This photo shows a tank with an Israeli occupation flag on it entering the Gazan side of the Rafah border crossing in occupied Palestine, on Tuesday, May 7, 2024. (AP)
A new report by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz underscored a plot to take the Rafah border crossing away from Palestinian control in favor of giving it to a US security private contractor that would do “Israel’s” bidding.
In an exclusive for Israeli newspaper Haaretz, “Israel” has made a plea to the US regarding the takeover of the Rafah border crossing, saying it would be passed on to a private security contracting company.
This was offered up after “Israel” committed to “restrict its operation in Rafah”, which started on Monday, “aiming only to deny Hamas authority over the border crossing that connects Gaza with Egypt, and concentrating on the eastern side of the city.”
According to Haaretz, the Israeli occupation government, in order to secure the deal, has been negotiating with “a private company in the US that specializes in assisting armies and governments around the world engaged in military conflicts. The company has operated in several African and Middle Eastern countries, guarding strategic sites like oil fields, airports, army bases, and sensitive border crossings. It employs veterans of elite US Army units.”
Allegedly, Tel Aviv also pledged “not to damage the crossing’s facilities to ensure its continuous operation,” alleging that the “private American security company will assume management of the crossing after the IDF [Israeli occupation forces] concludes its operation.”
In turn, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller, earlier claimed he had no information about such a plot to assume control over the Rafah border crossing.
In that regard, Haaretz also reported that Egyptian officials expressed opposition to an assault on Rafah because they were concerned that civilians might attempt to cross the border fence seeking shelter. Allegedly, they also warned that Hamas might try to breach the fence to assist Gazans in fleeing.
Under the agreed terms between the three countries, once “Israel” finishes its ‘limited operation’ in the border crossing area, a US company will take over the operation of the facility. This responsibility includes overseeing goods entering Gaza from Egypt and preventing Hamas from regaining control of the crossing. “Israel” and the US will provide support to the company as needed.
Rafah has a long history of confrontations with "Israel", yet each time, Israeli occupation forces are met with the unwavering resilience of the #Palestinian people. pic.twitter.com/rW7l3ugC7N
— Al Mayadeen English (@MayadeenEnglish) May 7, 2024
The Israeli newspaper also claimed that Cairo complained against “Israel” on Tuesday after Israeli occupation troops shared videos showing the Israeli occupation flag being flown at the Rafah crossing. The Egyptians argued, allegedly, that such a public display undermined their efforts to diminish tensions in the area near their territory.
Rafah crossing purely Egyptian-Palestinian: Senior Hamas official
Senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan made it clear on Tuesday that “the military operation in Rafah, if carried out by Israel, will not be a picnic” for the Israeli occupation forces, which were defeated and humiliated in all the areas they have entered in the Gaza Strip.
Speaking during a press conference in the Lebanese capital Beirut on Hamas’ acceptance of the ceasefire proposal presented by mediators Egypt and Qatar, Hamdan pointed out that the decision came as a result of long, difficult, complicated, and continuous negotiations over the past weeks and months.
He mentioned that the past period saw several proposals that did not meet the conditions of the Resistance or the demands of the Palestinian people, affirming that Hamas “adhered to its demands, showed flexibility where necessary, and set red lines that cannot be crossed or compromised.”
Hamdan stressed that Hamas’ acceptance of the ceasefire proposal stems from the movement’s responsibility before the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip and its deep concern for its interests, rights, constants, and sacrifices, and from a positive response to the role of mediators in achieving this deal.
The Israeli occupation army is investigation failure over Hamas rocket attack which killed four occupation soldiers and injured ten others near Karem Abu Salem (known in Hebrew as Kerem Shalom).
Israeli media reported on Monday that military was investigating why the Iron Dome air defense system did not engage the barrage launched by Hamas’ Al-Qassam fighters.
Hamas announced on Sunday an operation targeting the Zionist command headquarters and deployments inside the Karem Abu Salem military site, east of Rafah with a barrage of Rujoum rockets.
The resistance group issued a video on Sunday showing the rocket attack by Hamas’ armed wing, Al-Qassam Brigades.
For its part, the occupation army said at least ten rockets were fired from the Rafah area in southern Gaza in the attack. It announced that four Israeli soldiers were killed and 10 more were wounded in the Hamas-claimed strike.
The deaths brought the toll of announced slain troops in the Zionist ground offensive along the Gaza border to 267, The Times of Israel reported.
Most of the rockets struck an area where troops were gathered on the border, not far from the Karem Abu Salem border crossing, Israeli media reported, adding that the soldiers had been guarding military equipment that was brought to the area for the occupation army’s planned offensive in Rafah.
Isma’il Ibrahim Sha’ban Qarmout (33), married with two children, resident of Jabalia al-Balad, north of Gaza, gave his testimony to PCHR on 01 April 2024.
I lived with my family in a 4-story building of 300 sqms, a house to 5 families of 24 members, including 12 children and 6 women. My 190-sqm apartment was on the first floor and I work as a biomedical engineer.
Since the beginning of the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip on 07 October 2023, we remained in our house because our area was dubbed as a “safe zone” according to an interactive map circulating on social media and the Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF) urging evacuations to our area.
On 19 November 2023, we started hearing the sound of nearby bombings of homes and lands, and the roaring sound of Israeli tanks and bulldozers.
At around 02:00 on 20 November 2023, the IOF called one of the neighbors and ordered him to inform all residents of our area to evacuate, because they would bomb houses there but did not specify any. I took my handbag with 25000 shekels and 5000 US dollars inside in addition to some personal documents and clothes. We were already prepared for evacuation, and during our evacuation, my grandmother with a disability, Faitma Mustafa Qarmout (88), fell on the ground and injured her leg, so we carried her and immediately fled the area. My grandmother later suffered from gangrene affecting her foot and died due to lack of healthcare triggered by the Israeli ongoing aggression on Gaza and the continuous targeting of hospitals. (I learned of her death after I was released as I will explain later.)
Fifteen minutes after the evacuation, Israeli warplanes launched two missiles as we could hear two heavy explosions, so we returned to our homes and was shocked to find my 60-year-old uncle Nayef’s house next to ours was bombed and completely destroyed. The 350-sqm house of 5 floors housed 10 apartments and 9 families of 50 members, mostly women and children. Also, our house has become rickety and uninhabitable while other nearby houses were severely damaged, and others were partially damaged.
At approximately 06:00 on the same day, we decided to go to the south of Gaza through the so-called “safe corridor” designated by IOF during the aggression for the displaced residents of Gaza and northern Gaza heading to the south. At around 08:00, my family and I headed to the “safe corridor” in my golden Daewoo Matiz car, and about 500 meters away from the corridor, I parked near the Kuwait Roundabout and we got out of the car. I was holding my 1-year-old son, Adam, and carrying my backpack with money inside. We went towards the “safe corridor” and the road was uneven and bumpy having many sand berms that had been dug by the IOF. As I approached the Israeli soldiers stationed at the checkpoint, I raised my ID card and kept walking. Suddenly, a soldier called me from behind a sand berm and ordered me to give my son Adam to his mother, Ansaf Nayef Qarmout (28), who was behind me, and to walk towards him. When I was 4 meters away from him, he ordered me to read my ID number. After he verified the number, he ordered me to drop my backpack, but I told him it contained money (25000 shekels and 5000 USD), and he should take it in his custody, but he refused and forced me to throw it, so I did. Later, He ordered me to go behind a sand berm and forced me to strip fully naked. He then ordered me to wear my clothes again and approached me to tied my hands behind my back with a plastic zip tie, blindfolded me, and led me to another sand berm, where there were two soldiers. One of them interrogated me for a few minutes about where I was on 07 October, and whether I am affiliated with Hamas or any Palestinian faction, but I said no. He then told the soldier, “take him and shoot him”, so he took me and threw me on the ground, pulling his trigger and firing 6-7 bullets above my head. I was literally shaking in fear and begging the soldier to kill me. He suddenly kicked me while wearing his boots all over my body, especially on my back, sides and thighs. After about two hours, he left and I remained lying on the ground in shock while being tied and blindfolded. Every two minutes, the soldiers would bring a detainee and throw him next to me. After 4 hours, two soldiers picked me up and threw me at the back of a military SUV, where we were 20 detainees and two of whom were atop me. The SUV then drove us on a bumpy road for an hour and then stopped. The soldiers pulled me out of the SUV and stripped my clothes off by pulling down my pants and taking off my blouse. For whole 7 minutes, I was severely tortured that I could not recognize from where the blows come. I was constantly beaten with their rifles’ butts, feet, and batons. Afterwards, two soldiers held me from my handcuffs and two others from my feet and swung me back and forth about four times and then hit my head into the SUV, causing a bleeding cut in my head. After that, they dressed me and led me to a bus, where there were two soldiers: one in front of me on the bus stairs beating me on my legs and the other from behind hitting my calf (leg) with an iron rod that he could make shorter or longer. At the time, I did not know what to do, should I step forward or backward? and that when the soldier pushed me inside the bus and the other pressed my handcuffs tighter that made me scream out of intense pain. He seated me on the chair and then other detainees, who were tortured like me, got into the bus, among them were elderlies and children of 16 years old. I was not the only one who was subjected to torture as I could see other detainees from under the blindfold and when some of them told the soldiers that they held Canadian and Belgian passports, the soldiers would torture and beat them harder. After about 4 hours, when the bus has become full of 50 detainees, it drove away for an hour, during which, we were beaten on the heads when trying to raise our heads or move to sit in a more comfortable position.
The bus stopped and dropped us off. They then gave me a 1-cm thin mattress and a light blanket. They put us in a barrack divided into two halves, each half can take up to 150 detainees, while the barrack had a flake asphalt flooring, lined with barbed wires and roofed with tinplate. I was forced to kneel while being handcuffed and keeping our heads down. Since my first day, I asked for a doctor because I suffered a chronic stiff neck and the pain got worse due to the severe torture in addition to hand numbness. After 5 days, they took me to a doctor, and I told him what I was suffering from, but he did not give me any medication. Afterwards, they put a plastic tag around my left hand holding a number that I do not remember. It bearing in mind that all the way to the doctor, who was 10 meters ahead, I was being kicked, beaten with batons, and attacked by dogs backwards and forwards.
I was held in the barrack for 20 days, during which, I was interrogated twice and the first one was after 7 days of my detention there. They took me and 6 detainees on a bus 50 meters away and put us in a barrack of 3 caravans. Before entering those caravans for interrogation, I was stripped naked and examined with a metal detector. After that, they forced me to wear a diaper and then my clothes before they tied my hands and blindfolded me.
They put me in a 2×2 caravan with two soldiers, one was sitting on a computer. They seated me on a steel chair, tied one of my hands behind the chair and the other to the chair armrest while my feet were tied as well to the chair legs, and I was unblindfolded. One of the soldiers, whom I think was an officer, began to interrogate me about the neighbors’ houses, where I was on 07 October, and if I knew anyone from Hamas. When I denied knowing anyone from Hamas, he suddenly grabbed my face and forcefully pushed me. The interrogation continued for 5 hours and then they took me out into an area of pebbled floor. Also, while waiting to enter for the interrogation or after it, I was being shackled in the “Shabeh” position, where my hands were tied to an iron bridge above me, and my toes were barely touching the ground in the so-called “waiting barrack”. I remained in that painful position until they finished interrogating other detainees. They returned us later to the barrack in the evening.
The second interrogation was 5 days after the first one during which I was asked the same questions. They left us in the in the barrack for 3 days with our hands tied behind our backs and blindfolded, lying on the gravel floor. The soldiers gave us too little food consisted of a slice of bread with labneh or jam, and water. When I was in the barrack, I wanted to pee, so I asked one of the detainees to help me take off my clothes, and the other detainee next to me helped me to put my clothes on without cleaning myself. This was the same with every detainee, we were helping each other to relieve ourselves in the same place we were in while the soldiers were just watching, mocking us and laughing. On the third day, they took us back to the barracks at around 16:00.
After 10 days of detention, they started daily counting us 3 times a day: at 05:00, 13:00 and 23:30. While sleeping after the count, the soldiers would make loud noises or blast loud music, and when we woke up, they would scream and hit the tin plates, so we would wake up disturbed. The breakfast, lunch and dinner were mainly a loaf of bread with a little labneh spread, and sometimes there might be a tomato or a cucumber shared by 3 detainees. And when asking the detainee, who was appointed by the soldiers to help us, to take us to the bathroom, you would take your turn after half an hour. We went to the bathroom while being handcuffed and blindfolded, noting that there was no water or toilet paper, and only the appointed detainee helped us to take off or put on our clothes.
On the 18th day of detention, at around 17:00, one of the detainees asked to go to the doctor because he was suffering from shortness of breath due to a heart attack, but the soldiers refused and ordered the appointed detainee to cover him. At about 05:00, when we were being counted, the detainee, who asked to go to the doctor, did not stand up, so they ordered the appointed detainee to wake him up, but he was already dead. We then began to shout out loud “Allahu Akbar”, “translated God is Great”, so several soldiers raided the barrack and suppressed us by throwing stun grenades, beating us with batons and unleashing their dogs at us. This lasted for half an hour, after which, they took the deceased detainee whose name we did not know.
Two days later, at approximately 05:00, the soldiers called out 20 detainees, including me, and from the other barrack they called out 20 other detainees. They removed the plastic ties and tied our hands behind our backs and our feet with iron cuffs. They put us on a bus that drove us for 10 minutes. They then dropped us off, removed my blindfold, photographed me, and forced me to kiss the Israeli flag. Afterwards, the soldier blindfolded me again and hit my face against a wall, causing my nose to bleed. Then, the soldiers beat me with iron sticks and plastic brass knuckles (a melee weapon that is fitted and designed to be worn around the knuckles of the human hand to cause unbearable pain) and I was shocked by a soldier’s electric taser baton. The soldiers then threw me on the gravel ground and dragged me all the way to a closed detainee transportation bus called Al-bosta that was 4×2.5 meters long with small holes in its ceiling. In the bus, they made me sit on a chair and constantly beat me, particularly on the head with an iron stick. We were 20 detainees, and the soldiers turned on the air heating, and we started sweating, and then blew cold air and we started shivering. After 2 hours, the bus drove us for three hours, as soon as we got off the bus, the soldiers again beat us with iron sticks. Then they removed the handcuffs but kept the blindfolds and put us all sticking together in a 2.5×2.5-meter cell. Next to the cell, I could see from under the blindfold a sink and a water tap, and after few minutes I went to drink from it until one of the soldiers saw me and kicked me so hard with his foot on my waist that made me vomit. He then dragged me to a room surrounded by barbed wire, ordered me to strip naked, grabbed my genitals and lifted me up, so I fainted. I woke up from the severe beating I had been subjected to while I was unconscious, and this was repeated three or four times, after which, he ordered me to put on my clothes while the beating did not stop.
