Gaza Strip
The Gaza Strip (/ˈɡɑːzə/ ⓘ;[4] Arabic: قِطَاعُ غَزَّةَ Qiṭāʿ Ġazzah [qɪˈtˤɑːʕ ˈɣaz.za]), or simply Gaza, is a narrow piece of land on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea, bordered by Israel to the east and north, and Egypt to the southwest. With a population of 2 million on some 365 square kilometres (141 square miles), Gaza has a comparably high population density. It is one of the two Palestinian territories, along with the West Bank. Since 2007, Gaza has been governed as a de facto one-party state by Sunni Islamist political and military group Hamas.
The Gaza Strip initially emerged as an Egyptian-occupied territory after the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. Following the 1967 Six-Day War the territory came under Israeli military occupation until 2005. In the 1990s, as part of the Oslo Accords, the administration over most of the area was handed over to the Palestinian National Authority, alongside the existence of Israeli settlements in some areas, which were evacuated in 2005. Following Israel's disengagement, in 2006, Hamas won the last-held Palestinian legislative election and started administering Gaza; it took full control after a brief civil war the following year. Hamas has since brutally cracked down and executed opponents. In 2023, Hamas launched a major attack on Israel, beginning the Israel-Hamas war in which the Israel Defense Forces retaliated with an offensive into the Gaza Strip.
Quotes edit
- The economy in the Gaza Strip is "collapsing" mainly due to the 11-year blockade on the coastal enclave in addition to cuts in donor aid... unemployment in Gaza had reached more than 50 percent, while 70 percent of young people are jobless... Increased frustration is feeding into the increased tensions which have already started spilling over into unrest and setting back the human development of the region's large youth population... A situation where people struggle to make ends meet, suffer from worsening poverty, rising unemployment and deteriorating public services such as healthcare, water and sanitation, calls for urgent, real and sustainable solutions.
- From here, our people begin the march towards establishing an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital
- Mahmoud Abbas, Speech at the Gaza City harbour on the occasion of Jewish settler withdrawal (12 August 2005), quoted in BBC News, "Gaza boats mass to mark pullout"
- The Hamas attack... shook the Middle East and shattered many assumptions and misconceptions about the region. It’s not that Israel was shocked at the daring nature of the attack, but that Israel had long assumed that the Palestinian problem is dead and that there is no need to engage in a so-called peace process — even if managed by the U.S., the least neutral party in the Arab-Israeli conflict outside of Tel Aviv. Reflecting the belief in the death of Palestine as a question, the Biden administration was the first U.S. administration since Lyndon Johnson to not even attempt to launch a peace process regarding the Palestinian problem, demonstrating its belief that the issue is over. Joe Biden fully subscribed to the Jared Kushner school of thought and diplomacy, which believes Arabs don’t care anymore about Palestine and Israel can simply reach peace agreements with individual Arab states, after which Arab public opinion would follow. Little is being said about Biden adopting Kushner’s view of Middle East politics, which makes Palestine irrelevant in U.S. foreign policy in the region.
- As'ad AbuKhalil, How a DC Think Tank Helped Cause the Gaza ‘Deluge’, Consortium News, (12 October 2023)
- Had this 'Spring' been genuine, it would've started in the backward Arab countries. Were it a call for freedom, democracy, justice, it would've began in the most oppressive and tyrannical states... There is no clearer evidence than their current stand regarding the Israeli aggression against Gaza. Where is the 'alleged' zeal and passion that they showed towards Syria or the Syrian people? Why haven't they supported Gaza with money and arms? Where are their jihadists and why didn't they send jihadists to defend our people in Palestine?
- Bashar al-Assad, 2014 Presidential Inauguration Speech (2014)
- There is another story, that we tried to impose upon him [Arafat] cantons, Bantustans. Total lie. We talked about 80%+ of the West Bank and 100% of the Gaza Strip. How can it become non-contiguous? And if you have some reservation against this or that curl of the border, at some corner, come to the table, negotiate it, and demand that this will be removed. I can go with you more and more, and I cannot afford spending more time on it, but basically, all these were stories that were invented in order to explain to his own people, and maybe to try to convince honest people in the free world how come that such an opportunity had been missed. Of course, I had my own demands, to protect Israel, to ensure our security, to make sure that we know where do we head. I said loud and clear: we have to put an end to this asymmetric process where we are supposed to give tangible assets, and the Palestinians have just to give vague promises about the nature of future relationship. I said I'm ready to go very far, but I want to know, now, that there is a partner, which is ready and capable to make tough decisions, and painful decisions. I was a great supporter of the peace of the brave, but never a supporter of peace of ostriches, where you put your head in the sand, let whatever happen, happen, and then wake up and say, OK, that's what happened. We cannot afford this approach. That's the reality.
- Ehud Barak, Speech at UC Berkeley, November 22, 2002
- Israel will not transfer Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza District to any foreign sovereign authority, [because] of the historic right of our nation to this land, [and] the needs of our national security, which demand a capability to defend our State and the lives of our citizens."
- Menachem Begin, Iron Wall, p. 356
- A lesson we ignore at our peril is that oppression undermines not only the rights, dignity, and lives of the oppressed but eventually the security of the oppressors as well. The apartheid system that’s been suffocating Palestinians for so long is now also undermining the safety of Israeli civilians.
- Phyllis Bennis, We Need an Immediate Ceasefire in Gaza, Counterpunch, (20 October 2023)
- Since 2007, Gazans have lived under siege, prohibited from leaving their open-air prison by a high-security militarized wall and platoons of Israeli soldiers. For the last 16 years, starting long before the latest escalation, access to most goods was banned. Gazans couldn’t even get construction materials to repair the homes, hospitals, water treatment facilities, and places or worship that Israel bombed repeatedly — in 2008, 2012, 2014, 2018 and 2021. Israel often denied emergency medical permits to leave the Strip, leaving many Gazans to die without care. Electricity was already limited. A 72-year-old woman in Gaza told a reporter last January, “It is hard to imagine, but we used to experience 24 hours of electricity each day in Gaza; now we are lucky if we get six.” Now there is none. Water was already unavailable except through expensive purchases from Israeli water companies. And food has long been scarce — by the age of two, 20 percent of Gaza’s children are already stunted. On October 9, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant called for a “total siege” of Gaza. “No electricity, no food, no water, no gas — it’s all closed,” he said. For Gaza’s already impoverished and malnourished population, that’s not just collective punishment — it’s genocide ... If we’re serious about preventing violence, we need to change the conditions from which this brutality sprang. Sending more bombs, warplanes, guns and bullets won’t solve the problem.
- Phyllis Bennis, We Need an Immediate Ceasefire in Gaza, Counterpunch, (20 October 2023)
- I am satisfied that (i) war crimes have been or are being committed in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip ("Gaza")...; (ii) potential cases arising from the situation would be admissible; and (iii) there are no substantial reasons to believe that an investigation would not serve the interests of justice.
- The Prosecutor is satisfied that there is a reasonable basis to initiate an investigation into the situation in Palestine under article 53(1) of the Rome Statute, and that the scope of the Court’s territorial jurisdiction comprises the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza (“Occupied Palestinian Territory”).
- The security package I’m sending to Congress and asking Congress to do is an unprecedented commitment to Israel’s security that will sharpen Israel’s qualitative military edge, which we’ve committed to -- the qualitative military edge. We’re going to make sure Iron Dome continues to guard the skies over Israel. We’re going to make sure other hostile actors in the region know that Israel is stronger than ever and prevent this conflict from spreading. Look, at the same time, President Netanyahu and I discussed again yesterday the critical need for Israel to operate by the laws of war. That means protecting civilians in combat as best as they can. The people of Gaza urgently need food, water, and medicine. Yesterday, in discussions with the leaders of Israel and Egypt, I secured an agreement for the first shipment of humanitarian assistance from the United Nations to Palestinian civilians in Gaza. If Hamas does not divert or steal this shipment -- these shipments, we’re going to provide an opening for sustained delivery of lifesaving humanitarian assistance for the Palestinians. And as I said in Israel: As hard as it is, we cannot give up on peace. We cannot give up on a two-state solution. Israel and Palestinians equally deserve to live in safety, dignity, and peace.
