Op het Amsterdamse stadhuis wordt maandag de Israëlische vlag gehesen. Dat heeft burgemeester Femke Halsema besloten. ‘De vlag is een steunbetuiging aan de Israëlische bevolking en aan Amsterdammers met vrienden en familie in Israël die in angst en onzekerheid verkeren,’ meldt de gemeente zondag.
‘Het college van burgemeester en wethouders is samen met Amsterdammers enorm aangedaan door het brute geweld van Hamas tegen onschuldige burgers,’ aldus de gemeente. Het college leeft ook zeer mee met onschuldige slachtoffers aan Palestijnse zijde, geeft Amsterdam verder aan.
De gemeente stelt dat Halsema in lijn met het besluit van het kabinet heeft besloten de Israëlische vlag op het stadhuis te hijsen. Maandagochtend wordt op het Binnenhof de Israëlische vlag gehesen, zo heeft demissionair premier Mark Rutte besloten. De Rijksvoorlichtingsdienst laat weten dat het overigens niet gaat om een vlaginstructie, en dat het gemeenten dus vrij staat de Israëlische vlag al dan niet te hijsen.
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” De Amsterdamse collega-burgemeester Femke Halsema heeft wel positief besloten. “De vlag is een steunbetuiging aan de Israëlische bevolking en aan Amsterdammers met vrienden en familie in Israël die in angst en onzekerheid verkeren”, meldt de gemeente zondag.”
DAGBLAD010
GEEN ISRAELISCHE VLAG OP ROTTERDAMSE STADHUIS; ABOUTALEB WIL NIET
Op het Amsterdamse stadhuis wordt maandag de Israëlische vlag gehesen, maar dat krijgt geen navolging in Rotterdam. Aboutaleb kiest ervoor om niet de de Israëlische vlag te hijsen. Dit tot groot ongenoegen van de politieke partij Leefbaar Rotterdam. ,,Het is onbegrijpelijk en schandalig dat Aboutaleb niet meteen de vlag heeft laten hijsen. We eisen dat hij het alsnog doet. Hij heeft gewoon een fout gemaakt en hij moet dat eens een keer durven toegeven. We moeten solidariteit tonen met de Joodse gemeenschap en de staat Israel na alles wat er is gebeurd”, aldus Leefbaar-raadslid Simon Ceulemans.
De Amsterdamse collega-burgemeester Femke Halsema heeft wel positief besloten. “De vlag is een steunbetuiging aan de Israëlische bevolking en aan Amsterdammers met vrienden en familie in Israël die in angst en onzekerheid verkeren”, meldt de gemeente zondag.
Amsterdam stelt dat Halsema “in lijn met het besluit van het kabinet” heeft besloten de Israëlische vlag op het stadhuis te hijsen. Maandagochtend wordt op het Binnenhof de Israëlische vlag gehesen, zo heeft demissionair premier Mark Rutte besloten. De Rijksvoorlichtingsdienst laat weten dat het overigens niet gaat om een vlaginstructie, en dat het gemeenten dus vrij staat de Israëlische vlag al dan niet te hijsen.
Sinds vanochtend wappert de Israëlische vlag op de Stopera, dat heeft burgemeester Femke Halsema ‘in lijn met het besluit van het kabinet’ besloten. “Samen met Amsterdammers is het college enorm aangedaan door het brute geweld van Hamas tegen onschuldige burgers.” Onbekenden hebben ook een Palestijnse vlag, weliswaar ondersteboven, voor de Stopera geplaatst.
De vlag op het gemeentehuis is een steunbetuiging aan de Israëlische bevolking en aan Amsterdammers met vrienden en familie in Israël die in angst en onzekerheid verkeren, laat de gemeente weten. Daarnaast ‘leeft het college zeer mee met onschuldige slachtoffers aan Palestijnse zijde’.
Sheher Khan, fractievoorzitter van DENK, noemt het hijsen van alléén de Israëlische vlag ‘ongelooflijk slecht van Halsema’. “Je wil nooit onderscheid maken tussen burgerslachtoffers. Je kan zowel de Israëlische als de Palestijnse vlag hijsen, of een Nederlandse vlag halfstok zoals ze in Utrecht doen.” Hij heeft een debat over de kwestie aangevraagd. Een woordvoerder van burgemeester Halsema wil niet ingaan op de kritiek en laat het bij het eerder gegeven statement.
Fractievoorzitter Claire Martens-America (VVD) riep de gemeente op om steun te betuigen aan Israël. Annabel Nanninga (JA21) deed dezelfde oproep in schriftelijke vragen die ze stelde aan het college van burgemeester en wethouders.
De Israëlische vlag werd eerder al op meerdere plekken getoond, onder andere op de Brandenburger Tor in Berlijn en op het gebouw van het Europees Parlement. Het kabinet liet gisteren weten op het Binnenhof een vlag te hijsen. En sinds vanochtend is er dus een vlag bij de Stopera.
Oorlog
De militaire tak van terreurorganisatie Hamas heeft zaterdag vanuit de Gazastrook tweeduizend raketten afgevuurd op doelen in Israël. Onder andere in Tel Aviv en Jeruzalem ging het raketalarm af. Ook zijn Palestijnse militanten in het zuiden van Israël de grens overgestoken en hebben daar Israëlische burgers gedood en gegijzeld. Volgens Israël zijn er zeker honderd burgers meegenomen naar Gaza.
Operatie Al-Alqsa Storm, zoals de aanval door Hamas wordt genoemd, is een escalatie van het conflict. Israëlische president Netanyahu heeft gewaarschuwd dat ”de vijand een ongekende hoge prijs zal betalen.”
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”‘De vlag is een steunbetuiging aan de Israëlische bevolking en aan Amsterdammers met vrienden en familie in Israël die in angst en onzekerheid verkeren,’ meldt de gemeente zondag.”
”Ook andere gemeenten kiezen voor de vredesvlag, waaronder Arnhem, Zoetermeer en Dordrecht. De Arnhemse burgemeester Ahmed Marcouch hijst dinsdag de vredesvlag in zijn stad. De Gelderse hoofdstad wil medeleven betuigen ‘met alle burgerslachtoffers die deze dagen vielen in Israël en Palestijnse gebieden’. Ook Zoetermeer hangt de vredesvlag dinsdag bij het stadhuis. ‘Opnieuw een land in oorlog, waar onschuldige burgers de dupe van zijn,’ laat de Zuid-Hollandse gemeente weten.”
Het kabinet besloot direct tot het hijsen van de Israëlische vlag na de onverwachte aanval van Hamas op Israël afgelopen weekend, waarbij ook grote aantallen onschuldige burgerslachtoffers vielen. Een landelijke vlaginstructie ontbreekt echter. Het is aan gemeenten en provincies zelf daar over te beslissen. Al snel bleek dat het hijsen van de Israëlische vlag voor gemeenten minder vanzelfsprekend is dan bijvoorbeeld de Oekraïnse vlag in de oorlog met Rusland of die van Marokko na de verwoestende aardbeving kortgeleden.
Een rondgang van het ANP langs ruim honderd gemeenten laat zien dat dorpen en steden nu veelal voor een alternatief kiezen. Uit bijbehorende summiere persverklaringen valt op te maken dat ze vooral geen partij willen kiezen in dit gewapende Midden-Oostenconflict. Een aantal gemeenten hijst wel de Israëlische vlag, zoals Noardeast Fryslân.
Dilemma
Het dilemma laat zich goed zien in Amsterdam. Maandag hees de gemeente de Israëlische vlag als enige van de 15 grootste steden. Dat deed de gemeente volgens burgemeester Femke Halsema ‘uit afschuw over het brute geweld van Hamas tegen onschuldige burgers en als steunbetuiging aan de Israëlische bevolking’. Na 24 uur heeft de vlag op het Amsterdamse stadhuis plaatsgemaakt voor de zogenoemde vredesvlag, die blauw is met daarop een afbeelding van een witte duif. ‘Deze vlag is een steunbetuiging aan alle onschuldige slachtoffers aan Israëlische en Palestijnse zijde, en aan alle Amsterdammers die meeleven of in angst en onzekerheid verkeren,’ schrijft de gemeente op X.
Vredesvlag
Ook andere gemeenten kiezen voor de vredesvlag, waaronder Arnhem, Zoetermeer en Dordrecht. De Arnhemse burgemeester Ahmed Marcouch hijst dinsdag de vredesvlag in zijn stad. De Gelderse hoofdstad wil medeleven betuigen ‘met alle burgerslachtoffers die deze dagen vielen in Israël en Palestijnse gebieden’. Ook Zoetermeer hangt de vredesvlag dinsdag bij het stadhuis. ‘Opnieuw een land in oorlog, waar onschuldige burgers de dupe van zijn,’ laat de Zuid-Hollandse gemeente weten.
Dordrecht liet de keus op de internationale vredesvlag vallen, een regenboogvlag met het woord pace erop. ‘De recente schokkende gebeurtenissen in Israël raken ook veel Dordtenaren, hun familie en naasten. Deze situatie doet ons beseffen op hoeveel plekken op de wereld onschuldige burgers in een oorlogssituatie zitten,’ aldus de gemeente. Het Gelderse Rheden laat weten: ‘We betreuren de uitbarsting van het geweld en de onschuldige burgers die hiervan het slachtoffer worden. De vredesvlag is bedoeld om te benadrukken hoe belangrijk vrede is.’