After putting on my clothes, he tied my hands behind my back with plastic zip ties and blindfolded me. He then dragged to a bus that was 20 meters away where there was an officer who asked me, “how is it going with the intelligence?” and I told him out of fear, “all fine” and he started laughing – I have never been so broken and humiliated ever in my life as that time!- He then forced me into the bus while punching me, and I stayed there for 10 minutes until the bus was full. After Maghrib prayers, they dropped us off in a corridor where the soldiers, one by one, punched and beat us with iron sticks, until we reached the last soldier who had a cutter and removed the plastic ties and blindfolds, ordering us to run forward. As we were running, the detainees there said, “do not worry, there is no beating here”, and then I fainted. The detainees poured some water on my face, and I woke up, but I could not stand up, so they carried me all the way to the tent called “cell 11”, and I learned from them that I was in the Negev prison. My throat was so dry because I was very thirsty, so they gave me water to drink and so did those who were with me. I spent the first night without a mattress, blanket, nor food as we were sticking together while sleeping to warm each other because the weather was very cold.
At 05:00, we woke up to the inmate count, and they gave us breakfast, which was a cup of yogurt, though I do not eat it. Then at 13:00, we had lunch that was a piece of bread and an egg or cheese, and dinner was white rice. From 14:00 to 15:00, they turned on water for us, so we used to fill water in the milk cups and plastic bags of the bread and hide them in the tent grabs since there are not enough bottles in the tents.
After 10 days, they took me for interrogation and asked me the same questions: “Are you Hamas? Do you know anyone from Hamas? and Where you were on 07 October?” After taking my statement, they took my fingerprints and a DNA sample from my saliva, and photographed me. Then, they took me back to the tent. After four days, I became sick for a week and could not stand up due to cramps in my back and knees as the detainees were carrying me to the bathroom. When I asked to go to the doctor, the soldiers refused.
At around 14:00 on 08 January 2024, one of the soldiers came and called 8 detainees out, including me. He took us out of the tent, tied my hands with iron cuffs in front, and blindfolded us. They put us on a bus, which was divided into iron rooms that looked like a closed cell with small holes, as every four detainees were held in one room. After driving us for 5 minutes, they dropped us off a 3×3 cell with a small observation window on the door and a bathroom inside. After an hour, we heard the soldiers calling out the names of detainees who were with us in the tent. We thought they would be released, but they brought them to our cell until we became 20 detainees. Then, they called us five by five, and took us to a room, and checked our names more than once. Afterwards, they took us back to the cell. After an hour, they called out our names and put us in the bus with cells, each three were held in one cell. The bus then drove us away for 5 hours and then dropped us off a doctor, but I fainted right before reaching the doctor because I was fasting and only ate a piece of bread. The doctor examined me as I had low blood pressure and seizures, and he gave me one pill of Relaxone and another of Acamol. They took me back to the very first barracks, so I felt very frustrated because I thought that I would remain in detention while I was blindfolded, and my hands were tied with iron cuffs, kneeling on the ground with my head down from 05:00 till 23:30. At around 23:00, the soldiers came and took us out of the barracks, untied our hands, gave us a grey suit to wear, and tied our hands again, ordering us to sleep at the barrack gate.
At 03:00 on 09 January 2024, the soldiers came, called out 5 detainees, including me, took us out of the barrack, removed the iron cuffs and replaced them with plastic zip ties while keeping the blindfolds. They put us on a bus that drove us for 3 hours, until we arrived at Kerem Shalom crossing at 06:00, and we were 80 detainees, including workers and a woman whom I did not know. The soldiers removed our handcuffs and ordered us to walk forward and never look back. We walked for 2 kilometers and then found an UNRWA bus waiting for us that drove us to the Rafah crossing gate. I took one of the employee’s cellphone and called my family. My brothers: Moussa (28), ‘Issa (26), and Sha’ban (25), who had been all displaced to Rafah, came to take me to my wife and children at Al-Razi Primary School for Girls in Rafah. Meanwhile, my father and mother remained in northern Gaza as they could not leave, and now I sleep every day at a different house belonging to a friend or a relative, who were displaced to Rafah as well, because I do not have enough money to buy a tent and it is not allowed to sleep with my wife at the school.
Palestinian al-Qassam Brigades spokesperson Abu Obeida hails the steadfastness of the Palestinian Resistance as it faces the Israeli occupation forces for the 200th day.
The Israeli occupation has proven impotent as it proved unsuccessful in making any advances in Gaza 200 days into its ruthless onslaught as it only commits massacres and destroys civilian infrastructure, al-Qassam Brigades spokesperson Abu Obeida said on Tuesday.
Today marks the 200th day of Israeli aggression on Gaza in the wake of Operation al-Aqsa Flood, an aggression that has thus far claimed the lives of more than 34,000 people and displaced hundreds of thousands of others. However, no one is touting an Israeli victory, as their declared goal of destroying the Resistance is not only far from being achieved, but also continuously proving to be unattainable.
The spokesperson for Hamas’ armed wing underlined that the Israeli occupation continues to peddle the great lie that is its capacity to destroy all the Palestinian Resistance factions. “200 days later, and the Resistance is still unwavering. It will continue to deal blows to the occupation so long as its aggression continues and so long as it continues to exist on Palestinian land.”
“200 days later, the enemy is still stuck in the sands #Gaza with no goal, no horizon, and no retrieving of its captives,” Military spokesman for the Al-Qassam Brigades, Abu Ubaida said in a televised speech.
“One of the lies of the enemy government is its attempt to make the… https://t.co/PPUOjWycgh
The Resistance’s operations, the spokesperson said, “Will take new forms and adapt with new, adequate tactics.”
As the war entered its seventh month, Abu Obeida stressed that the Israeli occupation “is still stuck in the mud in Gaza with no hope on the horizon, and it will reap nothing but shame and defeat.”
The Resistance fighters are expelling and will continue to expel “this enemy despite being covered in ashes, rising from beneath the rubble as the whole world bears witness to the might of the Resistance fighters, not just through action on the battlefield but their withdrawal from various directions.”
The Israeli occupation is still trying to restore its image that was tarnished on October 7, the spokesperson underlined. “They aim to link their victory to invading Rafah, and it tries to sell the lie that it defeated all Resistance factions except for the Rafah Battalion.”
Ron Arad scenario to repeat itself
Commenting on the ongoing negotiations and prisoner swap talks, Abu Obeida said the Israeli occupation was attempting to rid itself of the pledges it made during the talks as it aims to gain more time. However, he added, “The Palestinian Resistance will not surrender the pivotal rights of the Palestinian people, chief among which is the withdrawal of the Israeli occupation forces, the lifting of the blockade, and the return of the displaced.”
Abu Obeida, addressing Israeli settlers, underlined that the ball was in the court of the Israeli regime, “but the window of time is very narrow, and they have very limited opportunities.”
He recalled the story of Israeli pilot Ron Arad, who disappeared during a mission in the airspace of Lebanon in 1986, with no information being known about him since. “The Israeli captives in Gaza might be fortunate to meet the same fate as Ron Arad,” he said, warning the Israeli occupation against delaying the talks any further.
“The occupation’s policy of exerting military pressure will not push the Resistance but to adhere to its position and safeguard the rights of the people,” he said.
Iranian response set up new rules of engagement
Abu Obeida hailed Iran’s Operation True Promise carried out by the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps in Iran in response to the occupation’s aggression against the Iranian consulate in Damascus and emphasized that this response “set new rules of engagement and disarrayed the occupation,” as the regime’s backers scrambled to defend it from thousands of miles away.
The al-Qassam Brigades spokesperson went on to praise every military and popular effort made toward Operation al-Aqsa Flood, especially the fronts of Lebanon, Yemen, and Iraq.
Abu Obeida said the leading edge front of the Resistance was the West Bank front. He also hailed the people of Jordan and called on them to escalate and called on the people of the Arab and Islamic Worlds to also escalate in support of the Palestinian people and cause.
“The hysteric reaction to the Resistance’s military actions on the various fronts indicates the importance of the armed struggle in the face of the occupying powers,” he concluded by saying.
200 days of genocide
The Ministry of Health in Gaza confirmed Tuesday that the number of Palestinians killed as a result of the ongoing Israeli aggression since October 7 has risen to 34,183 and those injured to 77,143.
In its daily report, the Ministry said that the Israeli occupation forces have committed three massacres against families in the Gaza Strip, resulting in 32 martyrs and 59 injuries who were transferred to hospitals in the past 24 hours.
On its part, the Government Media Office in Gaza confirmed that the Israeli occupation forces have committed a total of 3,025 massacres against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and dropped 75,000 tonnes of explosives on the enclave.
In an update on the figures resulting from 200 days of “Israel’s” genocidal war on Gaza, the Office emphasized that out of the 34,183 martyrs who reached hospitals, 14,778 are children and 9,752 are women. It added that 30 children lost their lives due to famine, confirming that 72% of the victims of the Israeli war were children and women.
According to the report, the Israeli occupation forces killed 485 medical staff, 67 civil defense crews, and 140 journalists.
It said that 7,000 are still missing and 17,000 children are now orphaned, living without one or both parents.
Multi-front solidarity
The Islamic Resistance in Lebanon – Hezbollah confirmed Tuesday that it engaged the headquarters of two Israeli military units in southern occupied Palestine in response to the assassination of one of its fighters in a southern Lebanese town earlier.
In a statement, Hezbollah said its Resistance fighters launched a combined aerial attack using diversionary and suicide drones and engaged the headquarters of the Golani Brigade and the Egoz Unit 621 at Shraga barracks north of the occupied city of Akka, hitting its targets precisely.
Reuters highlighted that this was Hezbollah’s “deepest attack” into occupied Palestinian territory since the start of the Gaza war on October 7.
Israeli media had earlier reported sirens sounding in the Upper al-Jalil area over a drone infiltration and mentioned that interception missiles were launched toward a suspicious aerial target in the skies of Nahariya.
The media also pointed out that sirens sounded in numerous northern settlements reaching the city of Akka. It was also noted that sirens sounded in Kiryat for the first time since last December.
The Israeli Army Radio confirmed that 200,000 Israelis took shelter in the north after three drones were launched from Lebanon over Nahariya.
As the humanitarian crisis worsens in the Gaza Strip, the 196th day of Israeli occupation has brought more bloodshed and suffering to the region. With over 34,000 dead and nearly 77,000 injured since October 7, the Israeli occupation forces are showing no signs of slowing down.
In the past 24 hours alone, Israeli occupation forces have committed four massacres in Gaza, leaving 37 dead and 68 injured. Air strikes and artillery shelling have devastated the area, with civilians being the primary targets of these brutal attacks.
BREAKING | 8 killed, 5 of them children, and multiple injured in an Israeli airstrike on a family home in Rafah pic.twitter.com/Nc06RlLlOY
"My dear grandson, your hair is as beautiful as before."
A grieving Palestinian grandmother kisses her grandchildren and nephews in a final farewell after they were all killed in the Israeli bloodbath last night in Rafah. pic.twitter.com/hQsM9Z5SO2
The situation has become dire, with more than 90% of the population displaced and struggling to survive amidst the siege. The Ministry of Health has reported that there are still victims trapped in rubble, unable to receive medical assistance due to ongoing attacks.
A heart-breaking scene of a Palestinian father crying while bidding farewell to his only daughter who lost her life in an Israeli airstrike on Rafah, leaving the bereaved father in deep grief. pic.twitter.com/sW5qGkUZ9f
Israeli warplanes continue to bomb residential areas, leaving families devastated and cities in ruins. The people of Gaza are living in fear as the violence escalates, with no end in sight.
Palestinian paramedic Fathi Nasrallah was shocked to find his son at the hospital of Tulkarm after he was shot dead in cold blood by Israeli occupation soldiers. pic.twitter.com/zNCE8qRz4A
To make matters worse, the Gaza Strip is facing a severe water crisis. With all water wells in the city shut down due to fuel shortages, residents are now facing extreme thirst.
Death toll of the Israeli aggression on Gaza neared 34,000 on Friday as the Zionist enemy went ahead with brutal war against the besieged enclave on day 196.
Israeli occupation carried out several strikes on Gaza’s Shati refugee camp, the Sheikh Radwan area north of Gaza City, and Nuseirat in the central area of the Palestinian territory.
Malaysia Qur'an School in Al Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza before and after Israel's army targeted it. pic.twitter.com/wI9rqxGhlf
Health Ministry in Gaza announced that at least 33,970 people have been martyred and 76,770 others have been wounded in the Israeli aggression on Gaza since October 7.
Nearly one-third of people martyred in the Gaza war – at least 10,000 people – have been women, according to the agency, UN Women.
The war in #Gaza continues to be a war on women.@UN_Women reports that 10,000 women, including 6,000 mothers, have lost their lives.
The situation is dire for over 1 million displaced women, who struggle to access clean water, food, & basic sanitary supplies. pic.twitter.com/lf73vQSGx4
Out of these women, 6,000 are mothers, whose deaths have left 19,000 orphans, according to UN Women.
Potential Attack on Rafah
Meanwhile, media reports said there were more signs on the horizon of a potential Israeli military incursion into Rafah.
According to the reports, the occupation military has deployed more troops in all areas that are adjacent to Rafah district.
“Since the early hours of this morning, they have been pounding the majority of the agricultural land in the eastern areas of Rafah,” Al-Jazeera reported on Friday, quoting sources.
Earlier on Thursday, the United States blocked a United Nations Security Council resolution that would have recognized a Palestinian state.
Twelve members of the Security Council had voted in favor of the resolution, while two countries – the UK and Switzerland – abstained. The US vetoed it.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said the US veto was “blatant aggression … which pushes the region ever further to the edge of the abyss”.
Hamas said it condemned the US’s “biased” position “in the strongest terms”.
Egypt expressed “deep regret” over the move, saying the US was violating its “legal and historical responsibility” by denying Palestinian statehood.
Russia said the US had demonstrated that it only considers the “the interest of Israel”.
The US was the sole country to veto a UN Security Council resolution that would have granted Palestine full UN membership…yet, the Biden Admin “clarified” they strongly support something they voted against. 12 nations voted yes, 2 abstained.pic.twitter.com/euatqJvEYUhttps://t.co/Aqs9rM5cJJ
Brutal massacres went ahead in Gaza on the day 193 of the Israeli war on the besieged enclave, with international organizations warning against humanitarian crises.