- So I believe this is a fight for freedom. And I want to make it a fight for justice too. Justice not only to punish the guilty. But justice to bring those same values of democracy and freedom to people round the world. And I mean: freedom, not only in the narrow sense of personal liberty but in the broader sense of each individual having the economic and social freedom to develop their potential to the full. That is what community means, founded on the equal worth of all. The starving, the wretched, the dispossessed, the ignorant, those living in want and squalor from the deserts of Northern Africa to the slums of Gaza, to the mountain ranges of Afghanistan: they too are our cause. This is a moment to seize. The Kaleidoscope has been shaken. The pieces are in flux. Soon they will settle again. Before they do, let us re-order this world around us. Today, humankind has the science and technology to destroy itself or to provide prosperity to all. Yet science can't make that choice for us. Only the moral power of a world acting as a community, can. "By the strength of our common endeavour we achieve more together than we can alone". For those people who lost their lives on September 11 and those that mourn them; now is the time for the strength to build that community. Let that be their memorial.
- Tony Blair, Speech to the 2001 Labour Party Conference (2 October 2001).
- Israel too has sharply criticized the ICC. While the court welcomes the membership of the so-called "State of Palestine," it has threatened Israel -- a liberal, democratic nation -- with investigation into its actions in the West Bank and Gaza to defend its citizens from terrorist attacks. There has also been a suggestion that the ICC will investigate Israeli construction of housing projects on the West Bank. The United States will always stand with our friend and ally, Israel. And today, reflecting congressional concern with Palestinian attempts to prompt an ICC investigation of Israel, the Department of State will announce the closure of the Palestine Liberation Organization office here in Washington, DC. As President Reagan recognized in this context, the Executive has "the right to decide the kind of foreign relations, if any, the United States will maintain," and the Trump Administration will not keep the office open when the Palestinians refuse to take steps to start direct and meaningful negotiations with Israel. The United States supports a direct and robust peace process, and we will not allow the ICC, or any other organization, to constrain Israel's right to self-defense.
- John Bolton, Address to the Federalist Society on the International Criminal Court, delivered 10 September 2018
- I can understand the deep anger and despair of the Palestinian people. For decades you've been treated as pawns in the Middle East conflict. Your interests have been held hostage to a comprehensive peace agreement that never seems to come, as your lives get worse year by year. You deserve democracy and the rule of law. You deserve an open society and a thriving economy. You deserve a life of hope for your children. An end to occupation and a peaceful democratic Palestinian state may seem distant, but America and our partners throughout the world stand ready to help, help you make them possible as soon as possible. If liberty can blossom in the rocky soil of the West Bank and Gaza, it will inspire millions of men and women around the globe who are equally weary of poverty and oppression, equally entitled to the benefits of democratic government. I have a hope for the people of Muslim countries. Your commitments to morality, and learning, and tolerance led to great historical achievements. And those values are alive in the Islamic world today. You have a rich culture, and you share the aspirations of men and women in every culture. Prosperity and freedom and dignity are not just American hopes, or Western hopes. They are universal, human hopes. And even in the violence and turmoil of the Middle East, America believes those hopes have the power to transform lives and nations.
- George W. Bush, Rose Garden Speech on Israel-Palestine Two-State Solution, delivered 24 June 2002,
- Humanitarian goods and people must flow in both directions. Gaza cannot and must not be allowed to remain a prison camp.
- David Cameron, Speech (27 July 2010), as quoted in The Guardian.
- Biden has pretty much picked up Trump’s foreign policy. He has eliminated some of the more gratuitously savage elements. Like in the case of Palestine, for example, Trump was not satisfied with just giving everything away to Israeli right-wing power—”do what you want”—and offering nothing to the Palestinians, just kicking them in the face. He even had to go beyond that to truly gratuitous savagery like cutting off the lifeline, the UNRWA lifeline, for Palestinians to be able to have at least minimal bare survival in the Israeli punching bag in Gaza. Even that, well, Biden removed those things. Other than that, pretty much followed the same policies.
- [Linking criticism over antisemitism to his stance on the Middle East] I have absolutely no doubt whatsoever that my clearly stated support for the right of Palestinian people to be able to live in peace free from occupation, free from being under siege as in Gaza, and for those living in refugee camps … played a factor in all this. Benjamin Netanyahu couldn't wait to condemn me for my support for the Palestinian people.
- Jeremy Corbyn, Interviewed by Al Mayadeen (Beirut), quoted in Heather Stewart "Jeremy Corbyn urges west to stop arming Ukraine" The Guardian (2 August 2022)
- Netanyahu in 2018 said Corbyn deserved "unequivocal condemnation" for a wreath laying in Tunisia four years earlier; the precise details of what had occurred were in dispute.
- Jeremy Corbyn, Interviewed by Al Mayadeen (Beirut), quoted in Heather Stewart "Jeremy Corbyn urges west to stop arming Ukraine" The Guardian (2 August 2022)
- Let us not today fling accusation at the murderers. What cause have we to complain about their fierce hatred to us? For eight years now, they sit in their refugee camps in Gaza, and before their eyes we turn into our homestead the land and villages in which they and their forefathers have lived. We should demand his blood not from the Arabs of Gaza but from ourselves. . . . Let us make our reckoning today. We are a generation of settlers, and without the steel helmet and gun barrel, we shall not be able to plant a tree or build a house. . . . Let us not be afraid to see the hatred that accompanies and consumes the lives of hundreds of thousands of Arabs who sit all around us and wait for the moment when their hands will be able to reach our blood.
- Moshe Dayan, quoted in The Iron Wall: Israel and the Arab World by Avi Shlaim, p 103
- Those shedding crocodile tears for civilians killed in the Ukraine-Russia war are silently watching the deaths of thousands of innocent children in Gaza.
- Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, "Türkiye to introduce Israel to world as war criminal: Turkish President Erdogan" Anadolu Agency (October 28, 2023)
- Since the mid-1970s, there's been an international consensus for resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict. [...] It's called a two-state settlement, and a two-state settlement is pretty straightforward, uncomplicated. Israel has to fully withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza and Jerusalem, in accordance with the fundamental principle of international law, [...] that it's inadmissible to acquire territory by war. The West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem, having been acquired by war, it's inadmissible for Israel to keep them. They have to be returned. On the Palestinian side and also the side of the neighboring Arab states, they have to recognize Israel's right to live in peace and security with its neighbors. That was the quid pro quo: recognition of Israel, Palestinian right to self-determination in the West Bank and Gaza with its capital in Jerusalem. That's the international consensus. It's not complicated. It's also not controversial.
- Since completing this memoir in 1995 I've returned to Palestine every year. In fact, apart from traveling abroad to lecture, Palestine is the only place I've been since I first journeyed there 15 years ago. I sometimes fantasize vacationing in Greece or Italy but never do. If I have time and cost isn't prohibitive, I always return to Palestine. I do so mostly from a sense of duty - do I have a right to be elsewhere? - relieved by the authentic affection I've developed for friends. I cannot say I enjoy going back. From the moment I arrive, even before arriving, I count the minutes left before I depart. The eminent Hebrew University sociologist Baruch Kimmerling has described Gaza as "the largest concentration camp ever to exist." The West Bank ranks only a mite less awful. Once the Israeli wall currently under construction is finished, the West Bank will replace Gaza with top honors. Bordered on both sides by four meter deep trenches, fortified with guard towers at regular intervals, and topped with barbed wire, this massive barricade will stretch across fully 347 kilometers - twice the size of the Berlin Wall.