‘Polarisatie niet versterken’
Sommige gemeenten kiezen ervoor helemaal geen vlag te hijsen of de eigen gemeentevlag halfstok te hangen. In Rotterdam wilde burgemeester Ahmed Aboutaleb in eerste instantie afzien van vlagvertoon, maar na intern overleg hing Rotterdam de eigen gemeentevlag halfstok ‘voor alle burgerslachtoffers van de recente explosie van geweld tussen Palestijnen en Israëli’s’. In een brief aan de Rotterdamse raad schreef Aboutaleb: ‘Rotterdam is een stad met inwoners uit alle windstreken. Mijn taak is om niets te doen wat de polarisatie in de stad versterkt.’ Ook Utrecht en Zwolle, evenals verschillende andere gemeenten, hingen de gemeentevlag halfstok.
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”Het dilemma laat zich goed zien in Amsterdam. Maandag hees de gemeente de Israëlische vlag als enige van de 15 grootste steden. Dat deed de gemeente volgens burgemeester Femke Halsema ‘uit afschuw over het brute geweld van Hamas tegen onschuldige burgers en als steunbetuiging aan de Israëlische bevolking’. ”
Na 24 uur heeft de vlag op het Amsterdamse stadhuis plaatsgemaakt voor de zogenoemde vredesvlag, die blauw is met daarop een afbeelding van een witte duif.
De driehoek – burgemeester, justitie en politie – heeft voorwaarden gesteld aan de organisatoren van de pro-Palestina mars van aankomende zondag. Zo moet de organisatie zelf de orde houden over de demonstranten. Daarnaast is het zwaaien van vlaggen van terreurorganisaties zoals Hamas of Hezbollah verboden, mag gezichtsbedekkende kleding niet worden gedragen en mogen er geen voorwerpen worden verbrand. De gemeente zegt dat er tussen de 2500 tot 10.000 deelnemers worden verwacht.
“De driehoek zal haatzaaien, oproepen tot geweld en andere bedreigingen van onze vreedzame en open samenleving niet tolereren”, zo laat de driehoek weten. Vlaggen van terreurgroepen mogen bijvoorbeeld niet worden getoond en een oproep tot geweld mag niet worden gedaan. Gezichtsbedekkende kleding is ook verboden om de orde te bewaren, religieuze kleding mag wel. Het verbranden van voorwerpen tolereert de driehoek ook niet: “Aangezien dit tot wanordelijkheden kan leiden en voor andere demonstranten en omstanders een gevaar kan zijn.”
Zelf orde houden
Omdat er bij eerdere pro-Israël en pro-Palestina protesten incidenten en confrontaties zijn geweest, is er bij de driehoek nu ook zorgen over de kans op nieuwe incidenten. “Het verleden leert dat demonstraties over dit thema vaak over en weer tegenreacties oproepen, waarbij strafbare feiten en confrontaties met tegendemonstranten kunnen plaatsvinden”, schrijft burgemeester Halsema aan de organisatie.
De driehoek wijst de organisatoren daarom scherp om de mars in goede banen te leiden en zelf mensen te regelen die de ervoor zorgen dat er geen strafbare feiten worden gepleegd. De Amsterdamse politie is ook ter begeleiding aanwezig. Halsema liet gisteren al weten dat het Openbaar Ministerie meeluistert tijdens de protesten, bijvoorbeeld bij de speeches. Als de voorwaarden worden overtreden of als er niet naar de politie wordt geluisterd, zal er worden opgetreden door de politie.
Pro-Israël demonstratie
Op het moment van de Palestina-mars is er ook een pro-Israël demonstratie op het Beursplein. De mars loopt niet langs de demonstratie en de demonstranten mogen niet afwijken van de afgesproken route. Vanaf de Dam loopt de Palestina-mars via de Nieuwezijds Voorburgwal en de Haarlemmerstraat naar het Westerpark.
Joodse buurt
Toen begin deze week de mars werd aangekondigd werd er op sociale media met afschuw gereageerd op de route. De protestmars zou namelijk vanaf de Dam richting het Jonas Daniël Meijerplein lopen, midden in de oude Joodse buurt. “In het hart van de oude Jodenbuurt, tussen de synagoges. Dit zou een gigantische schandvlek zijn voor onze stad. Nu en in de toekomst”, reageerde stadsdeelcommissielid uit Zuid Michael Vis (VVD).
Een van de organisatoren van de mars liet aan AT5 weten niet stil te hebben gestaan bij de gevoeligheid van het plein en dat de route was gekozen omdat het een makkelijke looproute is die vaker wordt gebruikt. De organisatie gaf aan de route te wijzigen en ook de politie en de gemeente verzochten de organisatie om dat te doen. Het eindpunt werd vervolgens verplaatst naar het Westerpark.
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The group’s audacious Saturday attack on Israel has triggered a bloody bombing campaign in the Gaza Strip.
The Palestinian armed group Hamas on October 7 launched a surprise attack into Israel in one of the most serious escalations in the Israel-Palestinian conflict in years.
Hamas fighters entered Israeli territory from the Gaza Strip, killing more than 1,400 people and sending shockwaves across Israel.
The latest conflict has thrown a spotlight on Israel’s 16-year blockade of the Gaza Strip and its policy of settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has launched a brutal military offensive in Gaza, killing more than 4,600 people as he promised to finish Hamas.
So what is Hamas, the group at the centre of it all? Here is what to know:
What is the group Hamas?
Hamas stands for the Islamic Resistance Movement and in Arabic means “zeal”.
The group politically controls the Gaza Strip, a territory of about 365sq km (141sq miles) that is home to more than two million people but is blockaded by Israel.
Hamas has been in power in the Gaza Strip since 2007 after a brief war against Fatah forces loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the Palestinian Authority and Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).
When was Hamas formed and what is its aim?
The Hamas movement was founded in Gaza in 1987 by an imam, Sheikh Ahmed Yasin, and his aide Abdul Aziz al-Rantissi shortly after the start of the first Intifada, an uprising against Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories.
The movement started as an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and created a military wing, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, to pursue an armed struggle against Israel with the aim of liberating historic Palestine.
It also offered social welfare programmes to Palestinian victims of the Israeli occupation.
What are the Palestinian group’s principles?
Unlike the PLO, Hamas does not recognise Israel’s statehood but accepts a Palestinian state on 1967 borders.
“We shall not waive an inch of the Palestinian home soil no matter what the recent pressures are and no matter how long the occupation,” Khaled Meshaal, the leader-in-exile of the Palestinian group said in 2017.
Hamas violently opposes the Oslo peace accords negotiated by Israel and the PLO in the mid-1990s.
It is formally committed to establishing a Palestinian state within its own borders. It has pursued this aim through attacks on Israeli soldiers, settlers and civilians both in the occupied Palestinian territories and in Israel.
The group as whole or in some instances its military wing is designated as a “terrorist” organisation by Israel, the United States, European Union, Canada, Egypt and Japan.
Who are its allies and supporters?
Hamas is part of a regional alliance that also includes Iran, Syria and the group Hezbollah in Lebanon, which opposes US policies towards the Middle East and Israel.
Hamas and Islamic Jihad, the second-largest armed group in the region, are often united against Israel and are the most important members of the joint operations room that coordinates military activity among the various armed groups in Gaza.
The relationship between the two groups has been tense when Hamas has exerted pressure on Islamic Jihad to stop attacks against Israel.
What prompted Saturday’s attack on Israel?
Hamas spokesperson Khaled Qadomi told Al Jazeera that the group carried out its military operation in response to atrocities that Palestinians have faced over decades.
“We want the international community to stop atrocities in Gaza against Palestinian people, our holy sites like Al-Aqsa [Mosque]. All these things are the reason behind starting this battle,” he said.
Hamas also called on other groups to join the fight, saying Saturday’s attacks were just the beginning.
Is Hamas targeting civilians?
Osama Hamdan, senior spokesperson for Hamas, told Al Jazeera that the group was not attacking civilians even though the group’s own videos have shown its fighters taking elderly Israelis hostage during the fighting on Saturday.
Rights groups such as Amnesty International have also pointed out that Israeli civilians had been killed by Hamas.
But Hamdan insisted that the group was attacking only settlers living in illegal settlements, whom he described as legitimate targets.
“You have to differentiate between settlers and civilians. Settlers attacked Palestinians,” Hamdan said.
Asked whether civilians in southern Israel were also considered settlers, Hamdan said: “Everyone knows there are settlements there.”
“We are not targeting civilians on purpose. We have declared settlers are part of the occupation and part of the armed Israeli force. They are not civilians,” he added.
How was the group able to carry out the attack?
Hamas said its fighters took several Israelis captive in the enclave, releasing videos of fighters dragging bloodied soldiers. It said senior Israeli military officers were among the captives.
The videos could not immediately be verified but matched geographic features of the area. Fears that Israelis have been kidnapped evoked memories of the 2006 capture of soldier Gilad Shalit, whom Hamas-linked fighters seised in a cross-border raid. Hamas held Shalit for five years until he was exchanged for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
Hamas also sent paragliders flying into Israel, the Israeli military said. The attack recalled a famous assault in the late 1980s when Palestinian fighters crossed from Lebanon into northern Israel on hang-gliders and killed six Israeli soldiers.