Continuing Israeli attacks on central Gaza’s Nuseirat refugee camp killed several Palestinians, local media reported.
Israeli fighter jets destroy a residential building in Nusseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, today. pic.twitter.com/wtX9UWBftc
In northern Gaza Strip, casualties were reported as Israeli warplanes pounded Jabalia, targeting a mosque there.
Civil defense crews rescue a little girl following the bombing of a number of homes in Jabalia refugee camp, north of Gaza. pic.twitter.com/sKBhdonNQL
— Palestine and MENA Info Center (@PALMENA_IC) April 16, 2024
Israeli army vehicles reportedly surrounded a school where hundreds of people were sheltering amid gunfire and explosions in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip.
Separately, four people, including a child, were martyred and several wounded in an Israeli attack on a house west of Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, the Wafa news agency reported.
Earlier on Monday, two mass graves were discovered by Gaza’s Ministry of Health and the Civil Defense Forces in the north of the Gaza Strip on Monday. The first mass grave was discovered at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, and the second was found in Beit Lahiya.
Death Toll and “Health Disaster”
Health Ministry in Gaza announced that 46 people were martyred and 110 injured by Israeli strikes in the past 24 hours.
It put the death toll of citizens martyred since the start of Israeli aggression on October 7 at 33,843. The ministry added that the number of injured Palestinians reached 76,575.
Meanwhile, the ministry warned that generators powering Gaza’s few functional hospitals around the clock for months could now lose power “at any moment.”
Doctors perform surgery at the European Hospital in Khan Younis (Anadolu news agency).
Such a loss would bring about a “major health disaster”, it said, issuing an urgent appeal for new generators and the restoration of power lines in the besieged territory.
For its part, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) reported in its latest situation update that the amount of aid entering Gaza is far below the operational capacity of the open border crossings of the besieged enclave.
It added that an average of 181 aid trucks reaching Gaza daily fails to meet the Israeli occupation’s stated goal of facilitating the entry of 500 trucks per day.
One Gaza Child Killed or Injured Every 10 Minutes
On the other hand, a UNICEF official said that Gaza children have become the faces of the continuing war as their stories paint a “harrowing picture” of the human consequences of the conflict.
“Children are wearing a tremendous share of the scars of this war,” UNICEF communications specialist Tess Ingram – who left Gaza on Monday after spending two weeks there – told a UN press briefing in Geneva.
Tess Ingram, UNICEF communications specialist.
More than 12,000 children were injured in Gaza since October 7, 2023, she said, and this is “almost certainly an underestimate”.
“With at least 70 children injured every day, we need the number of medical evacuations to increase so children can access the care they urgently need. And with one child killed or injured every 10 minutes, above anything else we need a ceasefire.”
Gaza still amazes the world with its incredible resistance despite all forms of oppression it has been facing since the start of the brutal Israeli aggression on October 7. On the day 192 of the war, both people and resistance stand firm in face of the Israeli massacres and deliberate starvation.
Israeli attacks on Monday took place in several areas across the besieged enclave with the concentration was on Gaza Strip’s center.
Palestinian media reported attacks on two mosques, a UN-run school and the Malaysian school in the Nuseirat refugee camp.
Israeli occupation forces target civilians and journalists in Nusseirat refugee camp in central Gaza. pic.twitter.com/Ni6Q5euIDM
Also in central Gaza, several residential homes and a market were subjected to Israeli strikes.
Elsewhere in northern Gaza, the Firas market was targeted.
Strikes were also reported in the southern city of Rafah, according to Palestinian media.
Health Ministry in Gaza reported that 68 people were martyred and 94 others were injured in 7 massacres in the past 24 hours. It put the death toll of the Israeli aggression on Gaza Strip at 33,545.
The ministry added that the number of injured people reached 76,094.
Destruction “Disproportionate to Anything One Can Imagine”
Meanwhile on Monday, Civil Defense in Gaza said on its Telegram channel that it recovered 13 more decomposing bodies in Khan Younis’ Al-Balad and Al-Amal neighborhoods.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs described the destruction in the southern city of Khan Younis as profound.
In a post on X the UN office said a team has visited Khan Younis and witnessed destroyed homes, schools and hospitals as well as unexploded ordinance.
🔺 Homes, schools and hospitals severely damaged 🔺 Roads reduced to dirt tracks 🔺 Civilians at grave risk of unexploded ordnance 🔺 Collapsed services
Yesterday, a @UN team visited #Gaza's Khan Younis where they witnessed profound destruction.
For his part, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO), said that the organization and its partners went to Khan Younis on Sunday to assess the health facilities there.
.@WHO and partners went to Khan Younis yesterday to assess the health facilities there. The team described the destruction as "disproportionate to anything one can imagine". No building or road is intact, there is only rubble and dirt.
Also on Monday, Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Jihad resistance group released a video showing fighters targeting Israeli concentrations east Jabalia.
سرايا القدس: مشاهد من استهداف قوات الاحتلال وتحصيناتها شرق جباليا بالأسلحة الرشاشة pic.twitter.com/9fMBdoQDZw
On the other hand, a security and military studies professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies said that Hamas’s armed wing, Al-Qassam Brigades, has surprised many military analysts over the past seven months.
Talking to Al-Jazeera, Omar Ashour said Al-Qassam Brigades was completely outnumbered and outgunned in all domains – sea, air and land – as well as electronic and cyberwarfare.
He added that the resistance group has created its own environment to be able to fight by constructing multilevel underground tunnels that doubled or tripled the size of Gaza
“Many Hamas fighters remain, and Israel has killed only one of its three top commanders. If Israel wants to achieve its aim of destroying Hamas, the fight will take a lot longer than the Israeli military expected, and it may not even be possible,” Ashour said, as quoted by Al-Jazeera.
Palestinians inspect the rubble of the Yassin Mosque at Shati refugee camp in Gaza City (photo by AP).
Israeli occupation army proceeds its brutal aggression on Gaza Strip, with military operation being waged in the enclave’s central area of Nuseirat.
Palestinian media reported massive raids in the refugee camp of Nuseirat overnight. The strikes were followed by a military push on the ground into the northern part of the Nuseirat camp.
Al-Jazeera reported that when the military announced its withdrawal from southern Khan Younis, it kept an entire brigade in the area that separates northern Gaza from the south, adding that Nuseirat is very close to deploy troops to the area.
Israeli military forces are carrying out a ground incursion in Nuseirat Camp, central Gaza amid heavy air raids and intense shelling. pic.twitter.com/zQQQfeXZpO
Israeli occupation army announced it launched a “targeted operation” against Hamas in the central Gaza Strip overnight, on the outskirts of Nuseirat, an area where ground troops have not yet operated during the ongoing war.
“Before troops of the 162nd Division’s 401st Armored Brigade, Nahal Infantry Brigade, and other units maneuvered into the area, the Israeli Air Force and 215th Artillery Regiment carried out strikes against dozens of Hamas targets, including tunnel infrastructure,” the occupation army declared.
More Strikes, Death Toll
In conjunction with air strikes on Nuseirat camp, Israeli gunboats shelled homes in the Shati refugee camp, west of Gaza City, killing multiple civilians, according to local sources cited by the Wafa news agency.
Elsewhere in the southern district of Rafah, Israeli strikes killed at least eight people, the Wafa news agency reports, citing medical sources.
Five of the martyrs were killed when Israeli warplanes struck a group of people near a cemetery in eastern Rafah, while three were killed by strikes that hit Rafah’s Janina neighborhood, also to the east, the news report said.
Breaking | Israeli occupation attack drones target a group of Palestinians near the eastern cemetery, east of Rafah. pic.twitter.com/TTjzPnXDo6
Health Ministry in Gaza announced that the death toll of the Israeli aggression now stands at 33,545, while the number of injured people reaches 76,094 since October 7.
It added that, Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip killed 63 people and wounded 45 others over the past 24 hours.
UNICEF Convoy Hit
Meanwhile, a UNICEF aid convoy was hit by Israeli gunfire in the latest attack on humanitarian relief workers in Gaza.
Tess Ingram, a UNICEF spokesperson, was in a convoy hit by Israeli gunfire as it tried to deliver aid to northern Gaza.
She said the vehicles were at a “holding point” – a designated area where cars have to wait until a checkpoint is ready to receive them.
“We were waiting there when gunfire broke out in the vicinity. The gunfire came from the direction of the checkpoint towards civilians who then ran away from the checkpoint and the gunfire hit us,” Ingram said.
🚨Breaking: UNICEF spokesperson recounts Israeli occupation forces shooting at their vehicle today while waiting at an Israeli checkpoint to enter and deliver aid to #Gaza. pic.twitter.com/j9j55u6qnK
US President Joe Biden’s goals in Gaza align with Tel Aviv’s. But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s execution of these objectives is heavily clashing with US interests, undermining its soft power elsewhere in the region.
In an interview with MSNBC last month, US President Joe Biden took a rare firm stance against his staunch Israeli ally, insisting that an invasion of Rafah by the occupation army – devoid of a civilian-focused plan – would cross a “red line.” He then countered his warning by affirming Washington’s unwavering support of Tel Aviv and promising that he would never “leave Israel.” The Israeli Broadcasting Corporation, citing unnamed political sources, said that the phone call between Biden and Netanyahu on 4 April was “more difficult than expected.” The White House said that Biden’s tough tone during the call reflected “growing frustration” over Tel Aviv’s lack of cooperation in protecting civilians.
This contradiction in words and behavior highlights the dilemma the White House faces in its interactions with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. You can’t have it both ways. While the US aims to temper Netanyahu’s aggressive policies – at least for public consumption – it seeks to do so without undermining the stability of his extremist coalition government.
In short, every word is weighed in public US announcements to balance that fine line. Following a virtual meeting between National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and Israeli officials on 1 April, which included talks on the proposed Israeli incursion in Rafah, a statement from the White House merely noted: “The two sides, over the course of two hours, had a constructive engagement on Rafah. They agreed that they share the objective to see Hamas defeated in Rafah.”
On 26 March, an Israeli Defense Ministry briefing revealed that US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin “expressed the view that Hamas’ remaining battalions in Rafah must be dismantled, that that’s a legitimate goal that we share.” He added that “Rafah should not be a safe haven for Hamas. Nowhere in Gaza should be.”
It is safe to conclude from these bland statements that there is a meeting of the minds between the Biden administration and the Netanyahu government over the war’s objectives. From the onset of hostilities, the US has actively collaborated with Israeli decision-making processes, ensuring alignment with strategic goals. High-ranking US officials, including Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Secretary Austin, have participated in Israeli War Cabinet meetings.
Three days after the launch of Al-Aqsa Flood, Biden made it “crystal clear” that “We stand with Israel. We stand with Israel. And we will make sure Israel has what it needs to take care of its citizens, defend itself, and respond to this attack.”
Tensions grow with Tel Aviv
Despite this shared strategic vision, recent developments have highlighted emerging disagreements between Netanyahu and Biden. The differences revolve around the methodologies used to safeguard Israel’s security and future. The core of the dispute can be summarized as follows:
The Biden administration views the path to normalization, as set out in the Trump-era Abraham Accords of 2020, as a historic opportunity to strengthen regional peace, with the jewel in the crown being a Saudi–Israeli normalization deal.
Blinken, during a visit to Saudi Arabia, warned that ongoing military operations in Gaza might jeopardize the Saudi–Israeli normalization prospects, which is a major strategic interest for Tel Aviv at the regional level:
“Almost every country in the region wants to integrate Israel, to normalize relations with it, and to “The reality is to help Israel provide protection for it. But this requires in particular the establishment of a Palestinian state, and it also naturally requires ending military operations in Gaza.”
A Palestinian state is, of course, anathema to Netanyahu’s coalition, the most extremist government in Israel’s short history. But US concerns are also growing over the possibility of the war in Gaza leading to a broader regional war, one which the US will be forced into to protect its settler-colonial ally.
From Washington’s perspective, Israel’s identity as a “functional entity” is significant because it fulfills US geopolitical objectives in the region. Conversely, Netanyahu and the Israeli right prioritize Israel’s identity as a Jewish nation-state. This divergence becomes pronounced in the face of existential threats when national identity overshadows functional roles, posing greater risks to Israel than to the United States.
Regional interests and domestic politics
But the catastrophic humanitarian crisis in Gaza is now limiting the US’s ability to provide international support for Israel’s continued warfare, with Netanyahu’s actions exacerbating the situation and destroying the US’ human rights ’advocacy’ reputation across the globe.
In recent months, Washington has been forced to adopt rhetoric stressing the need for Israel to abide by international laws and protect civilians. At the same time, however, it continues to support the occupation state with all the tools necessary to kill the population of Gaza.
US public opinion reflects growing opposition to Israel’s war crimes in Gaza, with recent polls showing a majority of Americans against the occupation army’s brutalities. A Gallup poll conducted between 1 and 20 March shows that 55 percent of US respondents oppose Israeli military action in the Gaza Strip, a 10 percent rise from November polls.
Crucially, this public sentiment suggests a growing dissonance between US government actions and voter preferences, with Biden’s popularity plummeting in domestic polls.
Concurrently, the US-dominated global “rules-based” order is coming under sharp fire from peer adversaries like Russia and China, which advocate for a return to international law. Israel’s brutal Gaza assault contradicts everything Washington has preached for decades about its ‘rules.’
Tel Aviv has blanketly ignored the binding UN Security Council Resolution 2728, which stipulates a ceasefire during the holy Muslim month of Ramadan, and stands accused of violating all respects of international humanitarian law.
Netanyahu’s government is responsible for the mass murder of tens of thousands of civilians in Gaza – two-thirds of them women and children – which saw Israel dragged for the first time to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on charges of genocide. He then proceeded to violate the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations by targeting the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria, on 1 April.
Netanyahu’s fight for survival
Several fundamental reasons drive Netanyahu to support, confront, and even ignore Biden’s stances. At the core is the Israeli premier’s uncertain political future: He is acutely aware that halting the war without securing strategic victories that translate into political capital will devastate his political legacy, making him bear the brunt of all outcomes since 7 October.
Faced with limited alternatives, Netanyahu opts for confrontation, banking on enduring until the upcoming US elections in November.
For Israel, the stakes in the ongoing war are significantly higher than for the US because Tel Aviv’s top brass widely views it as an existential threat. This perspective galvanizes even those within Israeli society and its hawkish military who might not necessarily align with Netanyahu’s policies.
