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2023 was deadliest year for Palestinians in the West Bank since 2005

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Original article by Abdul Rahman republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

Israeli occupation forces obstructing the work of ambulances in Jenin. (Photo: Mohammad Mansour/WAFA)

Over 500 Palestinians were killed in the West Bank in 2023. Under its undeclared policy of collective punishment, Israel also destroyed a significant amount of civilian infrastructure such as roads, residential buildings, and hospitals in West Bank since October 7

Israel’s war on Gaza has entered its fourth month. It has killed over 23,000 Palestinians in the besieged enclave and injured around 60,000. Nearly 80% of all Gazans have been displaced due to the constant bombings. The amount of destruction and killing in Gaza is horrendous. The offensive has also extended to the West Bank where Palestinians have been facing a form of undeclared collective punishment both before and since the war in Gaza.  

Though the West Bank has always faced violent attacks from Israeli occupation, those attacks have increased manifold since the beginning of the war in Gaza. Despite the fact that Hamas does not rule the territory, Israel used the excuse of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood to justify its unprecedented attacks on civilians and their infrastructure there. 

Between October 7 and December 31, last year more than 340 Palestinians, including a large number of children, were killed in attacks carried out by both the Israeli forces and illegal settlers. 

The Israeli attacks targeted Palestinian civilians, including artists from the famous Freedom Theater, while homes were demolished, hospitals and medical facilities targeted, and roads and other civilian infrastructure uprooted.  

At least three Palestinian men were shot and killed by the occupying Israeli forces during the intervening period of Monday evening and Tuesday night in Tulkarm. Video footage of these attacks showed Israeli forces first shooting and killing the men and then running over the bodies of one of them with their military vehicle.

Israeli forces reportedly conducted similar night raids in Qalqilya, Nablus, Ramallah, and Bethlehem, among several other places on Tuesday night, arresting scores of people and destroying civic infrastructure.

Israeli occupation is targeting the Palestinians in the West Bank economically as well by refusing to transfer millions of dollars in tax revenue to the Palestinian Authority, leaving it with no money to pay the salaries to its over 140,000 employees. It has also refused to allow around 150,000 workers from the territory to return to their jobs in Israel since October 7.  

Deadliest Year since 2005

Israeli forces similarly attacked the Jenin refugee camp a couple of days ago and killed at least 7 Palestinians. They have targeted the camp repeatedly since October 7, killing over 60 Palestinians there and deliberately destroying most of the roads and other civil infrastructure. According to Al-Jazeera, Tulkarm too has been a center of Israeli attacks with at least 60 Palestinians killed since October 7.

In August, the UN had already declared 2023 to be the deadliest year for the West Bank as the number of Palestinians killed in Israeli attacks had crossed 200, more than the previous high of 167 in 2022.

According to the latest data, the total number of Palestinians killed in 2023 has crossed 500 with over 13,000 more injured in the attacks carried out by both illegal settlers as well as Israeli soldiers.

More than 70 of the Palestinians killed in Israeli attacks were children. This is the highest number of the Palestinian children ever killed in the occupied West Bank in a year. Some sources say the death toll among children is even higher.

Settler Violence

According to Israeli human rights organization Yesh Din, 2023 was also the most violent year for the Palestinians in the occupied West Bank in terms of the number of attacks carried out by the illegal settlers. According to it, at least 10 Palestinians were killed in 2023 just in those attacks.

According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), at least 1,225 cases of settler violence were recorded in 2023.

The figure presented by the Palestinian officials for the same is almost double at 2,410. It also claims that the number of Palestinians killed in settler violence in 2023 was 22.

There are around 500,000 Israeli settlers living illegally inside the occupied West Bank. Most of these illegal settlers participate in attacks on nearby Palestinian villages under security cover provided by the Israeli occupation forces.

The settlers attack the villages, burn Palestinian houses, their farms and other properties, and attack people trying to prevent those attacks with the objective of terrorizing people to leave their villages and farms.