- Norman Finkelstein, Postscript to German edition of The Rise and Fall of Palestine
- Dershowitz: The Israeli military then did an analysis, and they discovered, of course, that when they dropped that bomb and killed those people, they had no idea that those people were in the building, and the people who made the decision to drop the bomb were criticized and disciplined for it. The point I make is, when they knew, for sure, that family members were there, they withheld doing it. That doesn't deny the fact that on occasion they will accidentally make a decision that's wrong. The difference is deliberateness, willfulness… Norman Finkelstein: …That was a nice fairy tale, dropping a 1 ton bomb on a densely populated civilian neighborhood in Gaza, and they had no idea that civilians would be there. And then he goes on to fantasy #2, that those who did it were disciplined. Really, Mr. Dershowitz? I'd love the evidence for that. I mean, if I could get $10,000 for every one of your fraudulent statements…
- Never Before Aired: Watch PART II of the debate between Finkelstein and Dershowitz (archive located here is a continuation of part 1) published 2003-9-24
- One of the enduring mysteries of modern political discourse is the way in which smart people — who are not remotely anti-Semitic — impose curious, unworkable double standards on the nation of Israel. Let’s take, for example, the response of many on the left to the so-called Great Return March, an effort by thousands of Gazans to storm the Israeli border. After all, the international legal standards are clear. A nation has the right to protect the integrity of its border, and that right is supplemented by an inherent right of self-defense in the face of a hostile foreign power. Hamas — which rules Gaza — rejects Israel’s right to exist and remains in a state of perpetual, declared war with Israel. Any reasonable person contemplating the consequences of a border-wall breach knows that chaos and bloodshed may result.
- David French, "Israel Has the Right and Obligation to Defend Its Border with Deadly Force", National Review (May 15, 2018)
- I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly.
- Yoav Galant, Cited in Defense minister announces ‘complete siege’ of Gaza: No power, food or fuel, The Times of Israel (9 October 2023).
- You don’t give a damn! You don’t give a damn, you don’t even know about the Palestinian families! You don’t even know that they exist! Tell me the name of one member of the seven members of the same family slaughtered on the beach in Gaza by an Israeli warship. You don’t even know their names! But you know the name of every Israeli soldier who has been taken prisoner in this conflict. Because you believe whether you know it or not that Israeli blood is more valuable than the blood of Lebanese or Palestinians. That’s the truth, and the discerning of your viewers already know it.
- George Galloway, Interview on Sky News (6 August 2006).
- After a Sky News reporter comments about israeli soldiers: "I have to say some people might find it offensive when there are more families mourning their dead."
- Let me also say that in many ways this administration has been better than I would have guessed, at the team they have assembled for national security and more responsible then I would have guessed in their policies. But there’s one thing they’ve announced that I think we should very aggressively question and challenge and that is a proposal to spend hundreds of millions of dollars rebuilding the Gaza strip through agencies infiltrated by terrorists. And let me be very clear. There are still missiles being fired every day from Gaza. We did not start rebuilding Germany in the middle of 1943 on the grounds that if we could only find good Germans that we could work with, they would take care of the bad Nazis. And we did not start rebuilding Japan in 1943 on the grounds that if only we could find good Japanese they could convince the militarists to be pleasant. We understood that when you have opponents who want to destroy you, you have to first win the war and then rebuild. The war does not have to involve American troops and the war does not actually have to involve much violence. Ronald Reagan as you’ll see in our movie, defeated the Soviet empire in 10 years with a grand strategy and collaboration with Pope John Paul II and Prime Minister Thatcher. North Korea, Iran, and Hamas are mortal threats to the survival of western civilization. And it is absolutely irresponsible to believe that those regimes can stay in power and we can find a negotiated agreement. In all three cases, we need nonmilitary but very sophisticated efforts at regime replacement and we need to say to the planet, somebody who threatens to destroy one of our cities is somebody we’re not going to tolerate and we’re not going to say well, we’ll get even after you take out our city. The idea of trading Tehran for Washington was abhorrent to Ronald Reagan and it should be abhorrent to every American. Mutual assured destruction is I think an immoral strategy and is not one that we can tolerate particularly against suicide bombers who would be thrilled to swap their capitol for our capitol. And so I think we have to understand and this administration had better learn pretty quickly, we may not be interested in war, but our enemies are. And our enemies are dangerous and some of these threats can be mortal. And so I think this is a very important component.
- Newt Gingrich, Address to the Conservative Political Action Committee, delivered 27 February 2009, Omni Shoreham Hotel, Washington, D.C.
- In 2015, Gabbard supported President Barack Obama’s nuclear agreement with Iran and more recently has criticized President Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the deal. Last May, she criticized Israel for shooting “unarmed protesters” in Gaza… Tulsi supported Bernie Sanders’ antiwar candidacy in 2016 and appears to be completely onboard and fearless in promoting her antiwar sentiments… Tulsi Gabbard could well be the only genuine antiwar candidate that might truly be electable in the past fifty years… [She] seems to be the “real thing,” a genuine anti-war candidate who is determined to run on that platform. It might just resonate with the majority of Americans who have grown tired of perpetual warfare to “spread democracy” and other related frauds perpetrated by the band of oligarchs and traitors that run the United States.
- Philip Giraldi, "Is Tulsi Gabbard for Real? America Is Ready for a Genuine Peace Candidate", Global Research (14 February 2019)
- I want to talk very quickly about the world as we wish it to be. As we celebrate tonight, let's embrace in our hearts the world that we all wish it to be, a world where there's no rockets from Gaza, no Hezbollah attacks from the north, where Palestinian children go to school without being taught hate -- that's the world we wish it to be. An Iran controlled by its people, not some theocracy. An Iran governed by someone other than a Holocaust denier -- that's the world we wish it to be. An Iran pursuing peaceful nuclear power, not a nuclear weapon. A world where moderate Muslims are celebrated, not condemned and killed. An Afghanistan where a young girl never fears the soccer stadium, but can go to school and achieve her dreams. A free and independent Iraq where Sunnis, Shias, and Kurds can settle their differences at the ballot box and through the rule of law and be an inspiration to the Mideast. A UN, a United Nations that can actually control thugs and dictators. A United Nations that would never issue the Goldstone Report. That's the world as we wish it to be. This is the world as it is, and if you don't know the difference, then the world is a dangerous place. I know the difference between the world as we wish it to be and the world as it is. The world as it is, is a divided Palestinian people, a place that allows rockets to be launched from apartment buildings, a place for a mosques are weapon storage sites, a place where school children are taught hate -- that's the world as it is.
- Lindsey Graham, Speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, delivered 22 March 2010
- There are monsters among us. Every day I read about an American “plan” to either invade some place new or to otherwise inflict pain to convince a “non-compliant” foreign government how to behave. Last week it was Iran but next week it could just as easily again be Lebanon, Syria or Venezuela. Or even Russia or China, both of whom are seen as “threats” even though American soldiers, sailors and marines sit on their borders and not vice versa... Just as often, one learns about a new atrocity by Israelis inflicted on the defenseless Arabs just because they have the power to do so. Last Friday in Gaza the Israeli army shot and killed four unarmed demonstrators and injured 300 more while the Jewish state’s police invaded a Palestinian orphanage school in occupied Jerusalem and shut it down because the students were celebrating a “Yes to peace, no to war” poetry festival. Peace is not in the Israeli authorized curriculum. And then there are the Saudis, publicly chopping the heads off of 37 “dissidents” in a mass display of barbarity, and also murdering and dismembering a hapless journalist. And let’s not forget the bombing and deliberate starving of hundreds of thousands innocent civilians in Yemen.
- The destruction of media offices and the killing of a journalist in Gaza are extremely concerning. Journalists must be able to carry out their essential work, including in conflict zones, without fear of attack and harassment. They must be protected and respected... Even wars have rules. First and foremost, civilians must be protected... Indiscriminate attacks, and attacks against civilians and civilian property, are violations of the laws of war...
- If there is a hell on earth, it is the lives of children in Gaza today. The destruction of media offices and the killing of a journalist in Gaza are extremely concerning. Journalists must be able to carry out their essential work, including in conflict zones, without fear of attack and harassment...Even wars have rules. First and foremost, civilians must be protected... Indiscriminate attacks, and attacks against civilians and civilian property, are violations of the laws of war...
- I mean, we desperately want to get those American hostages out. But if you saw those kids in the hands of those terrorists, like, with a mom heart, it made me sick to my stomach for all those parents having to see their children in those terrorist hands. So, of course, we want them out.