Central to Netanyahu’s resistance is his rejection of a two-state solution. He perceives the invasion of Rafah as a tactic to either circumvent negotiations with Hamas or to weaken the movement’s bargaining position. Importantly, Netanyahu aims to prevent the war’s conclusion from being interpreted as a step towards Palestinian statehood, rightly framing the conflict as a Palestinian liberation struggle.
Meanwhile, the White House continues on its impossible trajectory to balance pressure on Netanyahu with a clear commitment to Israeli security interests, including defeating Hamas. Netanyahu does not miss a beat in manipulating this situation to his advantage, twisting the narrative to ensure Israel’s interests are met, with a keen eye on how this plays out for him politically at home.
Re-evaluating relations
Commentary from both Israeli and US corners is starting to shine a light on the potentially thorny path ahead.
As Doron Matza recently wrote in the Israeli newspaper Maariv:
In the near future, the aid directed to Israel will decrease and be limited, and with it international legitimacy, not to mention the erosion of the Abraham Accords and the challenges represented by additional enemies waiting for the zero hour to turn the 7 October flood into a broader and greater catastrophe.
John Hoffman in Foreign Policy adds a scathing critique, questioning the very fabric of the US–Israel relationship: “The special relationship does not benefit Washington and is endangering US interests across the globe.”
It is time for the US to recalibrate its relationship with Israel. This isn’t about turning Israel into an adversary but about interacting with it as Washington does with any other state – with a measured distance and pragmatism.
The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of The Cradle.
The Israeli occupation commits a total of 5 massacres in 24 hours only.
The Health Ministry in Gaza reported that the Israeli occupation committed a total of 5 massacres against Palestinian families in 24 hours only, killing 54 and injuring 82.
This brings the total number of Palestinians killed in the Gaza Strip since the Israeli aggression on Gaza started on October 7 to 33,091, in addition to 75,750 injuries.
Compounding the devastation, some victims are still trapped under rubble and on roads, presumed dead, with the Israeli occupation hindering the arrival of ambulance and civil defense teams.
The Israeli occupation continues its relentless and genocidal campaign against Gaza for 182 consecutive days, targeting different regions of the Strip and enforcing a complete blockade. This has further worsened the already dire humanitarian situation, exacerbating the suffering of the people in Gaza.
Al Mayadeen‘s correspondent reported that a brutal airstrike targeted the vicinity of Sheikh Zayed City in the northern Gaza Strip.
Palestinian media outlets reported that Israeli artillery shelling targeted the central and western parts of Khan Younis city, as well as the eastern part of Rafah city in the southern Gaza Strip.
Furthermore, Israeli warplanes targeted Tal al-Hawa, west of Gaza City, just before midnight. Concurrently, Israeli artillery shelling and airstrikes targeting the southwestern and southeastern neighborhoods of Khan Younis city, as well as the eastern areas of the al-Maghazi refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, continued.
The bombing resulted in several casualties, including children and women, with some still trapped under the rubble.
The Israeli occupation commits a total of 6 massacres in 24 hours only.
The Health Ministry in Gaza reported that the Israeli occupation committed a total of 6 massacres, killing 62 and injuring 91, in 24 hours only.
This brings the total number of Palestinians killed in the Gaza Strip since the Israeli aggression on Gaza started on October 7 to 33,037, in addition to 75,668 injuries.
Not found
A Palestinian man, Ashraf Abu Daraz, in Gaza says goodbye to his children and pregnant wife, killed in US-UK-EU-armed Israeli airstrikes in Rafah.
The UNSC voted for a ceasefire, the US and Israel know the rules of the US-led ‘rules-based order’ don’t apply to them. pic.twitter.com/ofluuPe3jZ— Afshin Rattansi (@afshinrattansi) April 4, 2024
Compounding the devastation, some victims are still trapped under rubble and on roads, with the Israeli occupation hindering the arrival of ambulance and civil defense teams.
Human Rights Watch declared that the Israeli airstrike on a six-story apartment building in central Gaza on October 31, 2023, amounts to a potential war crime. The attack resulted in the killing of at least 106 civilians, including 54 children, marking one of the deadliest incidents for civilians since October 7.
According to Human Rights Watch, there was no evidence of a military target near the building during the airstrike, rendering it indiscriminate and in violation of the laws of war.
Israeli authorities have not provided any justification for the attack. This incident underscores the significance of the International Criminal Court’s investigation into alleged war crimes committed by “Israel”, particularly given the Israeli military’s history of inadequately addressing such allegations.
Gerry Simpson, associate crisis and conflict director at Human Rights Watch, condemned the airstrike, emphasizing that it resulted in significant civilian casualties, including children playing football, individuals at the ground-floor grocery store, and forcibly displaced families seeking refuge.
“This strike inflicted massive civilian casualties without an apparent military target – one of scores of attacks causing overwhelming carnage, and highlighting the urgency of the ICC probe,” he stressed.
Over and above industrial-scale mass murder of individual people—Israel is engaged in the eradication of Gazans as a People~ilana
Inarguably, to condemn Israel’s industrial-scale campaign of slaughter and starvation in Gaza ought to be ethically straightforward. Basic really.
That Israel is committing the “the crime of all crimes” against the Palestinians of Gaza is not within the realm of opinion.
That the Global North is standing stock-still in the face of this meticulously documented holocaust is not in dispute.
That the United States is an active participant in war crimes, funding and arming Israel in contravention of international humanitarian law , a plethora of US laws (having, without attached conditions, delivered more than 100 arms shipments to Israel since October 7), and the natural justice, articulated by Cicero as early as 106-43 B.C: these are all fact.
That America has provided the Jewish State with diplomatic cover—running interference for it, so that it may continue to its evil ends—until recently vetoing three (albeit symbolic) international attempts to stop Israel: this, too, is immutably true.
Right and wrong are universal, not relative. The Sixth Commandment is not opinion, but a species of the inviolable natural law. Neither is it optional. “Thou shalt not murder” is called a commandment for a reason. There are no tribal privilege clauses attached to it. Like gentiles, Jews are enjoined against murder, to say nothing of mass murder.
Yet Israelis now flout the Sixth Commandment with ugly audacity. They appear to believe that their sectarian supremacy transcends the universal moral order to which international law, the natural law and the Decalogue give expression.
With its actions, so “conspicuous and outrageous,” Israel has “knocked the cosmos out of kilter” (a lovely line by novelist Kathryn Harrison). Such is the moral turpitude of the Israel Über Alles crowd—Jewish and gentile, stateside and abroad—that they appear incapable of distinguishing evidence from assertion, and facts from feel-good fiction; they can’t tell right from wrong. By necessity, then, any preface to an essay about Israel’s manifestly intentional annihilation of the Gaza Strip must turn into a primer in ethics.
Clearly, if Israeli society is sick; then so are its cobelligerent backers and boosters.
AMERICA’S CEASEFIRE DECEPTION
America has conditioned the inalienable right to life of Palestinians on the return of Israeli hostages, in effect nullifying that right ~ilana
For throwing-up clouds of obfuscating sepia over its abstention vote on the United Nations Security Council’s ceasefire resolution, March 25, the Biden Administration and its UN representative must be exposed.
“Ceasefire” in previous U.S. drafts amounted to Orwellian News Speak. Having never once called for an immediate, unconditional ceasefire, the U.S. had perfunctorily predicated temporary ceasefireresolutions on the return of Israeli hostages.
Whereas it was obligated morally to compel Israel to forthwith cease and desist its systematic and sustained onslaught on Gaza’s civilians; the US had opted, until March 25, to merely condition the temporary cessation of immoral and illegal mass murder of innocent Palestinians on the release of Israeli hostages, in effect tethering a “ceasefire” to the return of the Israeli hostages.
Against the wishes of citizens of our country and the world, America has deployed its veto power, repeatedly and reliably, in previous United Nations Security Council votes, so as to prevent an immediate, unconditional cease-fire in Gaza.
By so doing, America had conditioned the inalienable right to life of Palestinians on the return of Israeli hostages, in effect nullifying that inalienable right.
Recognizing that the right to life of innocent men, women and children is unconditional; Security Council member states, aside the United States and its protégé Israel, had refused to tether the fate of Gaza to hostage negotiations.
With pellucid logic, Amar Bendjama, Algeria’s ambassador to the U.N and the Arab bloc’s current Security Council member, had stated, February 20, 2024, that, “A vote in favor of [an unconditional ceasefire] is a support to the Palestinians’ right to life.” With its prior veto es and current abstention, the US had nullified Palestinian right to life independent of the rights of Israeli hostages to the same.
You can say that Gaza’s innocent civilians are being held hostage by Israel enablers Blinken, Biden and Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield.
The general run of people around the world, however, are having none of this. We have been chanting “ceasefire” with catechetical promptness. The West’s “smart” set is belatedly getting the message that their constituents, decent citizens, are revolted by Israel’s acts and are in-revolt against supporting it.
In response, and oh-so cynically, all Ambassador Thomas-Greenfield did on March 25 was to abstain from using American veto power to stop the good guys—China, Russia, Algeria and the rest of the 15-member UN Security Council—from demanding an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in Gaza. That’s all.
Expect the Biden Administration and its bi-partisan backers to keep gently cajoling brief lulls—conditional breaks—in the IDF’s bloodletting of a helpless, cornered civilian population.
For moral compass scrambled; it’s hard to beat former ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley. In this protracted foreign-policy mirage, Blinken, Biden, Thomas-Greenfield and their political posse do Nikki Haley, a Republican, proud, for Trump’s appointee to the UN would have done nothing different.
CEASE AND DESIST! WHERE’S THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT?
A violent offender, a serial killer, must be stopped; not cautioned and observed! ~ilana
IDF soldiers vaporize young men picking their way through rubble as though in a video game; they mock their victims, invade their homes; filch from their businesses, and rummage through the piteous intimate effects of people dead and dispossessed ~ilana
In the world of patronage, it doesn’t get much worse. The United States is at Israel’s elbow—it is a cobelligerent: In actively sustaining Israel’s armed forces, and running diplomatic interference for its politicians; America is acting as Israel’s “principal sponsor,” complicit in war crimes, signaling to the Jewish State that it will let it continue to its evil endgame.
As I ventured in January, the issuance of the equivalent of a legal cease-and-desist or a restraining order against a violent offender, Israel, is urgent and long overdue. It’s already too late for Gaza as a habitable landmass.
While progressives lauded the International Court of Justice (ICJ), my perspective about the Court’s indecision, some months back, was dimmer. (Disgust, actually.) Unfocused as I was on legalistic definitions of genocide; it was obvious to me that, what was indubitably mass murder and ethnic cleansing—crimes that are in process and ongoing—had to be stopped right away. A violent offender, a serial killer, must be stopped; not cautioned and observed!
Were the International Court of Justice an effective and just organization it would have issued some sort of binding cease and desist order, some manner of restraining order, if you will, instructing the Israel Defense Forces, the Devil’s emissaries on earth, to stop its depredations.
Another international tribunal, the International Criminal Court (ICC), had “issued, in March of 2023, warrants of arrest, no less “for two individuals in the context of the situation in Ukraine,” one of whom was Mr. Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, president of the Russian Federation, who was being sought for war crimes.
With respect to Israel, the inept International Court of Justice appears compromised.
For in a just society, the moral strictures that apply to the individual must also extend to the collective. Immoral acts that are forbidden severally cannot be sanctioned collectively. If the citizen must not murder; neither should The State, any state.
UN SECURITY COUNCIL CEASEFIRE IS BINDING
A Security Council resolution not defanged by the US could have included a call for diplomatic, military, political, and economic sanctions, the freezing of Israeli assets, the deployment of a protection force, and the establishment of a tribunal for future prosecution ~ilana
In its uncontested superiority, the United States has asserted, moreover, that the UN ceasefire resolution is “non-binding.” “Completely false,” fumes international law expert Graig Mokhiber, in an interview, March 26, with Amy Goodman of “Democracy Now!” And I paraphrase Mr. Mokhiber:
It is black-letter law in the U.N. Charter that all members of the United Nations are bound to accept and carry out the decisions of the Security Council. The Charter, in Article 25, and in subsequent decisions of the International Court of Justice, has made it indisputable that Security Council resolutions are binding for all member states.
Not only is the last ceasefire resolution binding, but it opens up an opportunity, given that Israel is in breach of it, to table a resolution for enforcement under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, which “empowers the Security Council to orchestrate … collective actions … through a Military Staff Committee.”
A Security Council resolution not defanged by the United States could include a call for corporeal action: diplomatic, military, political, and economic sanctions, the freezing of Israeli assets, the deployment of a protection force, and the establishment of a tribunal for future prosecution.
If left to the rudderless Europeans and Americans—they’ve done not a thing to stop what Ron Unz has termed the first televised mass murder in history—it is for a heavenly tribunal that we will be waiting.
Scars will knit, but the dead don’t rise, and spry young limbs won’t grow back. More than ten children lose their legs daily by the IDF. Spare a thought for the lot of these children hobbled for life, for the US and world leaders have not.
Again, these judicial and political knaves and curs (with apologies to the canine community) could have cut off the supply of munitions to the culprits. (Some have. God bless Canada for placing an embargo on the export of kayaks and maple syrup to Israel.) Without Americans (you and me, the taxpayers); Israel would not last a day in its brave battle against mothers and their babies. We could hobble Israel’s offensive by the imposition of sanctions and boycotts, by freezing Israeli assets worldwide, as was done to Russians. Arrest warrants could have been issued, as the International Criminal Court had for Russians.
In essence, stop murdering and maiming Palestinians, no conditions attached.
ANNIHILATION, NOT WAR
Israel’s war is not a war by any known definition ~ilana
A ceasefire is called upon in war. This is not a war.
Ceasefire is defined as “an agreement, usually between two armies, to stop fighting in order to allow discussions about peace.” Israel’s onslaught on Gaza is not a war by any definition. These are not two armies arrayed one against the other. This is no war between opposing warrior forces. There is no parity here.
If combat veteran Alan Shebaro, U.S. Special Forces, fails to convince you with his experience, I will follow with fact, law and reason. Listen to Shebaro tell it to a Texas City Council in McKinney:
“I know war. What is going on in Palestine right now is not a war. It is the dehumanization, it’s the genocide, it’s the ethnic cleansing of a specific people to take their land. This is wrong … I’ve seen horrible things, but this [Gaza] takes it to an entirely new level.”
