Saturday, March 23, 2024

Gaza

All week, Israeli forces have attacked Al Shifa Hospital.  The United Kingdom's CHANNEL 4 reports on some of the young patients trapped inside. 


As these War Crimes continue and add up, more and more people speak out.  Philip Dewey (WALES ONLINE) reports:


Charlotte Church performed as part of a group singing in support of Gaza at Barry Island Promenade. The Welsh singer has lent her voice to a number of pro Palestine causes, calling for an immediate ceasefire on the Gaza Strip.

The Big Sing for Gaza event took place on Saturday at the popular tourist attraction, with fundraised for the Middle East Children's Alliance. Church led a choir on the promenade, singing "Let Gaza live", with the event also including kite flying, sand art and floral tributes.

Speaking at the event, Church said: "It's been a beautiful event, I feel very passionate about whatever I can to raise my voice to call for a ceasefire and to call to end the occupation of Palestine. What we're seeing happen in Palestine, what we're seeing happen to civilians, to children to babies, to birthing mothers, it's unbearable, it's unbearable to witness and I just (feel) like I have to do whatever I can as one small human to be with these other wonderful humans whose hearts are breaking over what is happened and what they are seeing, and what's being allowed to happen.

"Our government is complicit, America's government is complicit, and other world governments who are complicit in this and are still sending money and weapons to Israel. As a mother it's just too much, it needs to stop, it needs to end. I'll keep coming out until it does. Not just a ceasefire but an end to the occupation. Palestine has been under an apartheid system and a military occupation in Gaza since the 60s, and a really violent military occupation.


VATICAN NEWS reports that Cardinal Gianbattista Pizzaballa has termed the Gaza situation "objectively intolerable" and "Everyone -- religious, political, and social communities -- must do everything possible to put an end this situation."  AP notes U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres has called it a "moral outage."  Former UK Prime Minister David Miliband, International Rescue Committee president,  terms it "a failure of humanity" -- see video below.



And AOC calls it "an unfolding genocide."  Lauren Aratani (GUARDIAN) reports:


Progressive US congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called the Israeli military campaign in Gaza an “unfolding genocide” in a scathing speech that demanded the Joe Biden White House suspend aid to Israel’s armed forces.

“As we speak, in this moment, 1.1 million innocents in Gaza are at famine’s door,” Ocasio-Cortez said in a speech on the House floor on Friday.

Citing 30,000 Palestinian deaths in Gaza and noting 70% were women and children, she continued: “A famine … is being intentionally precipitated through the blocking of food and global humanitarian assistance by leaders in the Israeli government. This is a mass starvation of people, engineered and orchestrated.

“This was all accomplished – much of this was accomplished – with US resources and weapons. If you want to know what an unfolding genocide looks like, open your eyes.”


Friday marked the first time the congresswoman has publicly called the ongoing violence in Gaza ― where more than 30,000 people have been killed by Israeli forces ― a genocide. Of those deaths, more than 25,000 have been women and children, killed in an offensive launched in response to the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attack on Israel."  And Ece Goksedef (BBC NEWS) reports:

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has made a renewed call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

"It is time to silence the guns," he said, speaking from the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing with the enclave.

He also called on Israel to give "total, unfettered" access to humanitarian goods throughout Gaza.

A UN-backed food security assessment this week said 1.1 million people in Gaza were struggling with catastrophic hunger and starvation.

It added that a man-made famine in the north was imminent between now and May.


Despite all the above and more, the assault continues.  Stanly Johny (THE HINDU) explains, "Despite growing international calls for a ceasefire, the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vows that it would continue its military operation until 'Hamas is dismantled'."