- But why isn't it so easy that we can do that? It's because we don't know where they are. And I have been in those tunnels that are massive, that are sophisticated, and that Hamas uses to hide equipment and ammunition and to do their dirty work and maybe to have those hostages.
- But where are those tunnels? They're underneath hospitals. They're underneath schools. They're in hard-to-find places. So this is incredibly tough. I feel for the Israeli families. I feel for the American families. And I feel for any other families who've lost a loved one or have someone in a hostage situation, because it's really bleak right now. And it's hard for anyone to feel good about this.
Transcripts State of the Union (October 15, 2023)
- One microcosm of this can be seen in the Gaza Strip, where over 70 percent of the population are refugees living in one of the most densely packed areas in the world. The first two cases of COVID-19 were identified in Gaza on March 20 (a lack of testing equipment, however, has meant that only 92 people out of the 2-million-strong population have been tested for the virus). Reeling from thirteen years of Israeli siege and the systematic destruction of essential infrastructure, living conditions in the Strip are marked by extreme poverty, poor sanitation, and a chronic lack of drugs and medical equipment (there are, for example, only sixty-two ventilators in Gaza, and just fifteen of these are currently available for use). Under blockade and closure for most of the past decade, Gaza has been shut to the world long before the current pandemic. The region could be the proverbial canary in the COVID-19 coalmine — foreshadowing the future path of the infection among refugee communities across the Middle East and elsewhere.
- Adam Hanieh, "This is a Global Pandemic – Let's Treat it as Such" (27 March 2020), Verso Books
- Nearly all the words and phrases used by the Democrats, Republicans and the talking heads on the media to describe the unrest inside Israel and the heaviest Israeli assault against the Palestinians since the 2014 attacks on Gaza, which lasted 51 days and killed more than 2,200 Palestinians, including 551 children, are a lie. Israel, by employing its military machine against an occupied population that does not have mechanized units, an air force, navy, missiles, heavy artillery and command-and-control, not to mention a U.S. commitment to provide a $38 billion defense aid package for Israel over the next decade, is not exercising “the right to defend itself.” It is carrying out mass murder. It is a war crime.
- Chris Hedges, Israel, the Big Lie Scheerpost, May 14, 2021
- Mr. Speaker, Perhaps the greatest challenge Israel and the United States face at this time together is the Iranian nuclear program. Let there be no doubt: Iran does not strive to attain nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. Iran -- Iran is building nuclear capabilities that pose a threat to the stability of the Middle East and beyond. Every country or region controlled or infiltrated by Iran has experienced utter havoc. We have seen this in Yemen, in Gaza, in Syria, in Lebanon, in Iraq. In fact, we have seen this in Iran itself, where the regime has lost its people and is suppressing them brutally. Iran has spread hatred, terror, and suffering throughout the Middle East and beyond, adding fuel to the disastrous fire and suffering in Ukraine.
- Isaac Herzog, Address to a Joint Meeting of the U.S. Congress, delivered 19 July 2023, U.S. Capitol Building, Washington, D.C.
- I was apprehensive from the first moment [following the 9/11 attacks] about the sort of masochistic email traffic that might start circulating from the Noam Chomsky-Howard Zinn-Norman Finkelstein quarter, and I was not to be disappointed…. It is something worse than idle to propose the very trade-offs that may have been lodged somewhere in the closed-off minds of the mass-murderers. The people of Gaza live under curfew and humiliation and expropriation. This is notorious. Very well: does anyone suppose that an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza would have forestalled the slaughter in Manhattan? It would take a moral cretin to suggest anything of the sort; the cadres of the new jihad make it very apparent that their quarrel is with Judaism and secularism on principle, not with (or not just with) Zionism… What they abominate about "the west", to put it in a phrase, is not what western liberals don't like and can't defend about their own system, but what they do like about it and must defend: its emancipated women, its scientific inquiry, its separation of religion from the state. Loose talk about chickens coming home to roost is the moral equivalent of the hateful garbage emitted by Falwell and Robertson, and exhibits about the same intellectual content.
- Christopher Hitchens, “Let’s not get too liberal”, The Guardian, September 21, 2001.
- Israeli forces’ repeated use of lethal force in the Gaza Strip since March 30, 2018, against Palestinian demonstrators who posed no imminent threat to life may amount to war crimes, Human Rights Watch said today. Israeli forces have killed more than 100 protesters in Gaza and wounded thousands with live ammunition... The killings... highlight the need for the International Criminal Court to open a formal investigation into the situation in Palestine. Third countries should impose targeted sanctions against officials responsible for ongoing serious human rights violations
- Human Rights Watch Israel: Apparent War Crimes in Gaza (June 13, 2018)
- The International Criminal Court (ICC's) mandate to investigate war crimes has thus been hampered by the unwillingness of the world’s sole superpower to commit to the organization.... Recent statements...suggest that the United States is now preparing to go to war against the ICC itself, motivated largely by an effort to silence investigations into alleged American war crimes committed in Afghanistan, as well as alleged crimes committed by Israel during the 2014 war in the Gaza Strip....The unwillingness or inability of U.S. courts to seriously investigate war crimes carried out by American citizens is part of why the ICC mandate in Afghanistan has been viewed as an important effort to bring a minimum level of accountability over the conflict.
- Palestine is a state and the International Criminal Court has jurisdiction involving its cases, the ICC prosecutor ruled Thursday, which could pave the way for a war crimes investigation against Israel. A three-judge panel of the ICC Pretrial Chamber must now affirm the decision by Fatou Bensouda. Israel has been accused of committing war crimes in the West Bank, eastern Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip... Under Bensouda’s 60-page decision, the ICC may exercise its jurisdiction in “territory” that “comprises the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza.”
- I had to take a short break from reading about what’s happening in Gaza. I saw one too many images of dead kids on Twitter and just had to lie down for a while.... People are going insane, in the same way they went insane after 9/11. In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks there was this shrieking emotional intensity which saw critical thinking go out the window and saw people’s minds consumed with a rabid lust for Muslim blood. People have a serious case of 9/11 brain this week, and it’s more than a little scary.... It is very fitting, then, that numerous political and media figures have been working to brand the attacks this past Saturday as “Israel’s 9/11”. After 9/11 everyone lost their minds and started believing a bunch of lies and consenting to power-serving agendas that went on to do orders of magnitude more damage than the initial traumatic event did, and we’re seeing that same infernal trajectory unfolding again today with Israel.
- Caitlin Johnstone Caitlin Johnstone, People Have A Serious Case Of 9/11 Brain Right Now, And It's Scary, Ron Paul Institute, (12 October 2023)
- While skepticism, critique, and simple questions have only multiplied in the wake of outrageous Zionist atrocity propaganda, one thing appears certain: that the Holocaust—which some believe has been used dishonestly as a “warning” to prevent so-called genocide for years—was now being evoked as a justification to conduct actual genocide on a race of people trapped within the Gaza Strip.
- ‘Atrocity propaganda’ debunked following Israel’s war on Gaza, Justice Report, October 14 2023
- Humanitarian aid to Gaza? No electrical switch will be turned on, no water pump will be opened and no fuel truck will enter until the Israeli abductees are returned home.
- Israel Katz (2023) cited in "Energy minister: No electricity or water to Gaza until abductees returned home" on The Times of Israel, 12 October 2023.
- My grandmother was ill in bed when the Nazis came to her home town of Staszów. A German soldier shot her dead in her bed. Madam Deputy Speaker, my grandmother did not die to provide cover for Israeli soldiers murdering Palestinian grandmothers in Gaza. The present Israeli government ruthlessly and cynically exploit the continuing guilt among Gentiles over the slaughter of Jews in the Holocaust as justification for their murder of Palestinians. The implication is that Jewish lives are precious, but the lives of Palestinians do not count. On Sky News a few days ago, the spokeswoman for the Israeli Army Major Livovich was asked about the Israeli killing of, at that time, eight hundred Palestinians. The total is now a thousand. She replied instantly, "Five hundred of them were militants." That was the reply of a Nazi. I suppose the Jews fighting for their lives in the Warsaw Ghetto could have been dismissed as militants.
