Dave Stockton
A new stage is being reached in Israel’s genocide in Gaza—mass deaths by starvation and the calling up of tens of thousands of volunteers for an invasion and renewed occupation of the tiny enclave by the IDF. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised that the population is to be moved as part of an ‘intensive’ offensive. Finance minister Bezalel Smotrich declared ‘we are finally going to occupy the Gaza strip. We will stop being afraid of the word occupation’.
On 5 May The Times of Israel reported unanimous security cabinet backing for the new stage of the war:
‘The plan, which the official speaking Monday said had been presented by IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, provides for the “conquering of Gaza and holding the territories.” The official said it will see the IDF take control of territory in Gaza, move the civilian population toward the south, attack Hamas, and prevent the terror group from taking control of humanitarian aid.’
The paper goes on to describe a plan to deliver aid via private companies and ‘international organisations’, under the guard of the IDF, supposedly to eliminate Hamas influence over its delivery, but quite clearly in tiny amounts. Food and water are again to be weaponised; eat under colonial military rule, or starve under Hamas.
Reuters reported that the plan could involve ‘seizing the entire enclave’ of Gaza. Netanyahu also told the cabinet that he has been in talks with a number of countries about Trump’s plans to forcibly relocate Palestinians from Gaza.
There still remain obstacles to Netanyahu and his cabinet achieving their aims, though the IDF seem to be on board if not in the driving seat. Zamir openly said that ‘we may lose the hostages’, with the army finally admitting that destroying Hamas and returning the hostages were mutually exclusive aims. While Smotrich says there should be ‘no retreat from the territories we have conquered, not even in exchange for hostages’ once the next stage has begun, a consistent 70% of Israelis disagree in polls on the question.
Netanyahu is not so foolish to start the plan before President Trump visits him in Israel in mid-May. Who knows what Trump might say? It cannot be ruled out that he backs the planned endgame. On the other hand, it is perceived in Israel that the ousting of Mike Waltz is a blow to Netanyahu’s influence. Meanwhile, Gaza starves.
Starvation
Two months into Israel’s total blockade, food has run out and people are fighting over water amid relentless bombing, reported Olga Cherenkov, a UN humanitarian affairs coordination (OCHA) officer in Gaza City: ‘Food stocks have now mainly run out, water access has become impossible,’ she said. Cherenkov saw people ‘burning a few days ago from the explosions—and there was no water to save them.’
More than 1.8 million Palestinians of the total population of 2.3 million are experiencing ‘extremely critical’ levels of hunger, with 70% of crop fields destroyed and livelihoods decimated during the ongoing Israeli offensive, according to a UN-backed food security assessment. Some 70,000 children have been hospitalised in the enclave due to severe malnutrition.
After an Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report stating that famine is imminent in Northern Gaza, Sally Abi Khalil, Oxfam’s Middle East and North Africa Regional Director, said:
‘This new report shows that the catastrophic levels of hunger and starvation in Gaza are the highest ever recorded on the IPC scale, both in terms of [the] number of people and percentage of the population. Never before have we seen such rapid deterioration into widespread starvation.’
Israel’s war on Gaza has now killed at least 52,495 Palestinians and wounded 118,366, according to Gaza’s Ministry of Health. But thousands more people are missing under the rubble, presumed dead.
In yet another crime that is likely to originate directly from Israel, Conscience, the Freedom Flotilla Coalition’s humanitarian ship, was bringing volunteers and aid to Gaza, when it was attacked by two drones causing a fire and a hole in its hull just outside Maltese territorial waters early on 2 May. Maltese authorities denied critical assistance to the vessel, crew, and volunteers aboard.
Solidarity
Yet Britain, the European Union and above all the United States—continue to give economic and above all military support to the Zionist state. They are fully and totally complicit with its ongoing crimes against humanity. History will place our rulers in the dock, but the horror in Gaza demands we give history a giant push.
Britain’s RAF has flown more reconnaissance planes over Gaza, picking out ‘targets’ (two-thirds of whom are women and children) for the IDF, than the Israeli airforce itself. That is how embedded the British Labour government is in this genocide.
Despite systematic repression, the Palestine solidarity movements, both in the western allies of Israel and the Middle Eastern states, must redouble their efforts to force their governments to stop all military aid and halt all economic relations with Israel. This includes turning towards workers in arms factories supplying the IDF, on the railways, in docks and airports, who can blockade supplies.
Workers of the world must be under no illusions about the historic juncture. 50 years ago, the Vietnamese liberation movement expelled the US imperialists from Saigon. On that anniversary, imperialism is preparing its revenge against the Palestinians.
Now is the time to move from words to action.