Israel and Palestine

Today, as I report, the UN’s mechanism for assessing famine, the IPC (the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification) confirmed, in a brand-new report, that the most severe famine conditions are occurring in the Gaza Strip, that this is an “entirely man-made” disaster, deliberately engineered by the State of Israel, and that it can and must be “halted and reversed”, via an immediate ceasefire “to allow humanitarian aid to reach everyone in the Gaza Strip.” The UN’s Tom Fletcher announced the publication of the report with articulate, controlled fury and indignation, and I’m posting a video and a transcript of his speech, as well as some of the report’s main findings, and a history of Israel’s deliberate starvation of the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip over the last 22 months. Despite the copious evidence demonstrating Israel’s intent to starve the Palestinians as part of its genocidal assault on Gaza, including rulings by the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, and mounting evidence of an increase in the starvation policies over the last six months, since Israel broke the six-week ceasefire deal with Hamas at the start of March, Israel has refuted the IPC’s report, with Benjamin Netanyahu calling it “an outright lie”, and with the defense minister, Israel Katz, pledging to “open the gates of hell” in Gaza City via its planned military invasion. This would be an incomparable disaster, as Gaza City was identified by the IPC as the epicenter of the famine, but is there any way that Israel can be stopped?

My report about Israel’s monstrous targeted murder last night of the extraordinarily hard-working Palestinian journalist Anas Al-Sharif and four of his colleagues from Al Jazeera Arabic, in which I mourn their loss, dissect Israel’s lies about their involvement with Hamas, and criticize the western media for never having platformed Palestinian journalists in their reporting. I also express my fears that the murders were deliberately intended to create a media blackout for the imminent planned invasion and occupation of Gaza City, home to a million surviving Palestinians, where, it seems horribly probable, Israel is planning to replicate the “genocide within a genocide” that took place in northern Gaza from October last year until the ceasefire in January this year, which both Anas Al-Sharif and another murdered colleague, Hossam Shabat, covered assiduously. As I ask, “Is there any hope left, or will Israel’s darkness engulf us all?”

Israel’s deliberate campaign of mass starvation in Gaza has finally prompted outrage in western political and media circles, putting pressure on Benjamin Netanyahu to finally lift the deadly siege on all supplies into Gaza that has been in place for nearly five months. This seems like positive news, but, predictably, Netanyahu is seeking to provide nothing more than “minimal” aid — enough, he hopes, to placate his critics, but, crucially, not enough to address the desperate crisis unfolding in Gaza, which requires nothing less than the delivery of food, water, medical supplies, medical equipment and trained personnel on a colossal scale. It remains to be seen if he can get away with this almost incalculable cynicism, but it seems unlikely, as the death toll will inexorably rise in the weeks to come even if all the borders were opened today and unfettered aid was allowed in. Will western leaders and the media stay focused, or will their attention drift away once more? It’s clear that maintaining pressure on Israel is essential, because, behind the provision of “minimal” aid, Israel remains intent on continuing its starvation policy and its relentless bombing campaign. This is because its ultimate aim is nothing less than the extermination of the Palestinian people, and, as recent political developments within Israel have revealed, the complete military occupation of both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank — colossal crimes that it has only been able to contemplate implementing because of the west’s persistence indulgence of its genocidal actions for the last 663 days.

My new article has one purpose: to highlight the fact that Israel is now engaged in the “mass death” phase of its genocidal assault on the trapped civilian population of the Gaza Strip, brought about through a ban on all supplies of food (and water, fuel and medical supplies), in place since the start of March, and, since May 26, through the replacement of the well-established aid systems provided by UNWRA and other international aid agencies with the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a US-Israeli initiative that, from the beginning, has involved desperate starving civilians, on a daily basis, being shot at and killed. I also point out how the combination of starvation, relentless and ongoing bombing, and the ban on fuel and medical supplies (including formula milk for babies) is creating a nightmare in Gaza’s few surviving hospitals, and I also cover other depraved aspects of Israel’s ongoing campaign. These include the ongoing evacuation orders, which have led to a situation in which 85% of the Gaza Strip is now militarily occupied by Israel, the deliberate erasure of entire towns and most surviving buildings, and the long-term aims, still touted by Israel’s leaders, of squeezing the remaining population into a “concentration camp” in the south, and the ongoing efforts to locate third countries willing to support the “voluntary migration” of the remaining population, a grotesque form of enforced displacement and ethnic cleansing, which should be seen for what it really is — a smokescreen for further extermination. As was revealed last week, the only countries that Israel claims to be engaged with regarding this unforgivably illegal plan are Ethiopia and Libya, which are both unsuitably unstable, and Indonesia, which is too far away. I close by reiterating the only demand that counts — for Israel to stop the killing, and for vast amounts of humanitarian aid to be allowed into Gaza, via the UN and other reputable agencies.