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HAMAS, FROM ISLAMIC REVIVAL MOVEMENT TO PALESTINIAN GOVERNMENT
Contary to the leading opinions of the American-European politicians and media, the main aim of Hamas in calling for the “destruction” of the State of Israel, is not to kill or expel the Israeli-Jewish population, but to dismantle the zionistic State Model and to make an end to the 39-year Israeli occupation and settlement policy.
In the Palestinian elections January 25, 2006, Hamas obtained a startling victory. Of the 132 seats of parliament, the Hamas party, which for the first time was participating in the parliamentary elections, obtained 74 seats, in contrast with the then-reigning Fatah Party, which obtained a mere 43 seats. The remaining 13 seats were obtained by different smaller political parties, as well as independent candidates.
This great victory for Hamas was no surprise, considering the ongoing corruption of the Fatah-government versus the fundamental political and military resistance by Hamas against the Israeli occupation, as well as the Hamas social activities on behalf of the impoverished population of Palestine, especially Gaza.
In spite of this, leading American-European politicians, as well as the newsmedia, not only showed great astonishment at Hamas’ victory, they also demanded that Hamas renounce the violence against Israel and also acknowledge the State of Israel – and made this demand the condition of continued financial support to the Palestinian Authority.
When the newly-formed Hamas government refused to agree with those American-European demands, the American and Canadian governments, as well the European Union, decided to freeze the financial support to the Palestinian Authority, a measure which mainly affected the already seriously impoverished Palestinian civilian population, since at least 45% of the population [some reports put the number as high as 70 %] are living below the poverty-rate and 15% are living in extreme poverty.
Nutrition, education and medicine have been the areas most affected by the financial and economic boycott of Palestine. Moreover, 250,000 Palestinians depend on Palestinian Authority salaries, and these government employees support nearly one million people, or 20% of the total Palestinian population. However, due to the American-European boycott, salaries haven’t been paid since January, and the families of the government employees have had to bear the consequences.
Not only are the boycott measures morally reprehensible in regard with the humanitarian consequences for the Palestinian civilian-population, they have also led to mounting tensions within the Palestinian society.
Many international non-governmental organizations, as well as a number of United Nations agencies, have harshly criticized the economic boycott and blockade of Palestine.
Another consequence of the boycott is that, as a result of the freezing of European Union (EU) financial support, Hamas shall receive increased financial aid from the governments of the Arab and other Islamic countries. This will lead to the lessening of EU political influence regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the strengthening of the influence of regimes adhering to more radical political Islamic ideologies, such as Iran. Recently a number of Arab governments, and Iran, have either given or promised financial aid to the Hamas government.
No doubt aware of the above-mentioned political consequences of the diminishing EU influence regarding the Middle-East, the EU, represented by EU Commissioner Louis Michel (former Belgian minister of foreign affairs), has set aside a sum of 34 million euros for emergency aid to the Palestinian territories. This aid is to be delivered outside of the Palestinian government, mainly through non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
Also the World Bank, which has predicted an increasing humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian territories, is exploring, in direct cooperation with the ‘Quartet for Mideast Peace made up of the EU, USA, the Russian Federation and the UN, to resume financial aid to the Palestinian population, by going outside of Hamas channels, bypassing the Hamas-led Palestinian government by providing the aid by way of NGOs which are active in the area.
Double standards:
The basis of the American-European boycott of the financial aid to the Palestinian Authority lies in the refusal of Hamas to renounce violence against Israel and to acknowlegde the State of Israel. A further argument given in support of the boycott is the fact, that Hamas has played a major role in the incitement to suicide attacks against Israeli civilians and is still continuing this strategy.
It is self-evident that suicide-attacks as military attacks on civilians are not only inhuman, but also illegal according to International Law. But what is seldom mentioned by the EU and the American-European governments are that these attacks are a matter of cause and effects, since they have been the result of the now 39 years of Israeli occupation of Palestinian land — an occupation which is in violation of the unanimously-accepted UN-Security Resolution 242 of 1967, in which Israel was required to withdraw its troops from the territories conquered during the June 1967 war, including the Palestinian territories.
Also, the boycotting countries are ignoring the fact that the attacks by Hamas do not consist solely of suicide-attacks, but also of the internationally-recognized legitimate acts of defense by an occupied population against the occupying military force — in this case, the Israeli army.
Repeatedly, the Hamas leadership has declared, both pre- and post- the January elections, the group’s willingness to renounce violence against Israel, as soon as Israel is prepared to end its occupation of the Palestinian territories [ie. its international obligation under UN Security Council Resolution 242], to dismantle its settlements in the Palestinian territories, which are illegal according International Law [see also UN-Security Council Resolution 1979], to dismantle the Wall, which is being built across occupied Palestinian territories [see verdict of the International Court of Justice dated 9-7-2004], and its acknowledgement of the internationally-recognized right of return for Palestinian refugees, a right which is confirmed by General Assembly Resolution 194.
All of the Hamas movement’s demands are based on International Law, confirmed by the above-named United Nations resolutions, and are therefore absolutely legitimate demands that should be recognized as such by the international community.
What is striking in this particular case, however, is that the American-European boycotting goverments are demanding that Hamas completely disarm on the one hand, while on the other hand, making no clear demands on Israel regarding the implementation of the above mentioned UN resolutions, which were voted for by many of these same American-European States.
Also this double standard is being applied in regard to Israeli and Palestinian violence.
Although the condemnation of suicide-attacks against Israeli civilians is correct and justified, there is however a strong undervaluation of the serious character of the Israeli human rights violatons and war-crimes which have been committed by the Israeli army since the beginning of the occupation in 1967 (and before).
It is also significant to mention that from EU-side there is no real political pressure on Israel to end the occupation and withdraw from the Palestinian territories. Seen from that perspective, the American-European criticism against Hamas lacks moral credibility, as the boycotting nations are choosing to call for the enforcement of international law on a very selective basis. Why should international human rights standards only apply to Hamas? Why should they not apply to Israel as well?
The false international perception of Hamas ideology
It is a common standard in nearly all American-European newsmedia, as well in statements of politicians, to mention repeatedly that the Hamas ideology is associated with the “destruction” of the State of Israel.
In the context in which this statement is made, it is almost always implied that by calling for Israel’s “destruction”, Hamas intends to expel the Jewish-Israeli inhabitants out of the present Israel or even to kill them.
Before trying to unmask this stubborn American-European assumption I want to throw some light on the political history of the Hamas
Hamas [abbreviation of Harakat al-muqâwama al-islâmiyya, which means islamic resistanc emovement] was founded in 1987 as a religious-nationalistic resistance-organisation with Sheikh Ahmed Yassin as the spiritual leader. He was killed in an Israeli airstrike in March 2004, which, being an extra-judicial execution, not only killed him but also killed 7 other innocent bystanders.
However, since the beginning of the eighties, there was a predecessor of Hamas, also under the leadership of Sheikh Yassin, which was mainly an islamic revival movement, mostly directed toward social and charitable goals.
Although that movement of course opposed the Israeli occupation, it did not promote violent resistance, since the group considered the Israeli occupation as a punishment of God because of the lack of religious devotion in Palestine.
In other words, this revival-movement was meant to make the Palestinian population return to the basics of Islam, as explained by the movement, in their daily life.
This revivalist-ideological movement was supported financially by Israel, supposedly as a ‘counterbalance’ to the Palestine Liberation Organization, led by Yasser Arafat, which was, in combination with the al-Fatah organization, the most powerful resistance movement against the Israeli occupation at that time.
Even when the official Hamas organization was founded in 1987, initially there was no real resistance against the occupation, despite the anti-zionistic Charterof the group, written in 1988.
Only in the post-Oslo era (1993 on) did the Hamas organization became part of the resistance, resulting in military attacks against the Israeli occupation army, and, beginning in 1994, in suicide-attacks against Israeli civilians. The immediate cause of the first suicide-attack was the 1994 massacre by the Jewish-Israeli extreme-rightwing terrorist, Dr. Baruch Goldstein, on 29 Palestinians who were praying Palestinians in the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron.
The Hamas Charter
An analysis of the Hamas Charter, that consists of 36 articles, reveals that the purpose of the group is to form a religious resistance against the Israeli occupation, as well as advocating for the dismantlement of the zionistic State of Israel, to be replaced by an Islamic Palestinian State with equal rights for all the inhabitants and religious freedom regarding Jews and Christians.
Seen from this perspective, the Charter has an anti-colonialistic character, because of its fundamental criticism of the colonial character of the foundation of the State of Israel in historical Palestine, first as a colony of the Turkish-Ottoman Empire, and after World War I, a British Mandate-area.
Following the plans of the European zionist movement, the foundation of a “Jewish” State in historical Palestine took place in 1948, based on UN General Assembly Resolution 181, passed in 1947, which supported the division of Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab part. The Resolution was made without any consultation of the indigenous Palestinian population, despite the fact that the Palestinians, along with the surrounding Arab states, had proposed at that time an alternative plan that would allow for Jewish immigration into Palestine without the separation of the state into “Jewish” and “Arab” areas, but that alternative was rejected by the United Nations, under pressure from the European Zionist movement.
