held.

“There is no doubt that journalists are under massive danger,” said Nazzal.

 

 

Israeli strikes in Syria destroy Hezbollah weapons depots

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Israeli air raids earlier today hit a Hezbollah weapons cache near Yabroud, 80km (50 miles) north of Damascus, destroying weapons and ammunition there.

This follows earlier reports by the Syrian state news agency SANA that Israeli air strikes had targeted military sites near Damascus, with Syrian air defences downing several of the missiles.

According to the Syrian Observatory, this was Israel’s second strike on a Hezbollah site in Syria since Sunday, when Israeli forces hit another weapons storage site in the same area.

This year, Israel has waged 25 attacks on Syrian territory, killing 43 fighters, it added.



SvennoJ on 19 March 2024

How Israeli settlers are expanding illegal outposts amid Gaza war

https://www.aljazeera.com/features/longform/2024/3/19/how-israeli-settlers-are-expanding-illegal-outposts-amid-gaza-war

Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank have been emboldened during Israel’s war in Gaza, multiplying their attacks on Palestinian residents and building dozens of illegal roads and outposts that further limit Palestinians’ movements.

Data gathered by activists and satellite images verified by Al Jazeera show that between October 2023 and January 2024, settlers in the occupied West Bank built at least 15 outposts and 18 roads – illegal under both Israeli and international law. In addition, settlers built hundreds of metres of fences and multiple roadblocks, further limiting Palestinians’ movement.

“When there is a war, that is when settlers take advantage and try to establish as many outposts as they can,” said Mauricio Lapchik, an activist with Peace Now, an Israeli organisation documenting settlement activities.




What will become of Gaza’s orphaned generation?

There are more than 17,000 Palestinian children who have been orphaned or separated from their parents during the war in Gaza, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund, or UNICEF.

How are these children navigating the war-torn enclave alone, and what does their future hold?




SvennoJ on 19 March 2024

It just keeps getting worse


Biden can plea all he wants, he just gets told off by Netanyahu

Israeli PM on his call with Biden

Benjamin Netanyahu says he made “supremely clear” to US President Joe Biden, with whom he spoke on Monday, that Israel is “determined to complete the elimination” of the Hamas battalions in Rafah, in southern Gaza.

“There’s no way to do that except by going in on the ground,” the prime minister said, while briefing lawmakers.

His comments came after the White House said Biden had communicated to Netanyahu that a major assault on Rafah would be a “mistake”.

As we reported earlier, the Palestinian foreign ministry said Israel had already begun “to destroy Rafah without announcing, to avoid international reactions and without waiting for permission from anyone”.

Biden is Netanyahu's bitch


Biden reassures Netanyahu after political interference complaints: Report

US news outlet Axios reports President Biden told Prime Minister Netanyahu during their phone call he’s not trying to “undermine him politically”.

Two unnamed sources “with knowledge of the phone call” are cited as saying Netanyahu complained about Senator Chuck Schumer’s speech calling for Israeli elections and criticism over the conduct of the war on Gaza.

He also denounced Biden’s support of Schumer’s comments, American “public political attacks” against him, and interference in Israeli politics, the sources said. Biden reportedly responded he’s not trying to undermine Netanyahu or intervene in domestic politics.

Top Trump adviser: ‘Gaza’s waterfront property could be very valuable’

Video has emerged of Jared Kushner, former US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law who served as one of the chief Middle East dealmakers during Trump’s tenure in the White House, giving his vision for the future of post-war Gaza during an interview at Harvard University.

“Gaza’s waterfront property could be very valuable … if people would focus on building up livelihoods,” Kushner told Harvard Professor Tarek Masoud on March 8. Kushner also said that it’s a shame that “all the money” in the territory went towards building tunnel networks and arms instead of education and “innovation”.

He suggested that, were he in charge, he would move civilians in Gaza to somewhere in the Negev desert while Gaza is “cleaned up.” “I do think right now opening up the Negev, creating a secure area there, moving the civilians out, and then going in and finishing the job would be the right move,” he said.

When asked if this is something that’s being discussed by decision-makers in Israel and the US, Kushner did not elaborate. “I’m sitting in Miami Beach right now,” Kushner said. “And I’m looking at the situation and I’m thinking: What would I do if I was there?”

Should Donald Trump be re-elected to the US presidency this November, Kushner could again feature prominently in his administration. His comments give a window into what Trump’s policy on Palestine could be during his second term.

Israel’s Lieberman calls for war on Lebanon

Opposition lawmaker Avigdor Lieberman has called on Prime Minister Netanyahu’s war cabinet to take the war to Lebanon, as Hezbollah and Israel trade fire across the border. “After 165 days it is clear to everyone that the Israeli government has given up the north,” Lieberman said in a post on X.

Israel and Lebanon-based Hezbollah began trading fire at the beginning of the war on Gaza. Some 80,000 residents have been displaced from northern Israel due to incoming rockets.