My response to the horrific news that MPs have voted, by 385 votes to 26, to uphold legislation introduced on Monday by the home secretary, Yvette Cooper, to proscribe Palestine Action, a direct action group, as a terrorist organization. Under the legislation, it is now a criminal offence, punishable by up to 14 years in prison, for anyone to become a member of, or even to support the direct action of Palestine Action. I wrote most of this article before the vote, and in it I run through the long and noble history of direct action in the UK against arms companies and the government’s involvement in war crimes and genocide, which have generally led to jury acquittals. This latest move, condemned yesterday by UN experts, who insisted, correctly, that “mere property damage, without endangering life, is not sufficiently serious to qualify as terrorism”, not only seeks to equate property damage with mass murder; it also, most chillingly, demonstrates how the Starmer government is working not for the interests of the UK, but for the interests of its masters in Israel.

When an Israeli hospital was struck by a missile yesterday — whether deliberately or not is difficult to ascertain — it nevertheless prompted a wave of hysteria and unparalleled hypocrisy in Israel. Even though no one was killed in the attack, Benjamin Netanyahu spoke about how Iran’s aim was “to destroy every one of us”, and defense minister Israel Katz said that Ayatollah Khameini “can no longer be allowed to exist”, and called the hospital attack “war crimes.” Attacking a hospital is indeed a war crime, but nowhere in Israel’s response to the attack was there even the slightest scintilla of recognition that, if the attack on the Soroka Hospital was a war crime, Israel’s war crimes in relation to hospitals in Gaza are of a magnitude that is so much greater that it is almost incalculable. Last October, the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory found that “Israel has perpetrated a concerted policy to destroy Gaza’s healthcare system as part of a broader assault on Gaza, committing war crimes and the crime against humanity of extermination with relentless and deliberate attacks on medical personnel and facilities.” Over the last 20 months, Israel has attacked all 36 hospitals in Gaza, often repeatedly, destroying many, and decommissioning all but one, Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, which is now the last surviving hospital for 2 million people, although it too is on the verge of collapse. As Israeli officials were whining, the WHO warned that, even as Nasser Hospital is overwhelmed with casualties from the ongoing aid massacres, fuel will run out within the next few days, with premature babies on incubators particularly vulnerable, not only because of the need for fuel for their incubators, but also because the hospital is running out of milk for them because of Israel’s ongoing siege. As I also note, Israel has also attacked hospitals and healthcare facilities in Lebanon, and, in the last week, has also attacked two hospitals in Iran.

Five days since Israel’s unprovoked attack on Iran, which led to immediate military retaliation, I examine the shameful hypocrisy of the west, which has been insisting yet again that Israel has “the right to defend itself”, even though Israel is very clearly not the victim in this scenario, having launched its unprovoked attack on the spurious basis that Iran was about to secure nuclear weapons. In particular, I note how, 20 months ago, the west’s unconditional support opened the door to all the horrors that have been taking place ever since, and especially the ongoing genocide in Gaza, which, until this latest development, had become so severe that western leaders were finally beginning to condemn Israel. Shamefully, as the situation in Gaza deteriorates still further, the west’s sudden indifference is especially despicable. I also focus on the crucial role of the US, under Donald Trump, who faces a divided Republican Party — on the one hand, fanatical supporters of Israel, and neo-cons who have long hoped to wage war on Iran, and, on the other, opposition from MAGA isolationists within his own Party who support his “America First” policy, which was supposed to eschew any further involvement in ruinously expensive foreign wars. I also mock Israeli efforts to make themselves the victims, as they finally face some blowback from their monstrous actions over the last 20 months, and I end by examining whether one imminent problem, not much discussed, is that the supply of the very expensive weapons for this type of conflict may soon run out.

