Every time I go into the field for work, I’m keenly aware that it feels like I’m taking a direct route to my own grave. I slip from corner to corner, walking with so much care that it’s as if I must be a deadly threat to someone. I’m not a fighter. I have never held a gun or engaged in a fight. I don’t believe I’m a threat to Israel or anyone else — I’m just a writer who tells people’s stories. But I’m wrong.
For an occupying power, I might pose more of a danger to Israel than a fighter.
The fighters may die, and their journey will end, but as a writer, my stories can last forever. They are meant to chronicle the history of my people. The power of the occupation stems from its ability to hide history. Our role is to defend and maintain it, to preserve the truth about our people who were systematically slaughtered by their occupiers, whose nation was erased because our colonizer wanted to take our land.
That's from Tareq S. Hajjaj's report for MONDOWEIS about the ongoing destruction as the Israeli government continues to terrorize the residents of Gaza.
In the first couple of days of the attack, I went into the field to report. The places I went to were always the safest ones I could go to in Gaza, like al-Shifa’ Hospital in Gaza City. I never thought that the hospitals would be targets of Israel’s warcrafts. But here we are, and Israel has proven that nothing will hold back its crimes in Gaza.
The United Nations special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories expressed concern on Sunday that the international body has so far not publicly advocated for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza, as rhetoric from the United States and other influential countries has offered tacit approval of an Israeli air campaign in the blockaded enclave where at least 2,670 Palestinians, including more than 700 children, have now been killed.
Francesca Albanese, who has served as the special rapporteur since 2022, toldAl Jazeera that Israel must account for exactly "how the dismantlement of Hamas is happening" as it intensifies what it claims is a war targeting Hamas to retaliate for the group's surprise attack on October 7.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have spent the last week bombing residential buildings, schools housing refugees, healthcare facilities, and at least one convoy of people traveling through Gaza after Israel ordered one million people to leave the northern part of the enclave within 24 hours in order to "save their lives" from continued strikes.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health said Sunday
that at least 50 entire families in Gaza have been wiped out from the
civil registry, with all their members killed in air strikes and
shelling.
"I don't have any sign that [a cease-fire] is being considered even at the U.N. secretary-general level," Albanese told Al Jazeera. "It troubles me because, on one hand, you have Israeli officials saying they want to eliminate Hamas. But what we see on the ground is thousands of people including children being killed and injured."
U.N.
Secretary-General António Guterres has called for "international
humanitarian law and human rights law" to be upheld, but has not called
for a cessation of the strikes in Gaza.
On social media, Albanese said that "there can be no more delay" of a public call by Guterres for a cease-fire, and that atrocities like the mass displacement and killing of civilians "must not only be punished but also prevented."
The corridors may be dimly lit, but the devastation that has engulfed Gaza's Dar al-Shifa hospital is on full display for the newly arriving wounded to see.
Groans and screams of pain ring out from different sides of the emergency room, as doctors try to navigate through a sea of injured Palestinians being treated on the floors.
Hospital workers grab mops and start to clean the blood-stained tiles between the wounded, as the strong smell of chlorine wafts through the air.
We're only on day nine of Israel's latest round of air strikes on the besieged Gaza Strip, but the sheer scale of the devastation has aready pushed this war-battered facility to breaking point.
On the front page of today’s New York Times website there is an editorial leading the Opinion section under the title, “Israel is fighting to defend a society that values human life.” An obvious question arises. What society is that? If you click through to the article itself a different title appears —“Israel Can Defend Itself and Uphold its Values.” Once again, an unintentional irony. But in fairness, you could argue that they are trying to appeal to people inside Israel who can be shamed.
Today’s editorial probably shows that the Times editors are in a panic about just how far Israel will go, and they are trying to rein them in using a method they hope will work — flattery. There are, of course, Israelis who do not wish to commit a second Nakba, but those in charge — well, who wants to bet on that?
In reality, Hamas attacked Israel and massacred 1,300 civilians, and Israel is responding with its own massive war crimes, which have already killed over 1,000 more civilians than Hamas did. And as detailed elsewhere on this site and even in the New York Times, it is committing war crimes. The Times is suggesting that Israel kill fewer people in a piece that whitewashes Israel’s record. You can read the piece for yourself if you have a subscription.
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