Does any military man half-decent swallow the lie that, in its orgiastic annihilation of Gaza, Israel is fighting another army fair and square?!
Also a misnomer is the phrase “military operation.” It mocks out of meaning any linguistic convention that attaches words to the things they signify.
Valor was thus lost, not stolen, when, on October 24, 2023, Colonel Jack Jacobs, a retired US Army veteran—and a man who valiantly spoke up against the invasion of Iraq (ditto)—noodled on about Israel’s “expanding ground operations.” Once a principled voice, Colonel Jacobs lost respectability, right there, for there is no military operation an upstanding military man can get behind in Gaza, where easily 80 percent of the casualties are innocent civilians.
Hip to this last fact is U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. In a quickly retracted statement, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told Congress, on February 19, “that more than 25,000 women and children had been killed by Israel in Gaza since October 7.”
The Pentagon later “clarified” that estimate, insisting that, because the figure came from the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry, not U.S. intelligence; it was unreliable. During that February congressional hearing, Austin had been asked how many Palestinian women and children had been killed by Israel. “It is over 25,000,” he had reflexively blurted out: This, according to the Pentagon, was but a monetary lapse of reason.
“As they were turning Gaza into Dresden on TV, before our very eyes, Israel’s quicksilver state propagandists were also telling us, their American funders, that ‘this is not happening. …Who are you going to believe? Democratic Israel, or your ‘lying eyes’?’ I believe my ‘lying eyes,’ thank you very much. Those ‘lying eyes’ speak to the scale of Israel’s depredations against Gazans. … [And the numbers of dead, injured and displaced] are deemed ‘broadly reliable,’ by all reputable humanitarian, aid-rendering organizations worldwide, backed as they are by the science of satellite and radar.”
Let us indulge Secretary Austin’s already out-of-date estimate, in order to establish here that Israel’s “operation” is not a military operation behind which any military man worth his salt can stand:
Assume that 25,000 is the number of women and children murdered by Israelis, although it is more, not less, considering that thousands are buried beneath the rubble and more souls are being assassinated as we speak: To wit, in the 24 hours following the Security Councils’ vote, 76 Palestinians were murdered in Gaza.
IF 30,000 is the total—men and women, combatants and civilians—murdered heretofore; then women and childrenmake up 83.3 percent of this total. (25,000/30,000) *100
IF 32,000 is the total number of souls slain to date; then the percentage of women and children is 78.1. (25,000/32,000) *100
IF a total of 33,000 human beings were slaughtered; then the percentage of women and children among them is 75.5. (25,000/33,000) *100
And if the number killed rises to 35,000, as it has, and the number of women and children assassinated is, by some miracle, held constant—their percentage would still constitute (25000/35000) *100= 71.4.
Israel’s war is not a war by any definition.
Unctuous UN ultimatums notwithstanding, as of March 21, Netanyahu had vowed to continue his evil clown’s campaign—so “handsomely equipped to fail” I observed in November—executed by a corrupt, clownishly inept and consistently depraved army.
Why, then, are Israel’s 2023-2024 actions in Gaza genocidal?
WHY GENOCIDE
Four conditions of genocide fulfilled; not one law of war heeded: In the course of its genocidal campaign; Israel has violated every law of war codified in Customary International Humanitarian Law ~ilana
How do you compensate a people whose society you’ve cannibalized? ~ilana
“If you know in advance that your actions will cause the deaths of thousands-upon-thousands of civilians; attached to your criminal actions (actus reus) is a guilty mind (mens rea), which means malice aforethought, also known as intent, in Western jurisprudence and judicial philosophy.”
“The razing and ethnic cleansing of Gaza by Benjmain Netanyahu, abetted by Joe Biden and his Uniparty accomplices, in the course of which tens of thousands civilians are dying: This is murder with malice aforethought, a concept that includes ‘deaths resulting from actions that display a depraved indifference to life.‘ Further depraved indifference to life was Israel’s throttling of supplies of water, food and power to the millions of aid-dependent Gazans, as Israel knew full-well this would imperil civilians indirectly.”
More than industrial-scale mass murder of individual people—Israel is engaged in the eradication of Gazans as a People.
Objectively speaking, what Israel has visited on Gazans and their little enclave is not self-defense; but irreparable, wanton mass murder, a “blitzkrieg, by any other name,” combined with ethnic cleansing, and an orchestrated program of starvation against helpless civilians, who are still being indiscriminately and daily bombed, buried—alive and dead—evicted for life.
So says an international law consortium out of a Middlesex University London. So say countless reputable human rights organizations, who have submitted amicus briefs in American courts to enjoin President Biden, Secretary of State Blinken, and Secretary of Defense Austin from providing weapons and other forms of support for Israel’s Total War on Palestinian civilians in Gaza. Hoping to skirt jurisdictional limitations, “the U.S.-based Center for Constitutional Rights” has been joined by “an esteemed array of individuals and organizations from around the world, including 139 NGOs.”
Evidence of Israel’s trespass is everywhere.
As I write, raids on the Al Shifa hospital, begun on March 19, continue apace. As of March 22, Israel’sfourth raid on what remains of this hospital was in progress. Over 140 doctors, patients, journalists and other refugees had been summarily executed, reports the indefatigable Amy Goodman of “Democracy Now!” Thousands of refugees crammed into the hospital are currently being turned out, evicted.
All to “thwart terrorism.” Its missionary pursuit of murder in hospitals; Israel blankets with tidy lies.
Israel’s Hamas-made-me-do-it religious doctrine—this concealing of the truth for the faith—insults the intelligence. To listen to the Taqiyyah practiced by these Uncle Sam-sponsored Svengalis; “they are all terrorists.” Or “terrorist accomplices.” “Israel has effectively characterized the whole population in Gaza as human shields or terrorist accomplices as a matter of legal policy,” observed Francesca Albanese, speaking at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, where she presented her report, “Anatomy of a Genocide.” Ms. Albanese is a scholar, and a UN special rapporteur on the human-rights dispensation in the West Bank and Gaza. On March 27, she issued her report which found “reasonable grounds” to conclude that Israel is culpable of genocide in Gaza.
Gamely repeating Israel’s mantras; Matthew Miller, spokesperson for the United States Department of State, labeled and libeled Ms. Albanese as an “antisemite.” Yes, terrorism. Also, antisemitism if you disagree with Israel, or dare to disbelieve a country’s whose coin of the realm has become state terror.
On March 8, International Women’s Day, the United Nations detailed the warp and woof of survival as a woman in Gaza. At that time, 9000 Palestinian women had been slaughtered by the IDF; 63 women were being slain daily by the same force, including 37 mothers, each and every day.
While the women’s guerrilla movement, stateside, is galvanizing to go to the polls to ensure their right to evict fetuses from their wombs; Gaza’s women are fighting to keep their fully formed babies alive, fed, safe from unguided bunker-buster bombs lobbed by Israel, and provided by America.
Again: Around 80 percent of Gazans have been driven from their homes. More than 70 percent of structures in the Gaza Strip were reported demolished or damaged, three months ago by the Wall Street Journal. More current satellite radar is available, courtesy of researchers like Jamon Van Den Hoek. His March 13 mapped destruction via satellite reads thus:
IN North Gaza, 69.7 percent of buildings have been destroyed or damaged.
IN Gaza City, it’s 73.7 percent.
IN Deir El-Balah, it’s 54.1 percent.
IN Rafah, an Israeli “work” in progress, 29.5 percent of buildings have been destroyed or damaged.
Gazans have no residences or industries—no life-sustaining infrastructure—to return to upon the implementation of a permanent ceasefire. Gone are their homes, places of work and worship—businesses, agriculture, fisheries, food-production industries and the arable land attached. Gone are the roads, power plants, sanitation and drainage-works, water wells and wastewater treatment plants conduits of electricity, potable water, shelter and food distribution.
Mosques, churches and schools (primary, secondary, tertiary) have been vaporized. Most hospitals, too. Dr. Mads Gilbert, a Norwegian academic, clinician, and longtime volunteer in the occupied territories, speaks to “never-before-seen viciousness; sadism beyond evil.” Gaza had a network of European-style, teaching hospitals, where evidence-based medicine was practiced. Out of over 30 such hospitals, about four remain in tatters. Hundreds of the Strip’s top healthcare providers, who served heroically until hit, have been murdered, often while ministering to patients. The Palestinians of Gaza are now perishing from sepsis, curable and treatable diseases, starvation and dehydration, overseen by Israel. (According to Gisha, which means access.)
Lost with Gaza’s infrastructure is the very fabric of a society—immeasurable human capital—including indissoluble, extended-family networks, the kind of generational bonds we in the West can only dream of, whittled down and depleted in numbers and in their native energy. A people’s cemeteries and archived history have been decimated, their antiquities and artifacts bulldozed and pillaged; their universities flattened; their artists and intellectuals hunted from house to house and extinguished.
Broken, Tariq Haddad, MD, an American cardiologist, told of 100 members of his extended family eliminated. Images of beautiful people, in the full flowering of their vitality (most were highly educated) flashed across the “Democracy Now!” broadcast’s screen. In February, Dr. Nasser Abu-El-Noor, dean of the Faculty of Nursing at the Islamic University of Gaza, along with seven members of his family, sheltering in their home, were murdered. Dr. Medhat Saidam, a renowned plastic surgeon, is buried beneath a building.
Were the High Court in the Hague ever to do its job and engage forensic electronics to that end—it could easily trace the psychological warfare waged, say, against Dr. Refaat Alareer. He had figured out that, “There’s nowhere safe in Gaza, so he chose to stay in his house.” By guerrilla journalist Max Blumenthal’s telling, Alareer and family were sadistically hounded, telephonically, by IDF officers, as they fled from one abode to the next. The IDF finally assassinated he and six members of his family. Myself, I followed a young journalist , Ayat Al Khaddour, who vlogged heroically from her home in Gaza until she was no more, stopped by an IDF-lobbed “precision” bomb, along with members of her family.
Israel has clearly and systematically eliminated the human capital of Gaza in ways diabolically purposeful, irreparable and unforgivable. The best of Gaza are gone; entire Palestinian family trees truncated forever. Why purposeful? Just as the U.S.-backed Israeli military knows the precise azimuths of their targets, including that of the assassinated Refaat Alareer—in the same vein do Israelis have the GPS coordinates of “major infrastructure projects funded by the U.S. government.” These, reports the Associated Press, have been largely spared.
All this is what Article II of the Genocide Convention means by clause number four: “Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.” (Amnesty International: Genocide: The Legal Basis For Universal Jurisdiction.)
To Israel’s rap sheet add at least three additional genocidal actions stipulated in Article II of the Genocide Convention, perpetrated “with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group” (Ibid). These are:
* Killing members of the group.
* Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group.
* Direct and public incitement to commit genocide.
As after the Holocaust, responsibility for decent reparations—Israelis to the Palestinians of Gaza—will need to be worked out. But how do you compensate a people whose society you’ve cannibalized?
EVERY LAW OF WAR VIOLATED
Genocide is a process, not an act. It is the destruction of a population from its roots ~Francesca Albanese
Four conditions of genocide fulfilled; not one law of war obeyed. In the course of its genocidal campaign; Israel has violated every law of war, codified in Customary International Humanitarian Law:
‘Launching an attack which may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated, is prohibited.’ (Jean-Marie Henckaerts and Louise Doswald-Beck, Customary International Humanitarian Law, 2012, Cambridge University Press, 2012)
‘The undisputed cornerstone of international humanitarian law (IHL) is the principle of distinction between civilians and combatants, which obliges belligerents to distinguish at all times between persons who may be lawfully attacked, and persons who must be spared and protected from the effects of the hostilities. In order to avoid any ambiguity, these two categories of persons must be mutually exclusive…’ (Ibid)
‘In the conduct of military operations, constant care must be taken to spare the civilian population, civilians and civilian objects. All feasible precautions must be taken to avoid, and in any event to minimize, incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects.’ (Jean-Marie Henckaerts and Louise Doswald-Beck, Customary International Humanitarian Law (2012), Cambridge University Press, 2012)
Only neolithic beasts like Jonathan Conricus or IDF mouth Keren Hajioff, former IDF spokesmen for Israel’s war of annihilation in Gaza, would have the gall to praise the care uniformed IDF take with human life. In case you’ve missed these Israeli bulwark bureaucrats, Conricus and Hajioff are now fellows at the American Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington, D.C., as a perusal of the FDD member page would indicate. Following stints in which these two mindlessly chorused for and covered up the goings-on in Gaza—the two have migrated to an American “think tank,” likely promoting the interests of entities not the United States, and overriding the balancing forces of regionalism in the Middle East.
Still, nothing excites shame in Israeli leaders. Very many of them, including the prime minister, have called on IDF soldiers to show no mercy. This, International Law forbids. Quaintly put, prohibited are “directions to give no quarter,” as in “threatening an adversary therewith or conducting hostilities on this basis.” Prohibited.
“Genocide is a process, not an act,” explains Francesca Albanese. It is the “destruction of a population from its roots.” Lara Elborno, another articulate human-rights lawyer, has ventured the following clincher, and I paraphrase:
Had Israel not dropped a single bomb on Gaza, but had done no more than cut off food, water and electricity to its 2.3 million residents—these action alone would suffice to constitute genocide under the treaties.
RAFAH
Devil stretches; devil flexes ~Hilary Mantel
In its ravening appetite for destruction, Israeli leadership had explicitly indicated that it would “not relent in [its] assault on the Gaza Strip until they’ve effectively accomplished the destruction of the entire strip. And their attacks now on Rafah, in particular, demonstrate that the last refuge, the last piece of the Gaza Strip that hasn’t been effectively destroyed, is not only in their sights, but already under their bombs.” (Criag Mokhiber, “Democracy Now!,” March 26)
According to Customary International Humanitarian Law, cited so far, “Directing an attack against a zone established to shelter the wounded, the sick and civilians from the effects of hostilities is prohibited.” (Jean-Marie Henckaerts and Louise Doswald-Beck, Customary International Humanitarian Law (2012), Cambridge University Press, 2012, Chapter 11 – Protected Zones)
In truth, it was mid-February when the Israel Defense Forces had commenced its onslaught on 1.5 million Palestinian refugees, who had been corralled from the north to the south, and now huddle helplessly in Raffah.