Gaza remains under assault. Day 169 of  the assault in the wave that began in October.  Binoy Kampmark (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out, "Bloodletting as form; murder as fashion.  The ongoing campaign in Gaza by Israel’s Defence Forces continues without stalling and restriction.  But the burgeoning number of corpses is starting to become a challenge for the propaganda outlets:  How to justify it?  Fortunately for Israel, the United States, its unqualified defender, is happy to provide cover for murder covered in the sheath of self-defence."   CNN has explained, "The Gaza Strip is 'the most dangerous place' in the world to be a child, according to the executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund."  ABC NEWS quotes UNICEF's December 9th statement, ""The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child. Scores of children are reportedly being killed and injured on a daily basis. Entire neighborhoods, where children used to play and go to school have been turned into stacks of rubble, with no life in them."  NBC NEWS notes, "Strong majorities of all voters in the U.S. disapprove of President Joe Biden’s handling of foreign policy and the Israel-Hamas war, according to the latest national NBC News poll. The erosion is most pronounced among Democrats, a majority of whom believe Israel has gone too far in its military action in Gaza."  The slaughter continues.  It has displaced over 1 million people per the US Congressional Research Service.  Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "Academics and legal experts around the world, including Holocaust scholars, have condemned the six-week Israeli assault of Gaza as genocide."   The death toll of Palestinians in Gaza is grows higher and higher.  United Nations Women noted, "More than 1.9 million people -- 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza -- have been displaced, including what UN Women estimates to be nearly 1 million women and girls. The entire population of Gaza -- roughly 2.2 million people -- are in crisis levels of acute food insecurity or worse."  DPA notes today's events  "brings the total number of Palestinian fatalities in the latest Gaza war to 32,142, plus 74,412 injured."  Months ago,  AP  noted, "About 4,000 people are reported missing."  February 7th, Jeremy Scahill explained on DEMOCRACY NOW! that "there’s an estimated 7,000 or 8,000 Palestinians missing, many of them in graves that are the rubble of their former home."  February 5th, the United Nations' Phillipe Lazzarini Tweeted:








And the area itself?  Isabele Debre (AP) reveals, "Israel’s military offensive has turned much of northern Gaza into an uninhabitable moonscape. Whole neighborhoods have been erased. Homes, schools and hospitals have been blasted by airstrikes and scorched by tank fire. Some buildings are still standing, but most are battered shells."  Kieron Monks (I NEWS) reports, "More than 40 per cent of the buildings in northern Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, according to a new study of satellite imagery by US researchers Jamon Van Den Hoek from Oregon State University and Corey Scher at the City University of New York. The UN gave a figure of 45 per cent of housing destroyed or damaged across the strip in less than six weeks. The rate of destruction is among the highest of any conflict since the Second World War." 



  A United Nations panel said Thursday that the Israeli military's siege of Gaza appears "calculated to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinian children," pointing to the growing number of kids starving to death as Israel obstructs the delivery of humanitarian aid.

"They are cut off from food, even crumbs are not easy to find," the U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child said in a statement. "A little girl wept in front of the BBC's camera, crying, 'I miss bread.' The occupying power has blocked or severely restricted food and other life-essential supplies and aid."

At least 27 children have died of malnutrition or dehydration in recent weeks, a toll that the U.N. panel said is "likely to be significantly higher" and is "set to rise" as Israel's blockade and attacks on aid convoys continue. An alarming analysis released earlier this week by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification found that Gaza's entire population—roughly half of which is children—is "facing high levels of acute food insecurity."

"Children in Gaza can no longer wait, as each passing minute risks another child dying of hunger as the world looks on," the U.N. committee said.

Children are also at high risk from ongoing Israeli bombings, which have inflicted immense physical and psychological suffering on Gaza's children. Israel's military has killed more than 13,000 children in the territory since October 7, a figure that the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) called "astronomically horrifying." Save the Children estimated that between October and January, an average of more than 10 children per day in Gaza lost one or both of their legs due to Israeli attacks.

"I think these numbers that we're seeing out of Gaza are just staggering," Catherine Russell, UNICEF's executive director, said earlier this week. "We haven't seen that rate of death among children in almost any other conflict in the world." 



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