It is of importance to mention here, that the objections of the Palestinians to Resolution 181 were not against the settlement of Jewish people in Palestine, but against the division of their country in two different States.
Apart from that, the Hamas movement is within its rights under international law to challenge the existence of the Zionist State of Israel in its current form, as the State of Israel in its current form is, at its basis, discriminatory against non-Jews.
One of the most striking examples of the discriminatory basis of the State of Israel is the fact that any Jewish man, woman or child in the world has the right to settle in Israel, while the internationally-recognized right of return of the Palestinian descendants of the 750,000 Palestinians expelled by Zionist militias in 1948, a right confirmed in General Assembly Resolution 194, passed in 1948, is not acknowledged by Israel.
The statements often made by the American-European politicians and newsmedia that Hamas wants to expel or even kill the Israeli-Jewish inhabitants of Israel is made based on a false reading of the Hamas Charter.
Although in the Charter, reference is made to “the Jews”, a thorough reading makes clear that this is a reference to the Israeli zionist system and the Israeli occupation, and not to the Jews as an ethnic-religious group. In Hamas bulletins, the group never refers to “the Jews” as such, but rather to the “zionist enemy” or the “zionist entity” – a reference to the political basis of the state of Israel, _not_ to Jewish people as an ethnic or religious group.
Suicide-attacks
In any mention of Hamas in the American-European press, emphasis is always made on the suicide-attacks against Israeli civilians for which Hamas bears responsibility. It is evident that suicide-attacks are not only inhuman, they are also serious violations of International Humanitarian Law, which states that in any military conflict a clear distinction must be made between combatants [soldiers or fighters] and non-combatants [civilians].
From that point of view it is completely right that those attacks are being severely condemned by the International Community.
But it is important to realize that the cause of those suicide-attacks are rooted in the Israeli occupation of all Palestinian land since 1967. The attacks began in 1994 after nearly thirty years of continuous oppression, humiliation and unpunished war crimes by Israeli forces in Palestine with no international enforcement of United Nations Resolutions that both recognized and condemned the Israeli actions and war crimes.
Still, this is no justification whatsoever for any resistance group to also commit war crimes. According to International Law it is illegal to respond to a violation of one’s human rights by committing a reciprocal violation, even in regard to an occupation.
On the other hand, any military action against an occupation army is considered legitimate resistance by an occupied population against the occupying power. However, there is little international attention to the fact that an important part of Hamas’ strategy is also the use of this legitimate resistance method.
It is worth noting that Israel, as well as the USA, qualify those military attacks against the occupation army as ‘terrorist acts’, ignoring the internationally-recognized legitimacy of such acts.
Recently, Mr. Solana, Secretary-General of the Council of the European Union, has confirmed the right of resistance against a foreign occupation.
The Israeli extrajudicial assassination policy
One policy of Israel that is both morally reprehensible and a violation of international law is the policy of extrajudicial assassinations of the leaders and activists of the Palestinian resistance movements like Hamas.
These assassinations began in the beginning of the 1970s and have continued until the present day. Each successive Israeli government that has been elected has continued the policy unquestioningly.
Israeli assassinations of suspected Palestinian resistance fighters and leaders have taken a number of forms: the frontal shootings of cars, the exploding of mobile telephones and the current method: ‘assassination-by-missile’ – airstrikes by Israeli warplanes onto suspected cars or homes, regardless of whether the target is in a crowded refugee-camp, in a flat full of civilian apartments, or in a marketplace. All of these have been the sites of missile strikes by Israeli forces in attempted extrajudicial assassinations.
These attacks are severe violations of International Law, which states that every human being has a right on a fair and independent trial.
In the extrajudicial assassinations, which are still being carried out by Israeli forces on a nearly-daily basis, in many cases civilian bystanders are also killed.
In those cases, the extrajudicial assassinations become not just violations of international law, but war crimes. The fact that civilians are nearly always present at the assassination sites [streets, market-places, cars, apartments and refugee-camps] leads to a high probability of civilians being killed – this is a direct violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention’s Principle of Proportionality, and thus is considered internationally to be a war crime.
However, despite the high humanitarian risk for the civilian population, the current Israeli Prime Minister Olmert has made clear that those airstrikes are to be continued, despite the continuous loss of Palestinian civilian lives.
It is a striking example of Western ‘selective indignation’ that this Israeli policy of extrajudicial assassinations, which nearly always leads to civilian casualties, is not criticized as harshly as Hamas’ incitement toward suicide-attacks.
No sanctions have been taken against Israel in regard with thosde extrajudicial executions, as well the indiscriminate military attacks on Gaza. But all financial assistance has been cut to the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority.
Regarding this issue, Israel, being the occupying country, bears the lion’s share in the escalation of the present conflict. The EU, which claims to consider Palestinian humanitarian concerns in its policies, must be held accountable for its hypocritical double standard in the enforcement of international law in this conflict.
Social-charitable Hamas-activities
One aspect of Hamas’ activities that has long been undervalued internationally is the fact that Hamas has been engaging in social and charitable activities on behalf of the most impoverished in the two Palestinian territories, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Ironically, by doing this, Hamas is fulfilling the international-judicial obligation of the Israeli occupying power to take care of the humanitarian needs of the occupied Palestinian population – an obligation that Israel has failed to fulfill.
According one of the most important articles of the 4th Geneva Convention, an occupying power is responsible for the safety, well-being and the welfare of the occupied population, a population which, while under occupation, become “protected persons” – a class of people that have special rights under international law.
The impoverished situation of the Palestinian population is being intensified each day by the Israeli military attacks in Gaza and the West-Bank, which have also resulted in serious human rights violations and war crimes.
When such Israeli measures were taken in the past, Hamas has increased its efforts to support the most impoverished part of the population. Donors for the projects, which include schools, hospitals and daycare centers, have come from all over the world, but mainly from the Arab world. Hamas gained a reputation as a focused and devoted group that did not steal money for themselves and their own enrichment (as was the reputation of the ruling Fateh party), but dedicated funding to numerous projects that benefited the least-well-off of the Palestinian society.
Of course, this led to a great popularity of Hamas and the striking outcome of the elections.
Ongoing Israeli violations
In both Gaza and the West Bank, massive home demolitions of Palestinian homes have been carried out by Israeli forces, which is forbidden according to article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention. Also, in Gaza especially, the border with Israel is often completely closed, causing tens of thousands of Palestinians who work in Israel to lose their jobs — their only means of livelihood.
In July and August 2006, Israeli forces have not only closed the border with Gaza, but also bombed parts of the infrastructure [bridges and main roads], which caused considerable damage and has cut off the water and electricity supply for the entire population. This was done, according to Israel, as a retaliatory measure for the abduction and imprisonment of an Israeli soldier by Palestinian resistance fighters on June 25th.
Retaliatory measures such as these, as collective punishment of an entire population, are serious breaches of International Law. In particular, article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention forbids any collective punishment.
Epilogue:
In this article I’ve tried to make clear, that not only is the American-European freezing of the financial help to the Palestinian Authority is immoral, because it is at the cost of the impoverished Palestinian population, it is also a double standard to condemn the violence of Hamas, while not condemning the ongoing violence of the Israeli occupation of Palestine.
No resistance organisation in the world can be expected to lay down their arms while the occupation and oppression they are resisting is allowed to continue in the most extreme way.
However, it must also be noted that a resistance movement must also adhere to its obligations according to International Law.
The international community, particularly the European-American nations that have chosen to boycott the Hamas-led Palestinian government, must respect the stand taken by Hamas against the Israeli occupation and settlement expansion policy, as well as Hamas’ fundamental resistance against the zionistic State-model of Israel. This must not be done by closing our eyes to the serious human rights violations of the group by the part it has played in suicide-attacks against Israeli civilians, but neither can we close our eyes to the ongoing human rights violations by Israel.
I sincerely hope that Hamas will not yield to the growing American-European political pressure to make the Israeli occupation and settlements policy points of negotiation.
But if Hamas really wants to be respected internationally, the group must refrain from attacks on Israeli civilians.
Every human being, whether Palestinian or Israeli, has the right on the same humane treatment and in my opinion, even living under an occupation as severe as the Israeli occupation of Palestine does not give a person or group the right to violate the rights of their occupiers.
Astrid Essed Amsterdam The Netherlands
“Power in defense of freedom is greater than power on behalf of tyranny and oppression.” -Malcolm X
”In any mention of Hamas in the American-European press, emphasis is always made on the suicide-attacks against Israeli civilians for which Hamas bears responsibility. It is evident that suicide-attacks are not only inhuman, they are also serious violations of International Humanitarian Law, which states that in any military conflict a clear distinction must be made between combatants [soldiers or fighters] and non-combatants [civilians].
From that point of view it is completely right that those attacks are being severely condemned by the International Community.”