Israeli leadership, political and other, pollute the ear with an unbroken stream of genocide-justification jargon. The barbaric nature of their discourse complements their army’s actions. “Conspicuous and ostentatious” about their depredations; the uniformed IDF appear proud to revel in terrorizing and murdering Palestinian civilians forsaken. In general, YouTube runs cover for the IDF. Still, there are countless videos of nauseating brutality, in which IDF soldiers vaporize young men picking their way through rubble, as though in a video game; they mock their victims, invade their homes; filch from their businesses, and rummage through the piteous intimate effects of people dead and dispossessed. Other acts of defilement are too lewd to recount. (See BBC News’ “Israeli soldier videos from Gaza could breach international law, experts say.” Or, watch the Glenn Greenwald’s “Shocking IDF Social Media Videos Mock Gazans—Expose New Atrocities.”)
GOOD PEOPLE: GALLOWAY & BUSHNELL
Wars are a rich man’s affair and a poor man’s fight ~ilana
How many generations of young people can you raise on Big Lies—such as that Israel and its sugar daddy are prosecuting a fair, legitimate war, rather than waging Total War against innocent civilians? ~ilana
“Genocide Joe” and the foreign agents knowns as the “American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), whose Israel-First focus makes them a fifth column; Trump with Jared Kushner and his better-half: These are America’s 2024 election options.
The Biden-AIPAC bloc has begun whispering sweet nothings in the ears of Benny Gantz (National Unity Party), ostensible rival of Bibi Netanyahu (Likud). The AIPAC-run Biden bloc would like you to believe that a chasm in “Israel’s wartime leadership” has opened up. Biden’s bedroom talk with Benny is intended to impress upon the two squalid Jewish supremacists the danger of approaching some sort of political precipice. In the end, Netanyahu and Gantz, who both officiate in their country’s War Cabinet, are philosophically one, inseparable, spherical Gluteus Maximus.
Or, “two flapping cheeks of the same ass,” in George Galloway’s delightfully ribald language. Galloway was describing the political amalgam arrayed against truth and justice in the United Kingdom. As I noted in 2005, Galloway is a master flyter: the ancient Scottish form of invective for which a quick mind and a masterful command of the English language are a must.
Galloway’s capacity for extemporaneous verbal swordplay is not the only thing that distinguishes this jousting member of the British parliament. MP Gallaway and his Worker’s Party ran on foreign policy, in Rochdale, UK, and, in particular, he secured “thumping majorities” in a protest vote for Gaza—and against our overlords, stateside and in Israel, whose new norm is to be out-and-proud about genocide.
There will be flyting words aplenty to come.
The normalization of genocide is what US Airman Aaron Bushnell was protesting when he set himself alight, February 28. Airman Aaron Bushnell, of blessed memory, self-immolated to protest that upon which Galloway secured his victory in Rochdale: Israel’s war on Gaza.
Bushnell died horrifically, yet heroically, like a man—calm and rational—as he recited his reason for self-immolation: “I will no longer be complicit in genocide. This is what our ruling class has decided is the new normal.” Airman Bushnell was driven not by mental disease, but by a morally depraved society that supports de facto terrorist state Israel, with American moral imprimatur, its money and materiel.
Wars are a rich man’s affair and a poor man’s fight. American soldiers have always served as collateral damage in the nefarious projects of Uncle Sam and client states. Their causes and concerns, unless jingoistic and Fox-News friendly, seldom rate a mention. But, following Aaron Bushnell’s demise; many members of our military symbolically burned their uniforms in disgust, only to be mocked by Conservative Inc (or ConOink, as I call them). But they are right, and “this is wrong,” inveighed Alan Shebaro. “There’s nothing more American than speaking out against what’s wrong.” Like elite soldier Alan Shebaro, “Bushnell decried U.S. complicity in the Gaza genocide.”
At its core, what Bushnell was protesting is something even-more fundamental. For words are symbols. They are used as agreed-upon conventions to make sense of the world. What happens when these shared linguistic constructs no longer correspond to the things they are supposed to describe? Bushnell, who was in-the-know militarily, must have grown angrier and angrier as the symbols his society deploys clashed with the reality these symbols were supposed to signify. Particularly did he appear susceptible to the schizophrenogenic communications transmitted, on an ongoing basis, by the many Orwellian Ministries of Truth.
For how many generations of young people can you raise on Big Lies—such as that Israel and its sugar daddy are prosecuting a fair, legitimate war, rather than waging Total War against innocent civilians? Total War is a term to describe an all-out war against any and all. “What I saw was not war, but annihilation,” lamented Dr. Ifran Galaria, volunteer in Gaza, to MSNBC’s Joy Reid.
CALIGULA KUSHNER
Jared Kushner, the nepotistic scion of a dodgy New York realtor, and an empty husk of a man, is coveting the waterfront property of a conquered and dying people ~ilana
These days, “bloody Blinken, secretary of genocide”—a moniker given to him by the grand ladies of “Code Pink,” who have camped out at the Blinken mansion—has been coming and going to the Middle East. In dizzy rapture over Israel, Blinken shuttles to-and-fro on missions to smooth over Israel’s assault on Gaza; make it more genteel, more sellable.
Sellable as Jared Kushner assesses “Gaza’s waterfront property” to be.
With the fey charm of a state-cutter—a coroner—preparing to carve a corpse; philosopher-king Kushner shrugged a slender shoulder, as he languidly mused:
‘I’m sitting in Miami Beach right now, and I’m looking at the situation [in Gaza] and I’m thinking: What would I do if I was there? … I would just bulldoze something in the Negev, I would try to move people in there … I think that’s a better option, so you can go in and finish the job. … 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.’
This waterfront property “could be very valuable” Kushner let slip, on February 15, to an audience at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government’s Middle East Initiative.
Crooked Kushner, you recall, had been Trump’s point person on foreign policy, the Middle East and much else. Little Lord Fauntleroy had even been entrusted with “preparing a peace plan for the Middle East.”
That Kushner had been invited to regale an audience at an elite American university is all you need to know about the intellectual and moral tenor of discourse in the USA. In this repulsive vignette, Jared Kushner, the nepotistic scion of a dodgy New York realtor, and an empty husk of a man, is coveting the waterfront property of a conquered and dying people.
For once, America’s Fourth Column (media) was in the peculiar position of covering up and finessing Kushner’s unfiltered remarks. After all, his position is that of the legacy media and their political paymasters.
BILL CLINTON: ‘WHO’S THE F–KING SUPERPOWER HERE?’
Gaza is a desert of the dead and the dying. Let the American Super Power ride to the rescue ~ilana
Israel’s contempt for the United States is complete.
Unsatisfied with his butcher’s bill in Gaza, demiurge Netanyahu had, at first, cancelled Israel’s delegation to Washington, furious that the United States of America failed to veto a UN ceasefire proposal.
“After his first meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in 1996,” recounts Patrick Theros, of “Responsible Statecraft,” “Bill Clinton vented his fury before his staff about his visitor’s apparent presumptions about the balance of power in the bilateral relationship. ‘Who the f–k does he think he is?’ Clinton reportedly bellowed. ‘Who’s the f–king superpower here?’”
Indeed.
Gaza is a desert of the dead and the dying. Israel, however, is miring humanitarian aid in capriciously sadistic paperwork and protocol. An example is their “dual-purpose” doctrine: “Did you know that syringes, desperately stuck in Palestinian veins deflated by dehydration, can be dual-purpose items?” Yeah! Used for terrorism, found in the tunnels, the lot.
If you can believe it, our “allies” the Israelis are hindering the delivery of American aid to Gaza.
Come again?! You heard me. It now transpires that, in thrall to Bibi Netanyahu, the “Super Power” is planning to construct a floating pier—a run-around around the Israelis, who had also, long ago, tampered with Gaza’s little port, situated as it was, once-upon-a-time, “near the Remal district of Gaza City,” of blessed memory.
Commensurate with Israel’s outrageous excesses, and the crazed riffs coming out of Israeli heads; Israel has established itself as a war criminal. By letting the blood of Palestinians for six months, and showing no intention of letting up; Israel has forfeited its right to protest decisive American intervention. Besides, he who pays the piper calls the tune.
Under present conditions, a president who spoke like President Clinton might have made Americans proud. For once, the American Super Power could entertain ordering shabby little Israel, convulsing in paroxysms of evil, to cease and desist.
As easily, and after ordering Israel to stand down; America could… commandeer Israel’s Sde Dov or Ben Gurion Airport. Or, both. This is an emergency.
Fleets of our assorted military and cargo 747 aircraft would land like angels at an Israeli airport adjacent to Gaza.
Into Northern Gaza would rush these life-saving American trailer trucks, carrying supplies and sustenance for the starving.
Down would go Israel’s fences and in would flow non-stop supplies, as though on a loop.
Landing in and delivering life-saving supplies from a well-appointed Israeli facility into northern Gaza, and throughout the Strip: This is the fastest and smartest way to succor a dying people.
Instead, America chooses to fellate Bibi NetanYahoo, his barking mad military and their berserk countrymen, 88 percent of whom “give a positive assessment of the performance of the IDF in Gaza until now. (Tamar Hermann, “War in Gaza Survey 9,” Israel Democracy Institute, January 24, 2024), 58 percent of whom grumble that not enough force has been deployed to date; and 68 percent of whom say “they do not support the transfer of humanitarian aid to Gaza.”
Ilana Mercer has been writing a weekly, paleolibertarian think piece since 1999. Her new book is ‘The Paleolibertarian Guide To Deep Tech, Deep Pharma & The Aberrant Economy’(February, 2024). She’s the author of “Into the Cannibal’s Pot: Lessons for America From Post-Apartheid South Africa” (2011)), and other books. Mercer is described as “a system-builder. Distilled, her modus operandi has been to methodically apply first principles to the day’s events.”
A new report says the administration of US President Joe Biden has authorized the transfer of billions of dollars in bombs and fighter jets to Israel in recent days amid the regime’s genocidal war against the Palestinians in Gaza.
Pentagon and State Department officials said the new arms packages include more than 1800 bombs, The Washington Post reported.
According to the report, these are 2000-pound devices that can demolish entire city blocks and are rarely used in populated areas. Israel, however, has used them extensively in Gaza.
Some Democrats, including allies of President Biden, say the US government has a responsibility to withhold weapons in the absence of an Israeli commitment to limit civilian casualties during a planned operation in Rafah, and ease restrictions on humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, which is on the brink of famine.
“The Biden administration needs to use their leverage effectively and, in my view, they should receive these basic commitments before greenlighting more bombs for Gaza,” Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said in an interview. “We need to back up what we say with what we do.”
Last week, the State Department also authorized the transfer of 25 F-35 fighter jets and engines to Israel.
Earlier reports said the US had quietly made more than 100 weapons sales to Israel since the onslaught on Gaza began on October 7.
The arms supplies go against the US call for a ceasefire in Gaza.
A new report says the administration of US President Joe Biden has authorized the transfer of billions of dollars in bombs and fighter jets to Israel in recent days amid the regime’s genocidal war against the Palestinians in Gaza.
Pentagon and State Department officials said the new arms packages include more than 1800 bombs, The Washington Post reported.
According to the report, these are 2000-pound devices that can demolish entire city blocks and are rarely used in populated areas. Israel, however, has used them extensively in Gaza.
Some Democrats, including allies of President Biden, say the US government has a responsibility to withhold weapons in the absence of an Israeli commitment to limit civilian casualties during a planned operation in Rafah, and ease restrictions on humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, which is on the brink of famine.
“The Biden administration needs to use their leverage effectively and, in my view, they should receive these basic commitments before greenlighting more bombs for Gaza,” Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said in an interview. “We need to back up what we say with what we do.”
Last week, the State Department also authorized the transfer of 25 F-35 fighter jets and engines to Israel.
Earlier reports said the US had quietly made more than 100 weapons sales to Israel since the onslaught on Gaza began on October 7.
The arms supplies go against the US call for a ceasefire in Gaza.
Israel began hostilities in Gaza on October 7 after the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas carried out Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the usurping entity in retaliation for the regime’s intensified atrocities against the Palestinian people.
The regime has also cut off fuel, electricity, food, and water to the more than two million Palestinians living there.
Israel has killed more than 32,500 Palestinians and injured nearly 75,000 others in Gaza since the October day.
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On the 172nd day of the Israeli aggression on Gaza, the war continues to escalate. As the holy month of Ramadan enters its 16th day, Israeli bombings persist across various areas of the Gaza Strip, causing numerous casualties. Yesterday, a devastating attack on the Abu Hasira family home near the Shifa Medical Complex in western Gaza resulted in 30 fatalities.
Grieving family members bid a sorrowful farewell to their loved ones killed by Israeli airstrikes in Rafah. pic.twitter.com/a1vO3fSLRs
At dawn today, as a house housing displaced individuals in the northern region of Rafah, in southern Gaza, was destroyed, claiming the lives of 15 people, including 4 children, and leaving dozens injured. The Israeli occupation forces targeted residents in the Saudi neighborhood, west of Rafah, killing one Palestinian and injuring others. Ambulance crews faced difficulties in transporting the seriously wounded victims due to the airstrikes carried out by Israeli warplanes.
15 Palestinians killed in an Israeli airstrike on the Abu Nuqira family home in the Musabah area, north of Rafah pic.twitter.com/hn6kFpwY6v
More martyrs were reported in Rafah when the Israeli occupation forces targeted a house near the Stars Stadium in the Musabah area, resulting in multiple fatalities. The Israeli bombings were not limited to Rafah; a house was also bombed in the Birkat al-Waz area in the central Gaza Strip’s Maghazi camp. Additionally, Deir al-Balah, another city in central Gaza, was subjected to airstrikes by Israeli warplanes.
Yesterday evening, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society disclosed that the Society’s Al-Amal Hospital in Khan Yunis, located in the southern region of the Gaza Strip, had been forced to suspend operations. Israeli occupation forces compelled the hospital staff and wounded patients to evacuate the premises and blocked its entrances with dirt barriers.
Palestinians inspect the remains of the Abu Nuqaira family home in Rafah, southern Gaza, which was bombed by Israeli fighter jets killing 17 Palestinian civilians inside. pic.twitter.com/BnTHpFWrbV
The Israeli aggression against Gaza began on October 7th, 2021, and has resulted in a devastating toll. More than 32,000 Palestinians, predominantly children and women, have lost their lives, with over 74,000 sustaining injuries. Thousands of victims remain trapped under rubble, inaccessible to rescue teams due to the occupation’s obstruction, exacerbating an already dire humanitarian crisis.
This mother from Gaza City has made the tough decision to leave her war-torn home near Al Shifa Medical Complex and head south.