- Gerald Kaufman, UK Jewish MP: Israel acting like Nazis in Gaza. Youtube (16 January 2009). Retrieved on 2009-01-18.
- And I have witnessed firsthand the ravages of a conflict that has gone on for far too long. I’ve seen Israeli children in Sderot whose playgrounds had been hit by Katyusha rockets. I’ve visited shelters next to schools in Kiryat Shmona that kids had 15 seconds to get to after a warning siren went off. I’ve also seen the devastation of war in the Gaza Strip, where Palestinian girls in Izbet Abed Rabo played in the rubble of a bombed-out building. No children -- Israeli or Palestinian -- should have to live like that.
- John Kerry, On Israel-Palestine Two-State Solution, delivered 28 December 2016
- Most troubling of all, Hamas continues to pursue an extremist agenda: they refuse to accept Israel’s very right to exist. They have a one-state vision of their own: all of the land is Palestine. Hamas and other radical factions are responsible for the most explicit forms of incitement to violence, and many of the images that they use are truly appalling. And they are willing to kill innocents in Israel and put the people of Gaza at risk in order to advance that agenda. Compounding this, the humanitarian situation in Gaza, exacerbated by the closings of the crossings, is dire. Gaza is home to one of the world’s densest concentrations of people enduring extreme hardships with few opportunities. 1.3 million people out of Gaza’s population of 1.8 million are in need of daily assistance -- food and shelter. Most have electricity less than half the time and only 5 percent of the water is safe to drink. And yet despite the urgency of these needs, Hamas and other militant groups continue to re-arm and divert reconstruction materials to build tunnels, threatening more attacks on Israeli civilians that no government can tolerate.
- John Kerry, On Israel-Palestine Two-State Solution, delivered 28 December 2016
- Some geopolitical conflicts are morally complicated. The Israel-Gaza war is not. It possesses a moral clarity not only rare but excruciating. […] For Hamas, the only thing more prized than dead Jews are dead Palestinians.
- Charles Krauthammer, Column, January 2, 2009, "Moral clarity in Gaza" at jewishworldreview.com.
- I want to speak directly to the residents of the Gaza Strip, and tell them: There is another way. We know how to protect ourselves from anyone who threatens us, but we also know how to provide employment, a livelihood and a life of dignity to those who wish to live by our side in peace. There is another way to live. The way of the Abraham Accords, of the Negev Summit, of innovation and prosperity, of regional development and joint projects. The choice is yours. Your future is in your hands.
- Yair Lapid (2022) cited in "Prime Minister Yair Lapid speaks to Gazan civilians - opinion" on The Jerusalem Post, 22 August 2022.
- This vicious circle will not be solved by power, not be solved by tanks, and not will be — nor will it be solved by troops, only by political agreement and, above all and first of all, lifting this criminal siege, for God’s sake, after 17 years. This siege, what it was about, to guarantee the security of Israel. So, what happened out of the siege except of the suffer of — unbelievable inhuman suffer of 2 million people? What did it contribute to the security of Israel, this siege? You see the outcome.
- Israeli Journalist Gideon Levy: Israel Should Lift Siege & Call Off Plans for Ground Invasion of Gaza, DemocracyNow! (11 October 2023)
- The second flawed explanation for the longstanding conflict between Israel and the Palestinian[s] which has gained popularity is that the root of the problem is [the] so-called "occupation," the settlements in Judea and Samaria, and the settlers themselves. Only the establishment of an independent Palestinian state in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, so the argument goes, will ensure peace in the region. It is sufficient to state a number of well-known facts in order to refute this claim. Firstly, all of Judea, Samaria and Gaza were under Arab control for 19 years, between '48 and '67. During these 19 years, no one tried to create a Palestinian state. Peace agreements -- Peace agreements were achieved with Egypt and Jordan despite the presence of settlements. And the opposite is also true: We evacuated 21 flourishing settlements in Gush Katif, and we transferred more than 10,000 Jews, and in return we have Hamas in power and thousands of missiles on Sderot and southern Israel.
- Avigdor Lieberman, Address at the 65th Session, United Nations General Assembly, delivered 28 September 2010, New York, NY
- There are no innocent people in the Gaza Strip. Everyone has a connection to Hamas. Everyone receives a salary from Hamas. Those who are trying to challenge us at the border and breach it belong to Hamas’s military wing.
- Avigdor Lieberman, As quoted in 'There are no innocents in Gaza,' says Israeli defense minister (April 8, 2018), The Jerusalem Post
- The situation inside Gaza is dire. Not only is there no food, there is no water, electricity, or fuel. And that combination is not only catastrophic but can lead to more starvation and disease as well. We’ve got to get more trucks in.
- Cindy McCain of World Food Programme Egypt-Gaza Rafah crossing opens, allowing 20 aid trucks amid Israeli siege (October 21, 2023)
- On June 8, 1967, during the Six-Day War, the Israeli military attacked the USS Liberty, an American spy ship which had been monitoring Israeli transmissions about the conflict. Intercepted Israeli communications indicated that the goal was to sink the Liberty and leave no survivors. Warplanes and torpedo boats had already killed 34 and wounded 174, when Halbardier slid over the Liberty’s napalm-glazed deck to jury-rig an antenna and get an SOS off to the Sixth Fleet. The Israelis intercepted the SOS and broke off the attack immediately. In effect, Halbardier prevented the massacre of all 294 onboard. Still, the infamy of the attack on the Liberty was two-fold. First, the Liberty, a virtually defenseless intelligence collection platform prominently flying an American flag in international waters, came under deliberate attack by Israeli aircraft and three 60-ton Israeli torpedo boats off the coast of the Sinai on a cloudless June afternoon during the six-day Israeli-Arab war. Second, President Lyndon Johnson called back carrier aircraft dispatched to defend the Liberty lest Israel be embarrassed, the start of an unconscionable cover-up, including top Navy brass, that persists to this day. Does all this have relevance today? Of course. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu understands that there is little that Israel could do that would earn the opprobrium of the U.S. Congress or retaliation from the White House, whether it’s building illegal settlements or slaughtering civilians in Gaza. The Israelis seem convinced they remain in the catbird’s seat, largely because of the Israel Lobby’s influence with U.S. lawmakers and opinion makers.
- Ray McGovern in A USS Liberty’s Hero’s Passing, Consortium News (8 June 2019)
- The world saw Operation Cast Lead, where the United States-supplied F-16s, white phosphorus, depleted uranium, cluster bombs, DIME weapons, were rained down on the defenseless people of Gaza. And, of course, we wanted desperately to get in to take humanitarian relief supplies. And both times that I’ve tried to go with Free Gaza, they’ve been thwarted — we have been supported thwarted by the Israeli military.
- Cynthia McKinney,Interview with Democracy Now! (2009)
- I would like to see the children of Gaza have the coloring books and the crayons that we had on board with us. I would like to see the houses that have been destroyed rebuilt. I would like to see the lives rebuilt of the people of Gaza. And I would like to see the people of Palestine have, enjoy their human rights.
- Cynthia McKinney, Interview with Democracy Now! (2009)
- Israel, since its inception, has relied on external support, particularly from the Western world, for justification of its policies in Gaza and the West Bank. These relationships are contingent on many things, including values the West claims to hold dear like freedom, democracy, civil rights and equality. The prospect of a negotiated agreement based on two-states has allowed Israel to stave off the confrontation between the myth of these values and the reality on the ground. But as the notion of a two-state agreement fades firmly into history, the apartheid reality becomes impossible to ignore, and further episodes where Israel will confront masses of mobilized Palestinians demanding their rights will continue to highlight this contradiction.
- Yousef Munayyer on the events of Land Day 2018, In Gaza, Israel Aims To Massacre Hope (2 April 2018), HuffPost.