“I call on the war cabinet, the chief of staff and the general of the northern command to come to their senses and transfer the war to the enemy’s territory,” Netanyahu’s former defence minister added.



SvennoJ on 19 March 2024

‘Time has long passed’: US must end arms sales to Israel, HRW and Oxfam say

The US should immediately suspend arms transfers to Israel, Oxfam and Human Rights Watch (HRW) say, citing evidence that Israel is violating international law.

“There are good reasons why US law prohibits arms support for governments that block life-saving aid or violate international law with US weapons,” Sarah Yager, HRW’s Washington director, said in a statement. “Given ongoing hostilities in Gaza, the Israeli government’s assurances to the Biden administration that it is meeting US legal requirements are not credible.”

The organisations submitted a report to the US government listing a wide range of Israeli violations of international law, including indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks on or near hospitals and systematic blocking of humanitarian assistance, despite Israeli assurances to the contrary.

“The time has long passed for the Biden administration to end lethal arms sales to Israel, and we call on them to do so now and work to end the death and suffering in Gaza,” Scott Paul, associate director for peace and security at Oxfam America, said in a statement.

Humanity needs to ‘look at ourselves in horror and dismay’

South Africa accused Israel of setting a precedent for some world leaders to defy the top UN court as she again alleged a campaign of “mass starvation” in Gaza. Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor said Israel defied a January ruling by the International Court of Justice to prevent “acts of genocide” during its bloody war.

“The provisional measures have been entirely ignored by Israel,” Pandor said at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, DC. “We’re seeing mass starvation now and famine before our very eyes. I think we, as humanity, need to look at ourselves in horror and dismay and to be really worried that we have set an example.”

Israel’s actions may mean other nations will believe “there’s licence – I can do what I want and I will not be stopped.”

Despite global claims, US says Israel not using starvation as a weapon of war

US Department of State spokesman Vedant Patel has told reporters that the US has “not yet seen conclusive evidence indicating that Israel is using starvation as a weapon in the Gaza war”. These comments come as top officials of the EU, UN and major NGOs worldwide have accused Israel of weaponising hunger in its war on Gaza.

Yesterday, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said that the widespread starvation in the Gaza Strip is “unacceptable”. Starvation is being used as “a weapon of war”, said Borrell.

Also, in a new report, UK charity Oxfam said Israel’s policies of obstructing aid are creating the “perfect storm for humanitarian collapse”, and earlier today a spokesman for the UN’s human rights office said that these policies may amount to a war crime.

Still, the State Department’s Vedant said that the US is “concerned” about a UN-backed report, which found that famine is imminent in Gaza.

Concerned about the report coming out, not about the imminent famine...



SvennoJ on 19 March 2024

Another bloody day in Gaza

The Israeli military is upscaling its attacks on Gaza City which has been the theatre for military operations in the past 24 hours. Battles between Hamas fighters and the Israeli military continue in the vicinity of al-Shifa Hospital, as the Israeli bombardment continues to destroy residential homes.

We are talking about a series of houses in Gaza City being completely levelled to the ground.

Fifteen Palestinians from the same family have been reported killed in Gaza City, without any kind of rescue operation being made for the injured who are still stuck under the rubble.


Israeli forces targeted throughout Gaza

The armed wing of Hamas, the Qassam Brigades, says it attacked Israeli soldiers near al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City with rocket fire, killing several and wounding others.

Israel’s military hit Gaza’s largest hospital with tank and small-arms fire on Monday, resulting in dozens of deaths and injuries, according to Palestinian officials.

Meanwhile, the al-Quds Brigades – the military wing of Islamic Jihad – says it hit a group of Israeli soldiers with missiles west of Netzarim, north of the Central Governorate.


Israeli aggression against civilians as means of pressure won’t work: Hamas official

Izzat al-Rishq, a member of Hamas’s political bureau, has said that the Israeli attack on al-Shifa Hospital and its surroundings is “evidence of the state of confusion that [Israeli PM Benjamin] Netanyahu and his army are living in”.

He added that “the victory that Netanyahu imagines is a mirage and a distant dream thanks to the steadfastness of our people and our valiant resistance”.

Al-Rishq also said Israel’s attempt to use the escalation of “barbaric aggression” against civilians as a means of pressure to achieve its goals would not work.


British doctor describes ‘deeply tragic’ hospital cases in Gaza

Dr Nick Maynard, a consultant surgeon who recently volunteered to provide medical services in Gaza, says the experience was shocking. “I’ve been going to Gaza for nearly 15 years, and I thought I’d be prepared for what I was about to see. But what I saw at al-Aqsa Hospital was the worst cases in my 30-year career,” he told Al Jazeera.

“Appalling clinical injuries, mostly upon children and women. Terrible burns, traumatic wounds, and no real room to deal with these tragic cases.”

Maynard recalled a young girl with burns so bad on her face bone could be seen. “She clearly had no chance of survival and was going to die, but we had no pain relief to give her. She died in agony on the floor of the emergency department.”


A boy attends to a wounded relative at al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir el-Balah, central Gaza