GEPUBLICEERD DOOR IMEMC NEWS
HAMAS, FROM ISLAMIC REVIVAL MOVEMENT TO PALESTINIAN GOVERNMENT
” A total blockade of the Gaza Strip was announced on 9 October 2023 by the Defence Minister of Israel, Yoav Gallant. “We are putting a complete siege on Gaza … No electricity, no food, no water, no gas – it’s all closed” he announced.[2][26] “We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly,” he added”
WIKIPEDIA/ISRAELI BLOCKADE OF THE GAZA STRIP (2023-PRESENT)//BLOCKADE
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant says blockade will include ban on admission of food, electricity and fuel.
Israel has announced a “total” blockade of the already besieged Gaza Strip, including a ban on food and water, after Hamas carried out the biggest attack on the country in decades.
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said on Monday authorities would cut electricity and block the entry of food and fuel as part of “a complete siege” on Hamas-run Gaza, where about 2.3 million people live in one of the most densely populated areas in the world.
The Israeli blockade of the occupied Gaza Strip, in its current form, has been in place since June 2007. Israel controls Gaza’s airspace and territorial waters, as well as two of the three border crossing points; the third is controlled by Egypt.
“We are putting a complete siege on Gaza … No electricity, no food, no water, no gas – it’s all closed,” Gallant said in a video statement.
Israel’s chief military spokesperson, Daniel Hagari, told reporters on Monday that Israel has “control” of its communities following Saturday’s mass incursion of Hamas fighters into its territory.
Hagari said there had been some isolated incidents on Monday morning, but that “at this stage, there is no fighting in the communities”.
He added that “there might still be terrorists in the region”.
Israeli tanks and drones were guarding openings in the fence to prevent more infiltrations, Hagari said, adding that 15 of 24 border communities had been evacuated, with the rest expected to be evacuated over the next 24 hours.
Earlier, Hamas spokesperson Abdel-Latif al-Qanoua told The Associated Press news agency that the group’s fighters continued to battle outside Gaza and had captured more Israelis as recently as Monday morning.
He said the group aims to free all Palestinian prisoners held by Israel, which in the past has agreed to lopsided exchange deals in which it released large numbers of prisoners for individual captives or even the remains of soldiers.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant says he has ordered a “complete siege” of the Gaza Strip, as Israel fights the Hamas terror group.
“I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed,” Gallant says following an assessment at the IDF Southern Command in Beersheba.
“We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly,” he adds.
[47]
‘“We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly,””
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant says he has ordered a “complete siege” of the Gaza Strip, as Israel fights the Hamas terror group.
“I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed,” Gallant says following an assessment at the IDF Southern Command in Beersheba.
“We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly,” he adds.
Reacties uitgeschakeld voor Noten 46 en 47/KLEUR BEKENNEN!
Everyone in Gaza is going hungry. About 2.2 million people are surviving day by day on almost nothing, routinely going without meals. The desperate search for food is relentless, and usually unsuccessful, leaving the entire population – including babies, children, pregnant or nursing women and the elderly – hungry.
“There are no greens, fruit and dairy products here like I had before. Prices are very high because of the food shortage in the markets, so instead of three meals a day, we’ve gone down to one or two. My four-year-old has osteoporosis and needs to drink milk every day, but now I can’t get it for her.” Wisal Abu ‘Odeh, 34, a pregnant mother of two from Beit Hanoun, is a displaced person currently sheltering in the Khan Yunis area
The hunger in Gaza is not a byproduct of the war but a direct result of Israel’s declared policy, says B’Tselem in its new position paper. Residents now depend entirely on food supplies from outside Gaza, as they can no longer produce almost any food themselves. Most cultivated fields have been destroyed, and accessing open areas during the war is dangerous in any case. Bakeries, factories and food warehouses have been bombed or shut down due to lack of basic supplies, fuel and electricity. Stockpiles in private homes, stores and warehouses have long since run out, leading family and social support networks that helped residents at the start of the war to collapse, too.
Yet Israel is deliberately denying the entry of enough food into Gaza to meet the population’s needs. Only a fraction of the amount of food entering before the war is now allowed in, with limitations on the types of goods, how they are brought in and how they are distributed within Gaza.
Israel can choose to change this reality. The images of children begging for food, people waiting in long lines for paltry handouts and hungry residents charging at aid trucks are already inconceivable. The horror is growing by the minute, and the danger of famine is real. Still, Israel persists in its policy.
Changing this policy is not just a moral obligation. Allowing food into the Gaza Strip is not an act of kindness but a positive obligation under international humanitarian law: starvation as a method of warfare is prohibited, and when a civilian population lacks what it needs to survive, parties to the conflict have a positive obligation to allow rapid and unimpeded passage of humanitarian aid – including food. These two rules are considered customary law and violating them constitutes a war crime under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.
EINDE
HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
ISRAEL: UNLAWFUL GAZA BLOCKADE DEADLY FOR CHILDREN
Denial of Water, Fuel, Electricity Endangers Lives
Update October 19, 2023: President Joe Biden announced that the United States mediated an agreement allowing the movement of up to 20 trucks of food, medicine, and water into Gaza. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has urged negotiators to raise their “level of ambition.” OCHA reported that, in August 2023 alone, 12,072 truckloads of “authorized goods entered Gaza through the Israeli and Egyptian-controlled crossings.” After the total siege on the civilian population on October 9, a single dispatch of 20 truckloads does not adequately address the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza, Human Rights Watch said. Israel’s international partners should press the Israeli government to restore water and electricity supplies and lift its unlawful restrictions on aid delivery and closure.
(Jerusalem) – The Israeli government should immediately end its total blockade of the Gaza Strip that is putting Palestinian children and other civilians at grave risk, Human Rights Watch said today. The collective punishment of the population is a war crime. Israeli authorities should allow desperately needed food, medical aid, fuel, electricity, and water into Gaza, and let sick and wounded civilians leave to receive medical treatment elsewhere.
Israel announced on October 18, 2023, that it would allow food, water, and medicine to reach people in southern Gaza from Egypt, but without electricity or fuel to run the local power plant or generators, or clear provision of aid to those in the north, this falls short of meeting the needs of Gaza’s population.
The Israeli bombardment and total blockade have exacerbated the longstanding humanitarian crisis resulting from Israel’s unlawful 16-year closure of Gaza, where more than 80 percent of the population relies on humanitarian aid. Doctors in Gaza report being unable to care for children and other patients because the hospitals are overwhelmed by victims of Israeli airstrikes. On October 17, a munition struck al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City, causing mass casualties; Hamas blamed Israel for the strike, while Israel said it was a rocket misfire by Palestinian militants. Human Rights Watch is looking into the strike.
Public health officials said the lack of water, contamination of areas by sewage, and many bodies that cannot be safely stored in morgues could trigger an infectious disease outbreak.
“Israel’s bombardment and unlawful total blockade of Gaza mean that countless wounded and sick children, among many other civilians, will die for want of medical care,” said Bill Van Esveld, associate children’s rights director at Human Rights Watch. “US President Joe Biden, who is in Israel today, should press Israeli officials to completely lift the unlawful blockade and ensure the entire civilian population has prompt access to water, food, fuel, and electricity.”
Senior Israeli officials have said the total blockade of the Gaza Strip, where children comprise nearly half of the population of 2.2 million, is part of efforts to defeat Hamas, following its October 7 attack on Israel. Hamas-led Palestinian fighters killed more than 1,300 people, according to Israeli authorities, and took scores of civilians, including women and children, as hostages. On October 9, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced “a complete siege … no electricity, no water, no food, no fuel. We are fighting human animals, and we act accordingly.” The Palestinian Health Ministry has reported, as of October 18, that 3,478 Palestinians have been killed. The Palestinian rights group Defense for Children International – Palestine reported that more than 1,000 children are among those killed.
The laws of war do not prohibit sieges or blockades of enemy forces, but they may not include tactics that prevent civilians’ access to items essential for their survival, such as water, food, and medicine. Parties to the conflict must allow and facilitate the rapid passage of impartial humanitarian aid for all civilians in need. Aid may be inspected but not arbitrarily delayed.
In addition, during military occupations, such as in Gaza, the occupying power has a duty under the Fourth Geneva Convention, to the fullest extent of the means available to it, “of ensuring the food and medical supplies of the population.” Starvation as a method of warfare is prohibited and is a war crime.
Under international human rights law, states must respect the right to water, which includes refraining from limiting access to, or destroying, water services and infrastructure as a punitive measure during armed conflicts as well as respecting the obligations to protect objects indispensable for survival of the civilian population.
Israel’s total blockade against the population in Gaza forms part of the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution that Israeli authorities are committing against Palestinians.
News media reported on October 17 that Israel had refused to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza, while Egypt was refusing to allow Palestinians to cross into the Sinai. Egypt and Israel should permit civilians to pass through their respective crossings to seek at least temporary protection or life-saving medical care, while also ensuring that anyone who flees is entitled to voluntary return in safety and dignity.
Lack of Medical Care
Shortages of medical equipment, supplies, and medication in the face of overwhelming casualties are causing avoidable deaths in hospitals in the Gaza Strip. More than 60 percent of patients are children, Dr. Midhat Abbas, director general of health in Gaza, told Human Rights Watch. An intern emergency room doctor at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital wept while speaking to Human Rights Watch by phone on October 15:
Yesterday, in the intensive care unit, it was full, and all ventilators were in use. A child came in with head trauma who needed a ventilator. They had to choose between two children, who would die. He [the doctor] made a decision that one child was more promising to treat, so we were forced to switch the ventilator, and the other child died.