- "I came here tonight to talk about the agreement and security that are broad consensus within Israeli society. This is what guides our policy. This policy must take into account the international situation. We have to recognize international agreements but also principles important to the State of Israel. I spoke tonight about the first principle - recognition. Palestinians must truly recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people. The second principle is demilitarization. Any area in Palestinian hands has to be demilitarization, with solid security measures. Without this condition, there is a real fear that there will be an armed Palestinian state which will become a terrorist base against Israel, as happened in Gaza. We do not want missiles on Petah Tikva, or Grads on the Ben-Gurion international airport. We want peace."
- As Hamas's charter makes clear, Hamas's immediate goal is to destroy Israel. But Hamas has a broader objective. They also want a caliphate. Hamas shares the global ambitions of its fellow militant Islamists. That’s why its supporters wildly cheered in the streets of Gaza as thousands of Americans were murdered on 9/11. And that's why its leaders condemned the United States for killing Osama bin Laden, whom they praised as a holy warrior. So when it comes to their ultimate goals, Hamas is ISIS and ISIS is Hamas. And what they share in common, all militant Islamists share in common. Boko Haram in Nigeria; Ash-Shabab in Somalia; Hezbollah in Lebanon; An-Nusrah in Syria; The Mahdi Army in Iraq; And the Al-Qaeda branches in Yemen, Libya, the Philippines, India and elsewhere. Some are radical Sunnis, some are radical Shi'ites. Some want to restore a pre-medieval caliphate from the 7th century. Others want to trigger the apocalyptic return of an imam from the 9th century. They operate in different lands, they target different victims and they even kill each other in their quest for supremacy. But they all share a fanatic ideology. They all seek to create ever expanding enclaves of militant Islam where there is no freedom and no tolerance – Where women are treated as chattel, Christians are decimated, and minorities are subjugated, sometimes given the stark choice: convert or die. For them, anyone can be an infidel, including fellow Muslims. Ladies and Gentlemen, Militant Islam's ambition to dominate the world seems mad. But so too did the global ambitions of another fanatic ideology that swept to power eight decades ago. The Nazis believed in a master race. The militant Islamists believe in a master faith. They just disagree about who among them will be the master... of the master faith. That's what they truly disagree about. Therefore, the question before us is whether militant Islam will have the power to realize its unbridled ambitions.
- Benjamin Netanyahu, Speech at the United Nations General Assembly (September 2014), New York City, New York.
- As quoted in The Jerusalem Post.
- Palestinian and Syrian grievances against Israel were not rooted in israel's holding on to this or that territory. That's why they attacked us from the Golan, Judea and Samaria, and Gaza when those areas were in their hands. Their grievances were directed against Israel's very existence, in any territory.
- Benjamin Netanyahu, in Bibi My Story (2022), p.256-257
- This is part of our strategy – to isolate the Palestinians in Gaza from the Palestinians in the West Bank.
- Benjamin Netanyahu, Speaking to Likud members of the Knesset (March 2019), as cited in "Another Concept Implodes: Israel Can’t Be Managed by a Criminal Defendant", Haaretz (9 October 2023)
- [Israel] does not stop its efforts to return Avera Mengistu and the rest of our captives and missing persons
- in Prime Minister Netanyahu The forgotten Israeli hostages kept by Hamas in Gaza for years (“Published 3 days ago”)
- We must remember that the greatest price of this conflict is not paid by us. It is paid by the Israeli girl in Sderot who closes her eyes in fear that a rocker will take her life in the night. It is paid by he Palestinian boy in Gaza who has no clean water and no country to call his own. These are God's children. And after all of the politics and all of the posturing, this is about the right of every human being to live with dignity and security. This is a lesson embedded in the three great faiths that call one small slice of Earth the Holy Land.
- Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries, and anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust. Tomorrow, I will visit Buchenwald, which was part of a network of camps where Jews were enslaved, tortured, shot and gassed to death by the Third Reich. Six million Jews were killed -- more than the entire Jewish population of Israel today. Denying that fact is baseless, it is ignorant, and it is hateful. Threatening Israel with destruction or repeating vile stereotypes about Jews is deeply wrong, and only serves to evoke in the minds of Israelis this most painful of memories, while preventing the peace that the people of this region deserve. On the other hand, it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people -- Muslims and Christians -- have suffered in pursuit of a homeland. For more than sixty years they have endured the pain of dislocation. Many wait in refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza, and neighboring lands for a life of peace and security that they have never been able to lead. They endure the daily humiliations large and small that come with occupation. So let there be no doubt: the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable.
- Barack Obama, Remarks by the President at Cairo University, 4 June 2009
- Four years ago, I stood in Cairo in front of an audience of young people -- politically, religiously, they must seem a world away. But the things they want, they’re not so different from what the young people here want. They want the ability to make their own decisions and to get an education, get a good job; to worship God in their own way; to get married; to raise a family. The same is true of those young Palestinians that I met with this morning. The same is true for young Palestinians who yearn for a better life in Gaza. That's where peace begins -- not just in the plans of leaders, but in the hearts of people. Not just in some carefully designed process, but in the daily connections -- that sense of empathy that takes place among those who live together in this land and in this sacred city of Jerusalem.
- Barack Obama, Remarks of President Barack Obama To the People of Israel at Jerusalem International Convention Center in Jerusalem, Israel (21 March 2013)
- Israel never strived for a decisive victory in Gaza. While it could militarily defeat Hamas, Israel could not overthrow Hamas without risking the possibility that a more radical organization would govern Gaza. Nor did Israel want to be responsible for governing Gaza in a postconflict power vacuum.
- "Lessons from Israel's Wars in Gaza", w:RAND Corporation (2017), cited in Fintan O'Toole "No Endgame in Gaza", The New York Review of Books (31 October 2023)
- The most promising opportunity may be the development of tourism. No other branch of modern industry assures an immediate growth of the Middle East like this one. Our area is blessed by nature and by history -- a history which is still very much alive. The eternity of Jerusalem, the magnificence of the pyramids, the symbols of Luxor, the hanging gardens of Babylon, the pillars of wisdom in Baalbek, the red palaces of Petra, the inimitable charm of Marakesh, the old winds which still blow in Carthage, not ignoring the beaches of Gaza and the breathing of the perfume of the Jericho fruits. We have to open roads to those wonders and keep them safe and hospitable. Tourism depends on tranquility. Tourism enhance[s] tranquility. And it makes friendship into a vested interest.
- Shimon Peres, 48th United Nations General Assembly Address, delivered 28 September 1993, New York, NY
- We have negotiated one of the most complicated issues of the last hundred years. We are grateful to the United States for its support and leadership. We are grateful to both President Clinton and Secretary Christopher for their crucial role. We appreciate the Egyptian role and the Norwegian encouragement, the European involvement and serious contribution [for] the Asian support and blessing. May we now have the right to say to other people in conflict: "Don't give up. Do not surrender to old obsessions and do not take fresh disappointments at face value." What we did others can do as well. Mr. President, we are determined to make the agreement with the Palestinians into a permanent success. Israel would consider an economic success of the Palestinians as though it were its own; and I believe that a newly-achieved security will serve the aspirations of the Israelis and the necessities of the Palestinians. Gaza, after 7,000 years of suffering, can emancipate itself from want. Jericho, without her fallen walls, can see her gardens blossom again.
- Shimon Peres, 48th United Nations General Assembly Address, delivered 28 September 1993, New York, NY
- Palestinians must accept that they can only achieve their goals through negotiation. That was the essence of the agreements made between Israelis and Palestinians in Madrid and again in Oslo in 1993. There is no other way but direct negotiations in an atmosphere of stability and nonviolence. At the same time, Palestinians must also be secure and in control of their individual lives and collective security. In the absence of peace, Israeli's occupation of the West Bank in Gaza has been the defining reality of Palestinian's lives there for over three decades, longer than most of the Palestinians living there have been alive. The overwhelming majority of Palestinians in the West Bank of Gaza and Gaza have grown up with checkpoints and raids and indignities. Too often they have seen their schools shattered and their parents humiliated. Palestinians need security, as well. Too many innocent Palestinians, including children, have been killed and wounded. This, too, must stop. The occupation hurts Palestinians.