Her triplets, born just two months before the Israeli aggression began, are now 8 months old and weigh a mere 2 kilos each. pic.twitter.com/XIeUFNnQvL
UN Security Council Demands Immediate Gaza Ceasefire
While the situation worsens, the UN Security Council adopted a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, specifically during the month of Ramadan, and called on all parties to abide by it. Notably, the United States refrained from using its veto power but abstained from voting on the resolution. US declined to include an amendment calling for a permanent ceasefire in the draft.
Media Coverage: Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu cancels the Israeli delegation's visit to Washington in response to the US not vetoing the Security Council resolution for a ceasefire in Gaza during Ramadan.
In response, the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) squarely placed the blame on the Israeli occupation, accusing it of hindering negotiations and obstructing the path to an agreement. Hamas reiterated its commitment to the vision it presented on March 14th.
Intense clashes between the resistance and Israeli occupation forces near Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza city. pic.twitter.com/Ln7O1vOx7g
Amidst these developments, the Palestinian resistance continued its operations against the occupation throughout Gaza. Simultaneously, Israeli Minister Gideon Sa’ar tendered his resignation, which opposition leader Yair Lapid interpreted as a potential first step toward dissolving Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.
In a devastating Israeli raid on the north of Rafah, south of the Gaza Strip, today at dawn, five Palestinians, including innocent children, were killed and several others were left injured. The occupation’s aircraft mercilessly bombarded an inhabited two-story house in the Mirage area, resulting in this loss of life.
Five civilians were killed last night in the Israeli occupation's bombing of a house for the Kawarea family, south of Khan Yunis. They five are:
▫️Nadia Hassan Kawarea, 65 years old. ▫️Abdullah Raafat Jouda, 9 years old. ▫️Revan Raafat Jouda, 3 years old. ▫️Tallin Raafat Jouda,… pic.twitter.com/JfkcUU81Wk
Adding to the horrors, Israeli gunboats fired their artillery towards areas west of Rafah, while the occupation’s artillery bombed the town of Al-Qarara, north of Khan Yunis, further escalating the violence in the already war-stricken region.
Israeli tanks storm the outskirts of the town of Al-Qarara, north of Khan Yunis, amid gunfire. pic.twitter.com/yZBwO3h9fW
At dawn on Saturday, clashes and artillery shelling renewed on the vicinity of Al-Shifa Medical Complex
The occupation forces bombed with artillery northwest of Beit Hanoun and the vicinity of Jabalia camp in the north of the Gaza Strip, and north of Nuseirat camp in the center of the Gaza Strip.
The IOF siege on Al-Shifa Hospital Continues:
• 240 patients, those accompanying them, and dozens of healthcare workers detained
Yesterday, the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza announced, in its daily statistical report, that the death toll from the ongoing Israeli aggression on the Strip had risen to 32,070 martyrs and 74,298 injuries, on the 168th day of the ongoing aggression, since October 7, 2023.
Yesterday a woman had to carry 3 babies towards Central Gaza after being forced to flee by foot when the IOF laid siege on Al-Shifa Hospital in Northern Gaza. pic.twitter.com/wv8ySQ7756
The Ministry said that the occupation forces committed 9 massacres against civilians in the Gaza Strip, of which 82 martyrs and 110 injuries reached hospitals during the past 24 hours.
In Gaza City, this newborn was found on the sidewalk after her family's home was bombed by the Israeli occupation.
As Al-Shifa Hospital remains under siege, the newborn had to be transported to Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital for treatment. pic.twitter.com/t4BycIaZHH
The Israeli occupation army has issued new displacement orders to the residents of the Al-Rimal neighborhood in Gaza City. This comes as the elderly population faces the threat of death due to the worsening circumstances in the region. The situation has prompted Euro-Med to warn against Israel’s continuous attempts to empty Gaza City and the northern areas, pushing residents to forcibly move towards the south.
BREAKING | Israeli military vehicles are penetrating the tents of the displaced in the so-called "safe zone" of the Mawasi al-Qarara area, north of Khan Yunis, and civilians' are fleeing towards the west on the seashore. pic.twitter.com/cEGkOyl7pw
Under these displacement orders, all residents and displaced individuals in Al-Rimal neighborhood and nearby Al-Shifa Hospital have been instructed to immediately evacuate to the west, then proceed via Al-Rashid (Al-Bahr) Street towards the humanitarian zone in Al-Mawasi, located in the southern part of the Strip.
The consequences of this forced displacement, combined with military operations targeting civilians, the ongoing siege, and deprivation of basic necessities of life, are severe. The majority of the affected population is already grappling with the spread of famine due to the blockade, making the situation even more precarious.
Amidst these challenges, “The Hospice” has emerged as the sole refuge for the people of central and northern Gaza to obtain food. The distribution tents set up by this charitable organization are now the last hope for hundreds of families to satisfy their hunger and feed their children.
Despite the need, self-esteem wins
A Palestinian girl was collecting the remains of firewood to use in cooking for her family since they hadn't gas for cooking or money to buy firewood. Nonetheless, she refused to take aid money. pic.twitter.com/9wMYofUS2q
Recent reports on food security in the Gaza Strip have predicted an imminent famine in the northern part of the region. It is expected to occur between now and May, affecting approximately 300,000 people residing in the two northern governorates.
Internationally, the French Ambassador to the United Nations, Ambassador Nicolas de Rivière, has stressed the urgency for the UN Security Council to take further action in response to the worsening situation in Gaza. France intends to present new proposals to the Council, following their support for the American draft resolution on the Gaza war. The Ambassador called for a comprehensive respect for international law, the opening of crossing points for aid shipments, and voiced opposition to the Israeli incursion into Rafah.
I had an interesting discussion last week with a Washington-based political pundit who expressed some what I thought to be eccentric views on possible developments in the presidential campaign over the next six months. He said that that strange little man Jared Kushner is at it again engaged in secret meetings, but this time he is being promoted as a possible Vice-Presidential candidate to run alongside his father-in-law ex-president Donald Trump. Reportedly, he is being pushed by a number of hard right ardently pro-Israel Republican Senators, to include folks like Lindsay Graham and Ted Cruz, who are arguing that it would solve the loyalty issue for his father-in-law, a major concern for Trump given the perceived betrayal by ex-VP Mike Pence. Kushner would also be on the right side of a number of issues that Republican conservatives feel strongly about, most certainly including Israel. And, bear in mind, if a seventy-eight year old Donald Trump were to be re-elected and not finish his full term of office, Kushner would be his successor and the first Jewish president of the United States. You can bet that there are some people out there with long memories and deep pockets who might be longing for just that.
Now, given the fact that Kushner was Trump’s Senior Adviser and the one thing that nearly everyone agrees about the Donald was that his judgement on picking senior staff was flawed – one recalls names like Bolton and Pompeo – and would hardly be a credential for moving onward and upward, but it does nevertheless seem that some might actually be considering the possibility. And it is also true that Kushner brings almost nothing beyond name recognition to the ticket, but that is also the case for a number of other possible candidates for the position. Unlike most identified VP candidates, however, Kushner also would arrive with a considerable quantity of baggage. It is reported that when he was first named by Trump it proved to be difficult for him to get a security clearance, even with the president’s highly aggressive endorsement. This was possibly due to the activities of Jared’s father Charles Kushner who was a felon imprisoned in 2005-7 for business fraud to include illegal political contributions, tax evasion and witness tampering. The prosecuting United States Attorney for the District of New Jersey who handled the case was Chris Christie, later the governor of New Jersey and himself a presidential candidate. The witness tampering charge arose from Kushner’s retaliation against William Schulder, his sister Esther’s husband, who was cooperating with federal investigators against Kushner. Kushner hired a prostitute to seduce his brother-in-law, arranged to record a sexual encounter between the two, and had the tape sent to his sister. Donald Trump controversially pardoned Charles after the fact at the end of his term of office in 2020 together with a number of other Jewish businessmen who were on a list compiled by Jared.
Or, alternatively, the bad security review might have related to Jared’s family’s the Kushner Foundation which was funding completely illegal Israeli settlements in Palestine among its other activities. Since 2020, Kushner has also reportedly been heavily involved with Saudi Arabia, which has apparently benefited Kushner’s equity firm business interests to the tune of $2 billion.
Kushner and his wife might well be considered a footnote to history, minor players, but for the possibility that Jared might somehow connive his way into a position with real power if Donald Trump is re-elected, but he is in the news right now for other reasons. People forget that quite a lot of what goes on vis-à-vis Israel is driven by what might be called the “profit motive,” which admittedly might be considered a play on the word “prophet.” It all comes down to how much money will be generated once the Palestinians are kicked out of Gaza and the West Bank, just for starters. Kushner has recently revealed his own vision of successful conclusion of the war for Israel in an interview on February 15thplus additional comments and it goes like this: the Gazans should be removed from their homes and those who are still alive and who have not been repatriated to other countries including Sinai in Egypt, might be allowed to reside in a suitable refugee camp style location in the Negev desert, inside southern Israel. How exactly they will survive in a desert is not clear as Israel has no excess water resources to “make the desert bloom” as the expression goes. As Kushner explains how “… getting civilians out of Rafah and potentially into Egypt, might be possible ‘with the right diplomacy,’” suggesting that he “would just bulldoze something in the Negev, I would try to move people in there,” adding “I know that won’t be the popular thing to do, but I think that’s a better option to do, so you can go in and finish the job.” In his comments Kushner also demonstrated that he is delusional, commenting that “I think Israel’s gone way more out of their way than a lot of other countries would, to try to protect civilians from casualties.” More to the point, one has to suspect that Kushner’s views might well reflect those of Trump, who has called on Israel to “finish it up [in Gaza] and do it quickly.”
Israel meanwhile, one supposes, can get international donors like the US to pay for the cleanup of Gaza and it could be developed to provide luxurious seafront properties for Israeli and international Jewish buyers, which would produce substantial income for the government and also for investors like Kushner. He said that “Gaza’s waterfront property, it could be very valuable, if people would focus on building up livelihoods.. If you think about all the money that’s gone into this tunnel network and into all the munitions, if that would have gone into education or innovation, what could have been done? It’s a little bit of an unfortunate situation there, but I think from Israel’s perspective, I would do my best to move the people out and then clean it up.”
It might seem like a screwy idea but it is certainly not beyond the rapaciousness and cruelty that the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is certainly capable of. And it would be a substantial step towards getting completely rid of the pesky Palestinians. There have been independent reports that real estate dealers in Israel are already framing tentative offers for dividing up the more desirable bits of Gaza land, particularly along the Mediterranean Sea. The sales would be for Jews only since part of the desirability of the ethnic cleansing would be to turn Israel into as close as possible an all-Jewish state, which is favored by most Israelis, including expectation of an influx of presumably wealthy diaspora Jews who opt to make their “Aliyah” in a more substantive way.
It is interesting to note how the thinking of Jared Kushner is possibly in sync with the intentions of many Israelis and foreign Jews, but there is also additional evidence that more stolen Palestinian land and houses will soon be up on the auction block for purchase by Jews only worldwide. In early March there was held a so-called “Israeli Real Estate Event” at synagogues and Jewish community centers in Canada, New York state and New Jersey. Though one event was canceled due to fear of demonstrators, the Israeli brokers were selling houses and building lots in Israel, to include the West Bank, most of which were “acquired” by force or through illegal contrivance from their original Arab owners. The advertising for the sales stated boldly that “In a world where uncertainty looms and antisemitism shows its ugly face more boldly than ever, the decision to invest in a home in Israel is not just wise—it’s exhilarating!” The “Events” took place even though it is illegal in the US and Canada to restrict house or land sales to one particular religion or ethnic group.
Finally, the suggestion that a lot of the thinking about whither Gaza is possibly being driven by money comes from the tale of the Ben Gurion Canal Project and the reports of multi-billion dollar oil and gas reserves offshore of Gaza in the Mediterranean Sea. The Ben Gurion project has long been mooted as a way to create an Israel controlled alternative to the existing Suez Canal. It would be a navigable canal connecting the Mediterranean and Red Sea that would run through Gaza and down Israel, ending at the Gulf of Aqaba near Eilat. The oil and gas reserves have been verified though they have been inaccessible as long as Gaza has been in Palestinian hands even though the Israelis control the waters, regularly shooting Palestinian fisherman who venture too far from shore. Both the energy resources and total control of a ship canal would be enormous economic assets for Israel. Putting all of that together with the Kushner plan and those business ventures by other Israelis one would be remiss if dismissing the possibility that future development in those areas is really all about money.
All eyes are on Rafah as Israel prepares to mount an invasion to expel Palestinians or decimate them. It is this pivotal battle that will either force Israel into a ceasefire or thrust the region into an all-out, multi-front war.
The temporary truce struck on 24 November between the Hamas resistance movement and the Israeli government could have paved the way toward successive truces and potentially a sustainable ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
But the opportunity was squandered by Tel Aviv, who viewed the continuation of its genocidal war as a means to reshape Gaza’s political and security landscape under the guise of ‘restoring deterrence’ and mitigating domestic fallout from Hamas’ 7 October Al-Aqsa Flood Operation.
Now, nearly six months since the commencement of what Israel calls a ‘war of survival and existence’ against Gaza, it has become clear that the occupation state’s military aggression cannot unseat Hamas from either the Strip or the broader Palestinian political arena.
The recent flurry of indirect Hamas–Israel negotiations held in Paris, Cairo, and Doha have revealed a stark political reality: Hamas is the primary Palestinian negotiating party where Gaza is concerned. This tacit acknowledgment by Tel Aviv marks the strategic failure of one of Israel’s dual objectives set forth last October, aimed at eradicating Hamas and its allied resistance factions in the Strip.
Bibi’s political interests v domestic backlash
This reality raises questions about the potential pathways available to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as he struggles with immense international pressure to stop the carnage. Will he persist with the war on Gaza and risk global pariah status, or will he be compelled to pursue a politically costly settlement? The latter option, it should be noted, will not be an easy fix. It could potentially unleash a storm of domestic backlash within Israel, with various political factions eager to hold him accountable from multiple angles.
Since Netanyahu abandoned the truce in November, prominent Israeli political commentators and even former prime ministers have been surprisingly unanimous in their assessment. They argue that Netanyahu’s decision to prolong the war serves mainly his personal political interests, allowing him to project an illusion of victory while evading political, security, and judicial scrutiny.
Accordingly, Netanyahu’s stance remains firmly opposed to a war settlement. He has instead doubled down on the necessity of eliminating the military capabilities of Hamas and its allies, and is ostensibly pursuing an ‘absolute victory’ through total war.