A doctor at the Northern Medical Complex said that on the night of October 14, intensive-care unit medics had to disconnect an adult patient from a ventilator to use it for a 10-year-old. He said a lack of medical supplies had obliged him to stitch a woman’s head wound without gloves or sterile equipment.
In a voice message on October 14, a doctor at al-Shifa hospital described a group of patients with “back wounds, including compound fractures, that can be really painful.” He said that the hospital had run out of painkillers to administer to them.
Ghassan Abu Sitta, a British surgeon volunteering at al-Shifa hospital, posted on social media on October 10, that “the hospitals, because of the siege, are so short of supplies that we had to clean a teenage girl with 70 percent body surface burns with regular soap because the hospital is out of chlorhexidine (antiseptic).” On October 14, he said in a voice note shared with Human Rights Watch: “We are no longer able to do anything but the most life-saving surgeries” because medical supplies were exhausted, and deaths and injuries had caused staff shortages.
More than 5,500 pregnant women in the Gaza Strip are expected to deliver within the next month, but face “compromised functionality of health facilities” and lack of “lifesaving supplies,” the United Nations Population Fund said on October 13.
“We need insulin [for diabetics],” said the head of a UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) shelter on October 15. “People are dying.” The shelter was overwhelmed with 15,000 internally displaced people.
The UN World Health Organization stated on October 14 that it had flown medical and basic health supplies for 300,000 patients to Egypt, near the Gaza Strip’s southern border, and more than 1,000 tons of other humanitarian aid had been shipped to the area. As of October 17, though, humanitarian workers and aid remain blocked via the Rafah border crossing. Israeli attacks have reportedly hit the crossing repeatedly, rendering it unsafe. Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said four Egyptian aid workers were injured in the Israeli strikes and that “there is not yet any sort of authorization for a safe passage from the other side of the crossing.”
Israel’s order on October 13 to all civilians located in the north of the Gaza Strip to evacuate to the south exacerbated the medical crisis: 21 hospitals currently holding more than 2,000 patients are located in this region. The World Health Organization said the evacuations “could be tantamount to a death sentence” for the sick and injured and said hospitals were already beyond capacity in the southern Gaza Strip. A pediatric doctor at Kamal Adwan Hospital said evacuating would likely cause the deaths of seven newborns in the ICU who were connected to ventilators.
Dr. Abu Sitta said that Israel’s evacuation order forced the Mohammed al-Durra Pediatric Hospital east of Gaza City to close, including a neonatal intensive care unit supported by the charity he volunteers with, Medical Aid for Palestinians.
The sick and wounded, including children and pregnant women, have not been allowed to cross Rafah into Egypt or the Erez crossing into Israel to receive treatment. Dr. Abbas, the director general of health, said, “We are in desperate need of a safe humanitarian passage for patients immediately, [and] we need field hospitals immediately.”
Electricity
On October 7, Israeli authorities cut the electricity it delivers to Gaza, the main source of electricity there. Israeli authorities also cut fuel necessary to run Gaza’s only power plant. The power plant has since run out of fuel and shut down. On October 17, Dr. Abbas told Human Rights Watch by phone that hospitals’ emergency generators will run out of fuel “within hours.”
The International Committee of the Red Cross regional director warned on October 11 that the power cuts are “putting newborns in incubators and elderly patients on oxygen at risk. Kidney dialysis stops, and X-rays can’t be taken. Without electricity, hospitals risk turning into morgues.”
Water and Sewage
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported that 97 percent of the groundwater in Gaza is “unfit for human consumption,” leaving people dependent on the supply of water from Israel and on the territory’s desalination plants. Israel cut off all water on October 11, and most desalination also stopped that day due to the cutoff in electricity, leaving about 600,000 people without clean water, Omar Shatat, deputy director general of Gaza’s Coastal Municipalities Water Utility, told Human Rights Watch.
The last functioning desalination plant stopped operating on October 15. Israel partially resumed water delivery that day, but only to the eastern Khan Younis area, and it amounted to less than 4 percent of the water consumed in Gaza prior to October 7, according to OCHA.
UNRWA warned that “people will start dying of severe dehydration” unless access to water is resumed. The Associated Press reported on October 15 that a doctor had treated 15 cases of children with bacterial dysentery due to lack of clean water, which can also cause diseases like cholera, particularly in children under 5.
“Israel has cut off the most basic goods necessary for survival in Gaza, where there are more than a million children at risk,” Van Esveld said. “Every hour that this blockade continues costs lives.”
EINDE
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
ISRAEL/OPT: ISRAEL MUST LIFT ILLEGAL AND INHUMANE BLOCKADE
The shutdown of Gaza’s only power plant will exacerbate an already desperate humanitarian crisis for more than 2.2 million people trapped in the Gaza Strip, amid a massive bombing campaign by Israel that has killed at least 1,350 people and injured more than 6,000 people.
The airstrikes were launched in retaliation to the attack on 7 October by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups from Gaza who fired indiscriminate rockets and sent fighters into southern Israel, killing more than 1,200 people and injuring more than 2,700 and taking hostages, including many civilians.
“The Israeli authorities must immediately restore Gaza’s electricity supply and suspend the increased restrictions imposed as a result of the Minister of Defence’s order of 9 October 2023 and lift its illegal 16-year blockade on the Gaza Strip. The collective punishment of Gaza’s civilian population amounts to a war crime – it is cruel and inhumane. As the occupying power, Israel has a clear obligation under international law to ensure the basic needs of Gaza’s civilian population are met,” said Amnesty International’s Secretary General Agnès Callamard.
The blackout has plunged the Gaza strip into darkness and will exacerbate an ongoing humanitarian catastrophe. It will further limit communications and access to the internet. The power cuts will have a severe impact on essential services, access to clean water and will cause a public health disaster leaving Gaza’s already depleted hospitals without vital medical equipment at a time when medics are struggling to treat thousands gravely wounded in Israeli attacks. It will also endanger the lives of hospital patients, including people with chronic conditions or those in intensive care, including newborn babies on life support.
An Israeli minister said today that the authorities will not restore power or allow water or fuel to enter until Hamas releases hostages. This is an explicit confirmation that these acts have been taken to punish civilians in Gaza for the actions of Palestinian armed groups. Amnesty reiterates that Palestinian civilians are not responsible for the crimes of Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups and Israel must not, under international law, make them suffer for acts they play no role in and cannot control.
“Palestinian armed groups’ horrific mass killing of Israeli civilians and other serious violations do not absolve Israel from upholding its obligations to respect international humanitarian law and to protect civilians. The collective punishment of civilians in Gaza will not bring justice to the victims of war crimes by Hamas and other armed groups or security to civilians in Israel,” said Agnes Callamard.
Amnesty International is also concerned by the repeated attacks on the Rafah border crossing. It calls on Israel to facilitate the establishment of humanitarian corridors for the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza, and to allow safe passage for those in need of medical care outside the Gaza Strip. It urges the international community to work towards an agreement over humanitarian corridors.
Israeli authorities must refrain from committing unlawful attacks that kill or injure civilians and destroy civilian homes and infrastructure. Israeli officials must refrain from incitement to violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem and ensure the safety of all civilians living under its control. All Palestinian armed groups in Gaza must release all civilian hostages unconditionally and immediately.
Amnesty International is currently investigating Israeli air strikes in Gaza, including the air strike on a residential building in al-Zeitoun neighbourhood, which killed 15 members of the same family, including seven children – five siblings and their two cousins, in addition to their elderly grandparents; the destruction of Burj Palestine, a high-rise building in al-Rimal neighbourhood in Gaza; and the bombing of a crowded market street in Jabalia refugee camp, which killed at least 69 people, including at least 15 Children.
Amnesty International is calling on Israel and Palestinian armed groups to take all feasible precautions to spare civilians, in line with their obligations under international humanitarian law.
This output is part of a series of articles by Amnesty International into the escalating violence and human rights violations in Israel, Gaza and elsewhere in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Amnesty International has published its initial findings on war crimes committed by Hamas and Palestinian armed groups including mass summary executions, hostage-taking, and the firing of inherently indiscriminate rockets. With evidence still emerging of the violations committed in southern Israel, Amnesty International will continue its investigations to determine the full range of crimes committed under international law.
Background
Since 2007, Israel has imposed an air, land and sea blockade on the Gaza Strip collectively punishing its entire population. The current fighting is the sixth major military operation Israel and Gaza-based armed groups since then. On 9 October Israel’s minister of defence Yoav Gallant announced a “complete siege on Gaza… No electricity, no food, no water, no gas – it’s all closed,” as part of the Israeli retaliatory attack following the attack by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups that killed 1,200 people.
In June, Amnesty International published its investigation into the May 2023 offensive on the Gaza strip, finding that Israel had unlawfully destroyed Palestinian homes, often without military necessity in what amounts to a form of collective punishment against the civilian population.
In its February 2022 report, Amnesty International set out how Israeli forces have committed in Gaza (as well as in the West Bank and Israel) acts prohibited by the Statute of the International Criminal Court and the Apartheid Convention, as part of a widespread and systemic attack against the civilian population with the aim of maintaining a system of oppression and domination over Palestinians, thereby constituting the crime against humanity of apartheid.