Today is the eighth anniversary of the Grnefell Tower fire, a disaster that should never have happened, when 72 residents of a social housing block in west London died after an inferno engulfed the tower, a situation that only happened because those responsible for the safety of the residents were complicit in an industry-wide policy of profiteering and cost-cutting with the full backing of central and local government. In my annual reflection on the enduring significance of the fire, I focus in particular on issues of race and class, largely ignored in mainstream media reporting, and by the official inquiry, even though 85% of the inhabitants of the tower were of Black, Asian or Minority Ethnic (BAME) origin, who are, it seems, disproportionately housed on the upper floors of high-rise social housing blocks. I also reflect on how social tenants have been marginalized in favour of a privatised rentier economy, resulting in them becoming, at best, second-class citizens, and, at worst, disposable, as the victims of ‘regeneration’ and ‘gentrification’, and draw comparisons with the ultimate process of ‘regeneration’ and ‘gentrification’; essentially, the entire State of Israel, where, with the backing of the same elites responsible for Grenfell, Israel is engaged, in Gaza, in a diabolical process of genocidal ‘gentrification.’

Marking 600 days of Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza, I report on how, despite robust criticism and threats of “concrete action” by western leaders, nothing “concrete” has emerged at all to disrupt Israel’s ongoing slaughter of civilians, still averaging 100 deaths a day. I also report on the cynical and broken efforts to implement a US- and Israeli-backed food delivery scheme, which collapsed into chaos on its first day yesterday, as the system, alarmingly resembling a concentration camp, was overwhelmed by starving Palestinians, some of whom were subsequently shot and killed. The aid plan, which includes intrusive interrogations and biometric screening, is, of course, a deliberately engineered exercise in humiliation and control, also designed to shut down existing aid organizations, and especially UNRWA, the UN organization that has been successfully supporting Palestinians for 75 years, but which Israel has smeared as a front for Hamas, without providing any proof, and which it also despises because it advocates for all exiled Palestinians’ UN-mandated “right to return.” UNWRA and other aid agencies have a demonstrable ability to distribute aid where it is needed, and have full warehouses in Jordan and Egypt. In addition, over 9,000 trucks are waiting on the border, but Israel’s only intention is to keep on starving Palestinians to death, and preventing the delivery of urgently needed medical supplies. As we mark 600 days of the genocide, instead of progress, Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, have, instead, been doubling down on their messianic genocidal messages, continuing to implicate Israel’s supporters in policies of extermination drawn from the Old Testament, which, as I note, “scared me when I read it as a child, as it should anyone who believes that humanity cannot survive or thrive when weighed down by ancient hatreds.”

Last week, after starving Palestinian civilians for eleven weeks, and bombing them relentlessly for the last two months, Israel stepped up its aggression, launching “Operation Gideon’s Chariots” with even more savage bombing, and announcing its intention to militarily occupy the whole of Gaza, to erase every remaining building, and to force the surviving population into a concentration camp in the south, prior to an illusory program of “voluntary migration.” Plumbing unparalleled depths of depravity, after 19 months of unbearable horror, Israel’s genocidal endgame has finally provoked condemnation from its allies in the west, who, until now, have whispered barely a word of dissent. The foreign ministers of 22 countries and three senior EU officials issued a strongly-worded demand for the resumption of aid to prevent mass starvation, while the governments of the UK, France and Canada specifically threatened “concrete actions” if Israel continued its “wholly disproportionate” escalation, its starvation policies and its plans for the “permanent forced displacement” of the population, which, as they noted, “is a breach of international humanitarian law.” Words mean nothing to Israel, of course, and, if its allies are serious, they must follow up with arms embargoes, sanctions and more, but it remains noteworthy that so many countries are now turning against Israel, no doubt because the extent of its renewed escalation of hostilities and the impact of its starvation siege are so severe that they have suddenly become aware that they need to be seen to have made the right noises for when, inevitably, there will be a legal and moral reckoning. Hopefully, this turning of the tides is significant, reinforcing the recent warning, by opposition politician Yair Golan, that Israel, which is “kill[ing] children as a hobby”, that it “is on the way to becoming a pariah state, like South Africa was”, and the admission by an Israeli Foreign Ministry official that “the world is not with us” and that “No one will want to be identified with Israel.”