The prime minister’s roadmap hinges on continuing the ethnic cleansing of Gaza. In this scenario, he envisions the Battle of Rafah as the decisive climax that will definitively render the already terminal ‘two-state solution’ obsolete and permanently sever any ties between Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
The Battle of Rafah thus emerges as a pivotal juncture, delineating two competing trajectories: one driven by regional and international efforts towards a negotiated settlement, and the other dictated solely by Netanyahu’s ambitions.
Regional ramifications and Egypt’s dilemma
This raises complex questions about whether Netanyahu can prolong the war and influence regional and international actors – to buy time, if you will – all while factoring in the delicate balance of power involving Egypt and the wider regional war against other members of the Axis of Resistance.
Indeed, the Battle of Rafah presents a multi-level challenge for Egypt, encompassing political, security, and popular dimensions. Should the Israeli army invade Rafah, it will have significant implications for Cairo’s relations with Tel Aviv, in addition to severely impacting Egypt’s domestic security landscape.
A recent poll by the Washington Institute for Near East Studies revealed that three-quarters of Egyptians view Hamas positively. This popular sentiment influences Egyptian policy regarding potential Israeli actions in Rafah.
On 10 March, TheNew York Times and Wall Street Journal reported warnings from Egyptian officials on the potential suspension of the Camp David Accords if Israel were to attack Rafah.
Diaa Rashwan, head of the Egyptian Information Service, emphasized the seriousness of Israel’s occupation of the Philadelphi Corridor – a buffer zone on the Sinai–Gaza border designated by the Camp David agreement – stating it poses a grave threat to Cairo–Tel Aviv relations.
Dealing with the potential mass influxes of Gazan civilians seeking refuge and Palestinian fighters crossing into Egyptian territory also poses significant logistical and security challenges. This scenario also raises questions about the Israeli army’s potential incursions into Egyptian territory and how the Egyptian military would respond.
Moreover, any intensification of pressure on Rafah or a full-scale Israeli invasion will lead to widespread regional ramifications, potentially including the unraveling of the Abraham Accords. The Axis of Resistance has made it clear that the elimination of Hamas is unacceptable and, if threatened, may trigger a regional war.
Complicating matters further is the lack of substantive US pressure on Israel to halt its actions in Gaza. While the Biden White House seeks a ‘credible operational plan,’ it has not unequivocally opposed an attack on Rafah. This ambivalence enables and even emboldens Netanyahu to continue his military operations.
Rafah could reshape the region
Regardless of the outcome of the Battle of Rafah, both Israeli and US perspectives interpret it as a campaign directed against Hamas, which they view as an extension of Iranian influence in the region. This narrative aligns with what Thomas Friedman, writing for the New York Times, referred to as the new “Biden Doctrine,” which emphasizes confronting Iran and its allies in West Asia. This marks a significant shift in US strategy since 1979.
The convergence of US and Israeli interests casts suspicion on ongoing efforts to bring about a long-term ceasefire, with all eyes focused on the current round of talks in Doha. Amos Harel, writing for Haaretz, frames the discussions as a race toward either a negotiated ceasefire or a potentially expansive regional conflict involving multiple fronts.
Yemen’s Ansarallah movement, which last week expanded its naval operations into the Indian Ocean, has issued a stark warning against a Rafah invasion, threatening a sharp escalation in both sea and air operations, including the closure of the Bab al-Mandab Strait.
Similarly, the Lebanese front remains sensitive to developments in Rafah. Despite the northern front’s expansion since the onset of 2024, recent Israeli attacks targeting Baalbek, over 100 kilometers from the southern border, suggest Tel Aviv’s misguided willingness to escalate.
This possibility could spill over into reality if Israel invades Rafah, as the occupation army may resort to preemptive actions to mitigate perceived threats from Lebanese resistance forces.
Overall, the Battle of Rafah will likely reshape the regional conflict, adding new layers to existing pressure fronts. Importantly, it challenges the notion that Hamas stands alone, abandoned in Rafah, as various regional actors, including Iran and its allies, are closely watching and prepared to intervene.
The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of The Cradle.
Washington DC — (Scheerpost) — Piers allow things to come in. They allow things to go out. And Israel, which has no intention of halting its murderous siege of Gaza, including its policy of enforced starvation, appears to have found a solution to its problem of where to expel the 2.3 million Palestinians.
If the Arab world will not take them, as Secretary of State Antony Blinken proposed during his first round of visits after Oct. 7, the Palestinians will be cast adrift on ships. It worked in Beirut in 1982 when some eight and a half thousand Palestine Liberation Organization members were sent by sea to Tunisia, and another two and a half thousand ended up in other Arab states. Israel expects that the same forced deportation by sea will work in Gaza.
Israel, for this reason, supports the “temporary pier” the Biden administration is building to ostensibly deliver food and aid to Gaza – food and aid whose “distribution” will be overseen by the Israeli military.
“You need drivers that don’t exist, trucks that don’t exist feeding into a distribution system that doesn’t exist,” Jeremy Konyndyk, a former senior aid official in the Biden administration and now president of the Refugees International aid advocacy group, told The Guardian.
This “maritime corridor” is Israel’s Trojan Horse, a subterfuge to expel Palestinians. The small shipments of seaborne aid, like the food packets that have been air-dropped, will not alleviate the looming famine. They are not meant to.
Five Palestinians were killed and several others injured when a parachute carrying aid failed and crashed onto a crowd of people near Gaza City’s Shati refugee camp.
“Dropping aid in this way is flashy propaganda rather than a humanitarian service,” the media office of the local government in Gaza said. “We previously warned it poses a threat to the lives of citizens in the Gaza Strip, and this is what happened today when the parcels fell on the citizens’ heads.”
If the U.S. or Israel were serious about alleviating the humanitarian crisis, the thousands of trucks with food and aid currently at the southern border of Gaza would be allowed to enter any of its multiple crossings. They are not. The “temporary pier,” like the air drops, is ghoulish theater, a way to mask Washington’s complicity in the genocide.
Israeli media reported the building of the pier was due to pressure from the United Arab Emirates, which threatened Israel with ending a land corridor trade route it administers in collusion with Saudi Arabia and Jordan to bypass Yemen’s naval blockade.
The Jerusalem Post reported it was Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who proposed the construction of the “temporary pier” to the Biden administration.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who has called Palestinians “human animals” and advocated a total siege of Gaza, including cutting off electricity, food, water and fuel, lauded the plan, saying, “it is designed to bring aid directly to the residents and thus continue the collapse of Hamas’s rule in Gaza.”
“Why would Israel, the engineer of the Gaza famine, endorse the idea of establishing a maritime corridor for aid to address a crisis it initiated and is now worsening?” writes Tamara Nassar in an article titled “What’s the Real Purpose of Biden’s Gaza Port?” in The Electronic Intifada. “This might appear paradoxical if one were to assume that the primary aim of the maritime corridor is to deliver aid.”
When Israel offers a gift to the Palestinians, you can be sure it is a poisoned apple. That Israel got the Biden administration to construct the pier is one more example of the inverted relationship between Washington and Jerusalem, where the Israel lobby has bought off elected officials in the two ruling parties.
Oxfam, in a March 15 report, accuses Israel of actively hindering aid operations in Gaza in defiance of the orders by the International Court of Justice. It notes that 1.7 million Palestinians, some 75 percent of the Gaza population, are facing famine, and two-thirds of the hospitals and over 80 percent of all health clinics in Gaza are no longer operable. The majority of people, the report reads, “have no access to clean drinking water” and “sanitation services are not functioning.”
The report reads:
The conditions we have observed in Gaza are beyond catastrophic, and we have not only seen failure by Israeli authorities to meet their responsibility to facilitate and support international aid efforts, but in fact seen active steps being taken to hinder and undermine such aid efforts. Israel’s control of Gaza continues to be characterized by deliberate restrictive actions that have led to a severe and systemic dysfunctionality in the delivery of aid. Humanitarian organizations operational in Gaza are reporting a worsening situation since the International Court of Justice imposed provisional measures in light of the plausible risk of genocide, with intensified Israeli barriers, restrictions and attacks against humanitarian personnel. Israel has maintained a ‘convenient illusion of a response’ in Gaza to serve its claim that it is allowing aid in and conducting the war in line with international laws.
Oxfam says Israel employs “a dysfunctional and undersized inspection system that keeps aid snarled up, subjected to onerous, repetitive and unpredictable bureaucratic procedures that are contributing to trucks being stranded in giant queues for 20 days on average.” Israel, Oxfam explains, rejects “items of aid as having ‘dual (military) use,’ banning vital fuel and generators entirely along with other items essential for a meaningful humanitarian response such as protective gear and communications kit.” Rejected aid, “must go through a complex ‘pre-approval’ system or end up being held in limbo at the Al Arish warehouse in Egypt.” Israel has also “cracked down on humanitarian missions, largely sealing off northern Gaza, and restricting international humanitarian workers’ access not only into Gaza but Israel and the West Bank including East Jerusalem too.”
Israel has allowed 15,413 trucks into Gaza during the past 157 days of war. Oxfam estimates that the population of Gaza needs five times that number. Israel allowed 2,874 trucks in February, a 44 percent reduction from the previous month. Before Oct. 7, 500 aid trucks entered Gaza daily.
Israeli soldiers have also killed scores of Palestinians attempting to receive aid from trucks in more than two dozenincidents. These attacks include the killing of at least 21 Palestinians and the wounding of 150 on March 14, when Israeli forces fired on thousands of people in Gaza City. The same area had been targeted by Israeli soldiers hours earlier.
“Israel’s assault has caught Gaza’s own aid workers and international agencies’ partners inside a ‘practically uninhabitable’ environment of mass displacement and deprivation, where 75 percent of solid waste is now being dumped in random sites, 97 percent of groundwater made unfit for human use, and the Israeli state using starvation as a weapon of war,” Oxfam says.
There is no place in Gaza, Oxfam notes, that is safe “amid the forcible and often multiple displacements of almost the entire population, which makes the principled distribution of aid unviable, including agencies’ ability to help repair vital public services at scale.”
Oxfam blasts Israel for its “disproportionate” and “indiscriminate” attacks on “civilian and humanitarian assets” as well as “solar, water, power and sanitation plants, UN premises, hospitals, roads, and aid convoys and warehouses, even when these assets are supposedly ‘deconflicted’ after their coordinates have been shared for protection.”
The health ministry in Gaza said Monday that at least 31,726 people have been killed since the Israeli assault began five months ago. The death toll includes at least 81 deaths in the previous 24 hours, a ministry statement said, adding that 73,792 people have been wounded in Gaza since Oct. 7. Thousands more are missing, many buried under the rubble.
None of these Israeli tactics will be altered with the building of a “temporary pier.” In fact, given the pending ground assault on Rafah, where 1.2 million displaced Palestinians are crowded in tent cities or camped out in the open air, Israel’s tactics will only get worse.
Israel, by design, is creating a humanitarian crisis of such catastrophic proportions, with thousands of Palestinians killed by bombs, shells, missiles, bullets, starvation and infectious diseases, that the only option will be death or deportation. The pier is where the last act in this gruesome genocidal campaign will be played out as Palestinians are herded by Israeli soldiers onto ships.
How appropriate that the Biden administration, without whom this genocide could not have been carried out, will facilitate it.
Feature photo | Israel’s Trojan Horse | Mr. Fish
Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for fifteen years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East Bureau Chief and Balkan Bureau Chief for the paper. He previously worked overseas for The Dallas Morning News, The Christian Science Monitor, and NPR. He is the host of show The Chris Hedges Report.
Stories published in our Daily Digests section are chosen based on the interest of our readers. They are republished from a number of sources, and are not produced by MintPress News. The views expressed in these articles are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect MintPress News editorial policy.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect MintPress News editorial policy.
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Several Palestinians have been killed and numerous others injured in the cities of Rafah and Jabalia in the Gaza Strip. Local media reports suggest that at least 14 Palestinians lost their lives as residential houses and apartments were targeted by Israeli occupation forces.
Bereaved families in Rafah bidding farewell to their loved ones mass murdered by Israeli airstrikes late last night in Rafah, southern Gaza. pic.twitter.com/yYBCe7TvIA
Twenty-seven Palestinians were martyred in an Israeli airstrike on a house in the al-Nusseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip early Wednesday. The attack also resulted in several injuries. This airstrike follows another Israeli attack that took place at the Kuwait Roundabout in Gaza City, where 23 Palestinians were killed and numerous others were wounded.
An Israeli airstrike struck the house of the Mqbel family in northern Gaza, massacring 15 of the family members, including women and children, amidst the overnight airstrikes on Gaza. pic.twitter.com/NF4TxRfngN
Reports from various media outlets indicate that Israeli aircraft also targeted a residential building northwest of Gaza City, while artillery shelling was reported in the western areas of Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip.
The Latest Updates from Gaza:
• 15 people killed and dozens remain trapped under the rubble after an Israeli airstrike on a family home in Nuseirat
• 23+ people killed after an Israeli airstrike on tribal committees organizing aid distribution at the Kuwait roundabout pic.twitter.com/Uz9cbI0Wtx
The Ministry of Health in Gaza released a chilling statistic, stating that since October 7, a total of 31,819 Palestinians have lost their lives due to Israeli aggression, with a staggering 73,934 injuries reported.
However, amidst the devastation, Palestinian Resistance factions in Gaza have shown resilience and launched counter-attacks against Israeli occupation forces.
Israeli forces assassinated Amjad Hathat, the director of the Emergency Committee in western Gaza, while securing the entry of aid yesterday night. pic.twitter.com/IqM5vzEaPd
Fierce Clashes Near Medical Complex, Casualties Reported
Various Palestinian Resistance groups in Gaza City have confirmed engaging in intense confrontations with Israeli occupation forces near Al-Shifa Medical Complex. Al-Qassam Brigades from Hamas reported attacking Israeli occupation soldiers with a TBG shell, while al-Quds Brigades from the PIJ engaged with Israeli occupation troops using machine guns.
Recent reports from Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza confirm that Israeli forces have been conducting mass arrests of Palestinian civilians.
For the past two days, displaced Palestinians seeking refuge in the hospital have been pleading for rescue as they have run out of food… pic.twitter.com/7XKkFgCOT6
As the Palestinian Resistance continues to repel the Israeli incursions, the occupation military admitted to the killing of a commander in the 401st Armored Brigade and a First Sergeant in the Nahal Brigade during battles near the hospital. Israeli media revealed that a special unit was ambushed by the Palestinian factions, resulting in casualties among the raiding forces.
UPROOTED PALESTINIANS: SALAM ALQUDS ALAYKUM 