Previous reports by Amnesty International on violations and crimes committed in the context of fighting between Israel and Palestinian armed groups can be found here.
Amnesty International is an impartial human rights organization and seeks to ensure that all parties to an armed conflict comply with international humanitarian law and international human rights law. Accordingly, in future briefings, Amnesty International will be investigating Israel’s military action in the Gaza Strip to determine whether it is complying with the rules of international humanitarian law, including by taking necessary precautions to minimize harm to civilians and civilian objects and refraining from unlawful attacks and from collective punishment of the civilian population, as required under international law. Amnesty International will also continue to monitor the activities of Hamas and Palestinian armed groups.
Reacties uitgeschakeld voor Noot 48/KLEUR BEKENNEN!
In June 2007, following the military takeover of Gaza by Hamas, the Israeli authorities significantly intensified existing movement restrictions, virtually isolating the Gaza Strip from the rest of the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt), and the world. This land, sea and air blockade has significantly exacerbated previous restrictions, limiting the number and specified categories of people and goods allowed in and out through the Israeli-controlled crossings. ”
UNICEFTHE GAZA STRIP/THE HUMANITARIAN IMPACT OF15 YEARS OF BLOCKADE-JUNE 2022
In June 2007, following the military takeover of Gaza by Hamas, the Israeli authorities significantly intensified existing movement restrictions, virtually isolating the Gaza Strip from the rest of the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt), and the world. This land, sea and air blockade has significantly exacerbated previous restrictions, limiting the number and specified categories of people and goods allowed in and out through the Israeli-controlled crossings.
Prior to the Second Intifada in 2000, up to half a million exits of people from Gaza into Israel, primarily workers, were recorded in a single month. For the first seven years of the blockade, this number declined to just over 4,000 on average, rising to 10,400 monthly over the next eight years.
So far in 2022, the Israeli authorities have approved only 64% of patients’ requests to exit Gaza mainly for specialized treatment in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, by the time of the scheduled medical appointment. In previous years, patients have died while awaiting a response to their application.
The Egyptian authorities closed the Rafah border crossing with Gaza for long periods after 2014 following political unrest in Egypt. Rafah has been mostly operational since mid-2018, and was open for 95 days out of 151 in the first five months of 2022.
After the blockade, the number of truckloads of commercial goods exiting Gaza dropped significantly to only two truckloads on average per month in 2009. Following the 2014 escalation of hostilities, commercial transfers from Gaza to the West Bank resumed, and from March 2015 exports to Israel also resumed. In August 2021, exports to Egypt started for the first time, boosting the monthly average of exports to 787 in the first five months of 2022. Pre-blockade, the average monthly high was 961.
The volume of truckloads entering Gaza in the first five months of 2022, around 8,000 per month, was about 30% below the monthly average for the first half of 2007, before the blockade. Since then, the population has grown by more than 50%.
Israeli forces have largely restricted access to areas within 300 metres of the Gaza side of the perimeter fence with Israel; areas several hundred metres beyond are deemed not safe, preventing, or discouraging, agricultural activities.
Israeli forces restrict access off the Gaza coast, currently only allowing fishermen to access 50% of the fishing waters allocated for this purpose under the Oslo Accords.
Unemployment levels in Gaza are amongst the highest in the world: the Q1 jobless rate in 2022 was 46.6%, compared with an average of 34.8% in 2006. Youth unemployment for the same period (age 15-29) stands at 62.5%. (PCBS)
31% of households in Gaza have difficulties meeting essential education needs such as tuition fees and books, due to lack of financial resources.
1.3 million out of 2.1 million Palestinians in Gaza (62%) require food assistance.
At its current operating capacity, the Gaza Power Plant can only produce up to 80 megawatts (MW), supplemented by 120 MW purchased from Israel, meeting about 50% of the electricity demand in Gaza (400-450MW). In 2021, rolling power cuts averaged 11 hours per day.
78% of piped water in Gaza is unfit for human consumption.
EINDE HUMAN RIGHTS WATCHLETTER TO OLMERT: STOP THE BLOCKADEOF GAZA20 NOVEMBER 2008
November 20, 2008 Dear Prime Minister Olmert, We are writing to express our deep concern about Israel’s continuing blockade of the Gaza Strip, a measure that is depriving its population of food, fuel, and basic services, and constitutes a form of collective punishment.
The latest measures, a complete closure of all Gaza border crossings since November 5, are part of an ongoing policy by your government that has prevented the normal flow of goods and people in and out of Gaza since January 2006. It has contributed to a humanitarian crisis, deepened poverty and ruined the economy. We urge your government to abandon this policy.
Your government states that this latest blockade was in response to Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel, in which two Israel civilians were injured (on November 14 and 16), and over a dozen others treated for shock. Human Rights Watch has repeatedly condemned deliberate and indiscriminate Palestinian rocket attacks on Israeli communities as violations of the laws of war. We recently sent a letter to Hamas leaders calling on them to renounce such attacks, and arrest and prosecute those who carry out or encourage attacks on civilians.
However, violations of the laws of war by one party to a conflict do not justify violations by the other. As such, illegal attacks by Palestinian armed groups do not justify an illegal Israeli response. Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip, an occupied territory under the Fourth Geneva Convention, constitutes collective punishment in violation of the laws of war. While your government has eased the restrictions for one day on November 17 the humanitarian situation in Gaza is now critical as the borders remain closed. Food distribution by the United Nations to 750,000 people—half of Gaza’s population—was forced to a halt last week, and remains severely disrupted.
Israel permitted 30 trucks to enter Gaza on November 17, delivering just eight trucks of food aid for the United Nations relief agency distribution centers, enough to feed 20,000 people. Those supplies are now almost gone, according to UN officials. The agency has to import at least 15 truckloads of food daily to meet the territory’s needs. Food stocks in three UN warehouses have also been emptied.
Gaza’s main power station needs over 21 million liters of industrial diesel before it can restart power production, according to the relief agency. Gaza is currently suffering widespread power shortages with power cuts of up to 16 hours a day. On average 650,000 people–over a third of the population—are without power at any one time amid rolling power cuts throughout the territory.
The fuel and power shortages have disrupted the pumping of water from 80 percent of Gaza water wells according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). Twenty percent of the population has access to water for six hours five times a week. Forty percent have access to water four days a week, and the remaining 40 percent have water for just three days a week.
No wheat grain has entered Gaza for 16 days, prompting Gaza’s largest flour mill al-Philistiniya to close, according to OCHA. A lack of cooking gas has closed 28 out of 47 pita-bread bakeries in Gaza, and bread is being rationed. There are no bakeries in production in Rafah in the south of Gaza.
The latest closures have compounded the already severe effects of a longer term blockade your government implemented when Hamas took full control of Gaza in June 2007. Other restrictions have been in place since December 2005, when Hamas won legislative elections in the West Bank and Gaza. Over the last year, this policy has deepened poverty in Gaza and cut its industrial production by over 90 percent, according to the World Bank. The Palestinian Federation of Industries estimates that as a result of import restrictions and the inability to export, only 23 of the 3,900 industries in Gaza are operating, six of which produce wheat flour, one clothing, and the remainder food processing.
These restrictions are impacting a population that is already among the poorest in the world. Close to 70 percent of the population lives in deep poverty, according the UN relief agency, UNRWA. (The agency defines deep poverty as a family of six persons or more living on income of less than US$467 per month.) Egypt has been complicit in the blockade by keeping its borders with Gaza closed for much of the past year, in cooperation with your government.
Israel made a commitment in June to ease some of these restrictions – but the movement of goods into Gaza and people in and out the territory remains a fraction of what it was when borders were last opened for free trade. October’s imports represented only 21 percent of the December 2005 level (13,430 truckloads), that is prior to the Palestinian Legislative Council elections, and 26 percent of the May 2007 level, immediately before the Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip, according to OCHA. Exports from Gaza are not allowed by your government.
In September and October, Egypt and Israel allowed around 6000 pilgrims, hospital patients and some businessmen to pass through the Rafah and Erez border crossings. However, the Israeli and Egyptian governments have prevented over 800 students from leaving the territory to study abroad. Restrictions on freedom of movement for the large majority of the population remain in place, preventing their access to work, healthcare, and family outside of Gaza.
Even though Israel withdrew its permanent military forces and settlers in 2005, it remains an occupying power in Gaza under international law because it continues to exercise effective day-to-day control over key aspects of life in Gaza. Under the Fourth Geneva Convention, Israel is obliged to ensure the provision of food and medical supplies to the civilian population to the fullest extent possible.
We urge your government to immediately lift restrictions on the flow into Gaza of food, medicines, and other supplies essential for the well-being of the civilian population and to cease all measures that amount to collective punishment of the civilian population, including disruptions to the electricity supply and fuel cuts. We also urge your government to respect the right to freedom of movement, especially for those who need to travel for reasons of health or education.
We look forward to your response to this matter.
Yours sincerely,
SarahLeah Whitson Executive Director Middle East and North Africa Division Human Rights Watch
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“We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly,””
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant says he has ordered a “complete siege” of the Gaza Strip, as Israel fights the Hamas terror group.