- Colin Powell, McConnell Center Address on U.S. Role in Arab-Israeli Conflict, delivered 19 November 2001
- The terrifying events happening right now in Gaza, where hundreds of thousands of totally innocent people are being killed without differentiation, unable to flee, cannot be justified in any way.
- Vladimir Putin, "What antisemitic attacks in Dagestan say about Vladimir Putin’s Russia", Financial Times (30 October 2023)
- I would like Gaza to sink into the sea, but that won’t happen, and a solution must be found.
- Yitzhak Rabin, To a delegation from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Jerusalem, September 1992.[1]
- In the past, I might have favored a cease-fire with Hamas during a conflict with Israel. But today it is clear to me that peace is not going to be possible now or in the future as long as Hamas remains intact and in control of Gaza. Hamas's power and ability to threaten Israel — and subject Gazan civilians to ever more rounds of violence — must end.
- Israel is not alone in believing it must defeat Hamas. Over the past two weeks, when I talked to Arab officials throughout the region whom I have long known, every single one told me that Hamas must be destroyed in Gaza. They made clear that if Hamas is perceived as winning, it will validate the group’s ideology of rejection, give leverage and momentum to Iran and its collaborators and put their own governments on the defensive. But they said this in private. Their public postures have been quite different.
- Dennis Ross, "I Might Have Once Favored a Cease-Fire With Hamas, but Not Now", The New York Times (October 27, 2023)
- September 11th has a tragic resonance in the Middle East, too. On the 11th of September 1922, ignoring Arab outrage, the British government proclaimed a mandate in Palestine, a follow-up to the 1917 Balfour Declaration which imperial Britain issued, with its army massed outside the gates of Gaza. The Balfour Declaration promised European Zionists a national home for Jewish people. (At the time, the Empire on which the Sun Never Set was free to snatch and bequeath national homes like a school bully distributes marbles.)
- Arundhati Roy, Come September Speech, Santa Fe, NM, (29 Sep 2002)
- In 1947, the U.N. formally partitioned Palestine and allotted 55 per cent of Palestine’s land to the Zionists. Within a year, they had captured 76 per cent. On the 14th of May 1948 the State of Israel was declared. Minutes after the declaration, the United States recognized Israel. The West Bank was annexed by Jordan. The Gaza strip came under Egyptian military control, and formally Palestine ceased to exist except in the minds and hearts of the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian people who became refugees.
- Arundhati Roy, Come September speech; Santa Fe, New Mexico; 29 Sep 2002
- I shall conclude with a concrete example of what I mean. Amid all the din about normalization, I have noticed one startling absence, namely, the current status of the Palestinian refugees living in every major Arab country, whose condition everywhere—there are no exceptions—is unacceptably miserable. Wherever there are Palestinians in the Arab world, there are rules and regulations forbidding them full status as residents, forbidding them work and travel, requiring them to register with the police on a monthly basis, and so on. It’s not only Israel that treats Palestinians badly, it is the Arab countries who do so also. Now see if there is a sustained campaign by Arab intellectuals against this invidious local treatment of the Palestinian refugees: you won’t see or hear one. What excuse is there for the horrible refugee camps in which so many of them live, even in places like Gaza and the West Bank; what right do local mokhabarat forces have to harass them and generally make their lives miserable? And why is there no protracted press campaign to end this appalling state of affairs? Why, because it is much easier (and less risky) to rail against normalization and Hebrew translations than it is to dramatize the unacceptable condition of Palestinian refugees in the Arab world, who are always being told that they cannot be “normalized” because it would implement Israel’s design. What rubbish!
- Edward Said, "Defiance, Dignity, and the Rule of Dogma" (2001)
- Israel is now waging a war against civilians, pure and simple, although you will never hear it put that way in the United States. This is a racist war and, in its strategy and tactics, a colonial one as well. People are being killed and made to suffer disproportionately because they are not Jews. What an irony! Yet CNN never refers to “occupied” territories (always rather to “violence in Israel,” as if the main battlefields were the concert halls and cafés of Tel Aviv and not in fact the ghettos and besieged refugee camps of Palestine that have already been surrounded by no less than 150 illegal Israeli settlements). For the past ten years, the great fraud of Oslo was foisted on the world by the United States, with hardly an awareness that only 18 percent of the West Bank was given up, and 60 percent of Gaza. No one knows geography, and it’s better not to know, since the reality on the ground is so astonishing, considering the verbal hoopla and self-congratulation. And that pseudo-pundit—the insufferably conceited Thomas Friedman—still has the gall to say that “Arab TV” shows one-sided pictures, as if “Arab TV” should be showing things from Israel’s point of view the way CNN does, with “Mideast violence” the catchall word for the ethnic cleansing that Israel is wreaking on the Palestinians in their ghettos and camps. Has Friedman (or CNN, for that matter) ever tried to point out the difference between an attacking army fighting a colonial war on the territory of the people it has occupied for thirty-five years, and the people defending against that butchery? Of course not, for indeed why should Friedman ever bother to say honestly that there is no Palestinian occupation, there are no Palestinian F-16s, no Apache helicopters, no gunboats, no Merkava tanks, in short, no Palestinian occupation of Israel. So much for Friedman’s credentials as an honest commentator and reporter, who has utterly failed in unadorned terms both to explain the U.S. view and to understand the Arab and Palestinian cause. Can he not see that he and his writings are part of the problem, that in their maundering selfjustifications and their dishonesty, showing no sign of the self-criticism he keeps hectoringly expecting of others, he actually aggravates the ignorance and the misperceptions rather than reducing them? Poor journalist and educator, he.
- Edward Said, "What Price Oslo?" (2002)
- Israel suffered a barbaric attack and is well within its rights to defend itself in keeping with international law, including the protection of civilians. As a response, Israel is contemplating a large-scale ground invasion targeting Hamas. Reports indicate Israeli ground forces are already active in Gaza. We note recent reports that senior U.S. officials – including Secretary of Defense Austin – have conveyed to the Israeli government their serious concerns about the risks associated with this course. We share many of these concerns, not just relating to the timing and difficulty of such an operation and its likely humanitarian toll, but also regarding the difficult questions about the political reality it will leave in its wake.
- Bernie Sanders, in a press release posted on his web site at NEWS: Sanders, Warren, Welch, Merkley Send Urgent Letter to President Biden Amid Israel’s Invasion and Potential Occupation of Gaza (November 1, 2023)
- Our humanitarian aid ensures more than half of the population, especially in the Gaza Strip, which lacks the most basic necessities for survival: food and basic health care. Hamas, on the other hand, offers them nothing but poverty and suffering. Hamas is not acting in the interests of the Palestinian people. And it is unfortunately foreseeable: The suffering and hardship of the civilian population in the Gaza Strip will only increase. Hamas is also responsible for this with its attack on Israel. Dear Colleagues: Even if it is difficult for us at the moment -- in view of the terrible reports and images from Israel and the Gaza Strip -- we must also look at the long-term perspective of the Middle East. There have certainly been changes for the better there in recent times: the normalization of relations between Israel; the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain in 2020; the end of the Qatar crisis in 2021; the resumption of relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia in 2023; the last chance for a normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia as well. We must not allow terror to destroy these positive developments. And that may be precisely the goal of terror. All the more reason for us to continue to use diplomatic means to find solutions to the numerous conflicts in the region. In doing so, we will not give up the goal that our Israeli friends and the Palestinians who want peace will one day be able to live side by side and without terror, even if that seems further away than ever today.
- Olaf Scholz, Address to the Bundestag on Solidarity with Israel, 12 October 2023
- For decades, Israeli and Western leaders have dehumanised Palestinians, but the response cannot now be to dehumanise Israelis. Explaining the political context of the Hamas attacks and the principles of strategic armed struggle is a world away from endorsing an indiscriminate massacre. For if you think that war crimes from Hamas last Saturday are acceptable, how are you going to argue that war crimes from Israel today are not? To lose moral consistency weakens the moral core of the Palestinian cause. To see these indiscriminate Hamas attacks as an acceptable outcome of Palestinian suffering is not a sign of solidarity; it is a form of moral relativism. To cast oppressed Palestinians as having special clearance for brutality is not a liberation struggle; it is specifically intertwining the cause with violence against civilians. And to say that all Israeli citizens are fair game (as I have seen repeatedly online) is a level of permissibility that is extraordinary. It is the same logic applied now to Palestinians in Gaza by the extremist Israeli government and its cheerleaders.
- Rachel Shabi, "To lose moral consistency weakens the Palestinian cause", i (14 October 2023)
- Hamas murdered at least 1,3000 Israelis on 7 October 2023 beginning the 2023 Israel–Hamas war.
- The Arab enmity for Jews and the state of Israel allows for no peace process. The time for half measures has passed. Bulldozing houses of homicide bombers is useless. Instituting ongoing curfews in Arab-populated cities is useless. Roadblocks, touch fences, midnight negotiations and cease-fires are useless. [...] Here is the bottom line: If you believe that the Jewish state has a right to exist, then you must allow Israel to transfer the Palestinians and the Israeli-Arabs from Judea, Samaria, Gaza and Israel proper. It's an ugly solution, but it is the only solution.
- Ben Shapiro, "Transfer is not a dirty word", Townhall.com, 27 August 2003, Shapiro has since retracted and apologized for this column.[2]
- I'm Jake Tapper in Washington, where the state of our union is rather terrified that this brutal war between Israel and Hamas is about to get much bigger and much worse, more desperation in the Middle East this morning.
- This was the scene after an Israeli strike in Gaza just hours ago, as people rushed to save survivors stuck under the rubble. Now the Israeli government says, after eight days of a brutal air campaign, it is now preparing -- quote -- "significant ground operations," a reminder that Hamas embeds itself within the Palestinian population, in response to the devastating terrorist attacks in which 1,000 Israelis were slaughtered, the deadliest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust.
- And that was, of course, accompanied by the kidnapping of more than 100 innocent people from Israel.
- And, this hour, Israel is warning the Lebanese group Hezbollah, which the U.S. considers to be a terrorist group, about any further escalations from the north after the two sides escalated, exchanged fire earlier today.
- Meanwhile, tens of thousands of innocent civilians in Gaza, a population of 2.3 million, are trying to flee. There are reports from inside the country that Hamas, which uses human shields, has set up blockades to stop its own people from escaping.
- Earlier today, U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told me that Hamas is blocking civilians, including Americans, from using the only viable exit from Gaza, the Rafah Crossing, into Egypt's Sinai Desert. Sullivan also told me that water service has been restored by Israel to Southern Gaza.
- Earlier this week, Israel cut off supplies of electricity, food, water, and medicine to Gaza until Hamas frees its hostages, including some Americans.
- Jake Tapper, Transcripts State of the Union (October 15, 2023)
- The ICC’s chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, said last month that there was a “reasonable basis” to open a war crimes probe into Israeli military actions in the Gaza Strip as well as Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank...she recently told The Times of Israel that accusing her of anti-Semitism was “particularly regrettable” and “without merit... I, along with my Office, execute our mandate under the Rome Statute with utmost independence, objectivity, fairness and professional integrity. We will continue to meet our responsibilities as required by the Rome Statute without fear or favor,” she said
- I believe that we shouldn’t be supporting any form of aid towards countries that are killing people that are innocent. And you can claim, as many will claim, that this is about security and so forth, but I think America needs to be held responsible. I mean, me, as an American, I know and feel that when you see protesters, peaceful protesters, marching, if it’s in Gaza, all the way to even Africa and other parts of the world—I see it everywhere—that if it’s promoting, you know, the violation of people’s international human rights, if it’s promoting the lack of freedom of speech, the lack of freedom to assemble, which is our core—part of our core of who we are as Americans, then, yes, cutting off aid is a possibility for me, absolutely. I mean, we have to use our American aid and our partnership as leverage, to promote who we are. And we don’t do that by supporting those kinds of killings.
- Rashida Tlaib, interview with Democracy Now (2018)
- I am deeply alarmed by developments in Gaza after Israel launched a military operation this morning targeting members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement (PIJ), said Tor Wennesland the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process. Persistent drivers of conflict, including school demolitions, breed a climate of mistrust and tension between Palestinians and Israelis and undermine the prospect of achieving a political solution, he said. ... The demolition followed an Israeli court order citing safety concerns in response to a petition by a settler organization. Currently, 58 schools, serving 6,500 children, face the threat of demolition due to a lack of building permits that are almost impossible for Palestinians to obtain, Mr. Wennesland said. A child’s right to education must be respected, he said, calling on Israeli authorities to cease such demolitions and evictions, which are illegal under international law
- UN Middle East envoy condemns deadly Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, United Nations News (9 May 2023)
- UN humanitarians expressed deep concern on Friday for all civilians in the Gaza Strip following Israel’s order for the entire population there to leave the north, amid ongoing airstrikes and a deepening humanitarian crisis. The development follows an announcement by UN Spokesperson, Stéphane Dujarric, just before midnight Eastern Standard Time on Thursday, that UN representatives in Gaza had been “informed by their liaison officers in the Israeli military” that everyone living north of Wadi Gaza should relocate to southern Gaza within 24 hours. Some 1.1 million people would be expected to leave northern Gaza, Mr. Dujarric said, adding that the same order applied to all UN staff and those sheltered in UN facilities, including schools, health centres and clinics. The UN considers it “impossible” for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences and appeals for the order to be rescinded, Mr. Dujarric said. Echoing that message, the UN World Health Organization (WHO) joined the call for Israel to rescind the relocation order, which amounted to a “death sentence” for many, said WHO spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic.
- Gaza: Nowhere to go, as humanitarian situation reaches ‘lethal low’, United Nations News (13 October 2023)
- "The complete siege of Gaza coupled with unfeasible evacuation orders and forcible population transfers, is a violation of international humanitarian and criminal law. It is also unspeakably cruel,” the [United Nations] experts said.
- It has been four weeks waiting for this moment really to happen, and, I mean at some stage I wasn't sure this would happen, really but thank God, I am here.
- Dr Abdelkader Hammad accrding to Gaza surgeon's 'big relief' on UK family reunion (BBC a few minutes ago)
- The United States should have an equal and simultaneous support for both the legitimate security concerns of Israel, and the human rights, dignity and economic opportunities of the Palestinian people... I do not believe the settlements on the West Bank are legal. Also, I would rescind the president's affirmation of sovereignty of Israel over the Golan Heights. I understand the occupation of the Golan Heights, but only until there is a stable government in Syria with whom one can negotiate. According to international law, the occupation of a territory does not give the occupying country a right to annex it. Also, according to international law, the resources of the occupied territory are to be used for the good of those living there. I also do not support the blockade of Gaza.
- Marianne Williamson, Quoted in Candidates Answer CFR's Questions Marianne Williamson, Council on Foreign Relations, August 16, 2019
- What SNCC taught me was that I needed to act in my own community. It took me some time to put all of this together but finally, eleven years ago, I went to Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza for the first time. Based on what I saw with my own eyes and the anguish I felt in my own heart I became a Jewish activist against Israeli governmental policies of injustice and inequality.
- Dorothy Zellner, Interview (2014)
- Gaza's society is sensitive to its heritage, but the crushing that has been inflicted by the occupying forces over the past fifty years means that vital priorities like feeding, caring for, and educating the population have pushed cultural heritage aside as a luxury for wealthy countries.
- Jean-Baptiste Humbert, quoted in Report on the Impact of the Recent War in 2023 on the Cultural Heritage in Gaza Strip - Palestine (2023)
See also edit
External links edit
- (youtube) Israel in 'discussions' for Gaza's future post-Hamas control, Mark Regev says
- Video: Drone footage shows flattened mosque in Gaza’s Deir Al-Balah
- ↑ "Middle East | Analysis: Hopeless in Gaza". BBC News. 20 November 2000.
- ↑ So, Here's A Giant List Of All The Dumb Stuff I've Ever Done (Don't Worry, I'll Keep Updating It), retrieved on 2021-05-26