“I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed,” Gallant says following an assessment at the IDF Southern Command in Beersheba.
“We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly,” he adds.
De driehoek – burgemeester, justitie en politie – heeft voorwaarden gesteld aan de organisatoren van de pro-Palestina mars van aankomende zondag. Zo moet de organisatie zelf de orde houden over de demonstranten. Daarnaast is het zwaaien van vlaggen van terreurorganisaties zoals Hamas of Hezbollah verboden, mag gezichtsbedekkende kleding niet worden gedragen en mogen er geen voorwerpen worden verbrand. De gemeente zegt dat er tussen de 2500 tot 10.000 deelnemers worden verwacht.
“De driehoek zal haatzaaien, oproepen tot geweld en andere bedreigingen van onze vreedzame en open samenleving niet tolereren”, zo laat de driehoek weten. Vlaggen van terreurgroepen mogen bijvoorbeeld niet worden getoond en een oproep tot geweld mag niet worden gedaan. Gezichtsbedekkende kleding is ook verboden om de orde te bewaren, religieuze kleding mag wel. Het verbranden van voorwerpen tolereert de driehoek ook niet: “Aangezien dit tot wanordelijkheden kan leiden en voor andere demonstranten en omstanders een gevaar kan zijn.”
Zelf orde houden
Omdat er bij eerdere pro-Israël en pro-Palestina protesten incidenten en confrontaties zijn geweest, is er bij de driehoek nu ook zorgen over de kans op nieuwe incidenten. “Het verleden leert dat demonstraties over dit thema vaak over en weer tegenreacties oproepen, waarbij strafbare feiten en confrontaties met tegendemonstranten kunnen plaatsvinden”, schrijft burgemeester Halsema aan de organisatie.
De driehoek wijst de organisatoren daarom scherp om de mars in goede banen te leiden en zelf mensen te regelen die de ervoor zorgen dat er geen strafbare feiten worden gepleegd. De Amsterdamse politie is ook ter begeleiding aanwezig. Halsema liet gisteren al weten dat het Openbaar Ministerie meeluistert tijdens de protesten, bijvoorbeeld bij de speeches. Als de voorwaarden worden overtreden of als er niet naar de politie wordt geluisterd, zal er worden opgetreden door de politie.
Pro-Israël demonstratie
Op het moment van de Palestina-mars is er ook een pro-Israël demonstratie op het Beursplein. De mars loopt niet langs de demonstratie en de demonstranten mogen niet afwijken van de afgesproken route. Vanaf de Dam loopt de Palestina-mars via de Nieuwezijds Voorburgwal en de Haarlemmerstraat naar het Westerpark.
Joodse buurt
Toen begin deze week de mars werd aangekondigd werd er op sociale media met afschuw gereageerd op de route. De protestmars zou namelijk vanaf de Dam richting het Jonas Daniël Meijerplein lopen, midden in de oude Joodse buurt. “In het hart van de oude Jodenbuurt, tussen de synagoges. Dit zou een gigantische schandvlek zijn voor onze stad. Nu en in de toekomst”, reageerde stadsdeelcommissielid uit Zuid Michael Vis (VVD).
Een van de organisatoren van de mars liet aan AT5 weten niet stil te hebben gestaan bij de gevoeligheid van het plein en dat de route was gekozen omdat het een makkelijke looproute is die vaker wordt gebruikt. De organisatie gaf aan de route te wijzigen en ook de politie en de gemeente verzochten de organisatie om dat te doen. Het eindpunt werd vervolgens verplaatst naar het Westerpark.
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More than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since Israel launched its war on Hamas following the group’s October 7 attack, the health ministry in the enclave said Thursday, yet another darkmilestone in the 10-month-old conflict.
The ministry said 40 people had died in Gaza during the past 24 hours, taking the total number of deaths since October 7 to 40,005 – about one in every 55 people in the enclave.More than 92,401have been injured.
The health ministry does not distinguish between combatants and civilians in its figures but says most of the dead are women and children. Israel said last month that it had killed more than 17,000 combatants in Gaza since the start of the war. CNN cannot independently verify the ministry’s numbers.
In addition, at least another 10,000 people are missing and believed to be buried under rubble in Gaza, the Gaza government’s media office said earlier this week.
The soaring figures give a window into the daily suffering, malnutrition and volatility in Gaza after 10 months of conflict.
United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini has described it as “a very grim milestone at the world’s watch,” on X, adding that it is “a direct result of a collective failure to reach a ceasefire.”
And the milestone has been passed at a particularly unpredictable point in the conflict. A new round of ceasefire talks are due to begin Thursday, after the killings of senior figures in Hamas and the Iranian-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah upended the leadership of both organizations and made the negotiations appear precarious.
The news follows an especially deadly weekend for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. At least 93 people were killed overnight into Saturday when an Israeli strike hit a school and mosque in the eastern part of Gaza City where displaced people were sheltering, according to local officials. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed to CNN that it hit the compound, saying its air force “precisely struck Hamas terrorists operating within a Hamas command and control center embedded” in the building.
Israeli military officials have said they try to minimize harm to civilians in Gaza and that Hamas bears the blame for using civilians as “human shields.”
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed to CNN that it hit the compound and said that “at least 19 Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists were eliminated” in the strike. It later said it had identified 12 more militants who were killed in the strike.
The strike was almost universally condemned, including by some of Israel’s closest allies.
Thursday marks “a grim milestone for the world,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said after the figures were announced. “Most of the dead are women and children. This unimaginable situation is overwhelmingly due to recurring failures by the Israeli Defense Forces to comply with the rules of war.”
Fading hopes for a ceasefire
Israel launched its war against Hamas after the militant group’s cross-border October 7 attacks, in which more than 1,200 Israelis were killed and 250 taken hostage, according to Israeli authorities. More than 100 of those hostages remain in Gaza, their families back home pleading for a breakthrough to secure their safe return.
Hopes of a hostage-for-ceasefire agreement seemed todiminish in recent weeks after Israel launched a series of strikes against senior figures in Hamas and in Hezbollah, which has been sparring with Israel on a near-daily basis since October, in solidarity with Hamas.
But Egyptian and Qatari mediators have conveyed to Israeli officials in recent days that Yahya Sinwar, the new head of its political bureau following the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, wants a ceasefire deal, an Israeli source familiar with the matter said.
Israel said it would send a delegation to the talks. Hamas, however, has said it will not participate in talks Thursday but is willing to speak to mediators afterwards if there are “developments or a serious response from Israel,” the source told CNN.
A hardliner and, according to Israel, one of the masterminds behind the deadly October 7 terror attacks, Sinwar was previouslybelieved to be dismissive of a ceasefire and hostage release deal.
Hamas said Sunday it has asked mediators to implement a ceasefire plan based on previous ceasefire talks such as those put forward by US President Joe Biden and the UN Security Council in July.
International pressure is intensifyingfor Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reach an agreement with Hamas.
A drumbeat of Western criticism of Netanyahu’s actions has grown louder in recent weeks, with the election of a Labour government in the United Kingdom and the confirmation of US Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic nominee for November’s presidential election. Harris’ comments on Gaza signal a shift in tone from Biden’s steady support of Israel.
Harris said Saturday that “far too many” civilians have been killed in Gaza, saying a deal “needs to get done now.”
And Netanyahu faces anger from some quarters at home. The Hostage and Missing Families Forum, a powerful voice in Israel, has for months repeatedly called on Israel and Hamas to finalize a hostage-and-ceasefire deal.
“A deal is the only path to bring all hostages home. Time is running out. The hostages have no more to spare. A deal must be signed now!” the forum said in a statement last week.
A humanitarian catastrophe
A ceasefire deal would provide a reprieve for the approximately 2.2 million Palestinians who have been living in nightmarish conditions in Gaza.
Nearly everyone living in Gaza has been displaced in the conflict, with many people forced to flee repeatedly as the Israeli military operation expanded, often into placesitpreviously said had been cleared of Hamas fighters.
In recent days, some 75,000 people southwest Gaza after Israeli evacuation orders were issued, according to UNRWA chief Lazzarini.
Less than a sixth of the area of Gaza is not under Israeli evacuation orders, Lazzarini said late last month.
“Quite often, people have just a few hours to pack whatever they can & start all over again, mostly on foot or on a crowded donkey cart for those who can afford it,” he said Sunday on the social media platform X.
So dire are conditions in Gaza that gravediggers in the enclave are struggling to find space to bury those who have died. A grave digger in Khan Younis, Najy Abu Hateb, told Reuters he is “exhausted.”
“Since the war began, we haven’t stopped for even a minute, and we hope the war ends … there’s no place (to bury people),” Hateb said.
Hateb said gravediggers have been forced to dig up old graves to bury the new bodies. “We have reached a situation that forced us to bury people even with sand, placing bodies on top of one another,” he added.
Earlier this week Fikr Shalltoot, the Gaza Director for aid group Medical Aid for Palestinians, said the impending milestone “means that 40,000 families are grieving, and their hearts are broken.”
“Many people are losing hope and some are losing faith, but mostly people are losing trust in the international community. They are angry and disappointed and believe that the world has failed them and let them down,” she said in a statement.
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