Record number of Palestinians detained

More than 11,000 Palestinians were also arrested or detained by Israel in the last year in the occupied West Bank alone, which is almost three times higher than the total number of Palestinians inside Israeli prisons before the beginning of the year.

Some of them were later released after a brief period of detention. Some others were released as part of the prisoner exchange deal between Hamas and Israel. Still the number of Palestinian prisoners inside Israeli jails has jumped from around 4,500 before the beginning of the year to over 7,000 at the end of it.

A joint statement issued by Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs Commission, the Palestinian Prisoners Society, Addameer, and others stated that 1,085 of those detained by the Israeli occupation forces from the West Bank in 2023 were children.

As per reports, scores of Palestinian prisoners have been killed inside Israeli jails with large number of them reporting torture and abuse by the prisoner authorities.

Original article by Abdul Rahman republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

Continue Reading2023 was deadliest year for Palestinians in the West Bank since 2005

World faces days of “moral decay” as Israel bulldozes hospital grounds, detains more doctors

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Original article by Ana Vračar at peoples dispatch republished under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

Israel carries out unprecedented attacks against health workers and infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, bulldozing hospital grounds and detaining doctors

Al-Awda Hospital Manager Dr. Ahmed Muhanna was arrested by Israeli Forces and his whereabouts are currently unknown. Photo: People’s Health Movement

“Moral decay,” as Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) put it, is possibly the best way to summarize the past weekend of Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF) attacks on health in the Gaza Strip. Days of unimaginable horrors haunt health workers, patients, and displaced people in Gaza’s hospitals as violent raids and sieges of health centers continue over 70 days into Israel’s war on Gaza.

On Saturday, December 16, reports came in about Israeli bulldozers crushing those staying in tents on the grounds of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza. The raid turned the area into a mass grave, leaving many more injured behind. Soon after the event, Mai al-Kaila, Palestinian Health Minister, called for an urgent probe into the event.

Not only did the Israeli occupation bulldoze living people, but they also “released dogs on us in the courtyard of Kamal Adwan Hospital, and they mauled a wounded person before his martyrdom,” said the Ministry of Health’s statement.

Around the time the ministry’s statement was published, there were still 12 babies in the incubators of Kamal Adwan who health staff could not reach, leaving the infants without food.

The Israeli occupation announced it had detained dozens of people during the raid. According to reports, these also include health workers.

Health workers were detained and taken to unknown locations from Al-Awda Hospital in Jabalya, another health center that had been besieged for days. Among the 21 health workers who had been detained was Dr. Ahmed Muhanna, the director of the hospital, who had been one of the health staff to provide regular reports about the health situation in the Gaza Strip. All the health workers except for Dr. Muhanna were released after a three-hour interrogation, but the hospital director’s current location remains unknown.

A week ago, Dr. Muhanna reported that the situation in the hospital was “critical,” with the hospital under complete siege and snipers having shot two staff members. Shortly before he was taken away by the IOF, Dr. Muhanna had reassured media that the hospital staff remained steadfast and in high spirits despite the siege.

Read more: As attacks on hospitals in Gaza intensify, health workers remain steadfast

Among other hospitals attacked were the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, and Gaza’s biggest hospital, Al-Shifa. Bombs damaged the maternity ward at Nasser Medical Complex, killing one and injuring at least ten. A new mission led by the WHO visited Al-Shifa on December 16, delivering much-needed supplies. The team found a “hospital in need of resuscitation.”

According to their report, there are no blood supplies at Al-Shifa, meaning that no surgical interventions can take place, and supplies needed for pain management are also virtually non-existent. The WHO described the “emergency department as a ‘bloodbath’, with hundreds of injured patients inside, and new patients arriving every minute.”

“Patients with trauma injuries were being sutured on the floor,” the WHO reported, and “care must be exercised not to step on patients on the floor.”

On December 17, news came in that Hani Al-Haitham, the head of Al-Shifa’s emergency department, was killed in an Israeli attack, along with his wife, Dr. Sameera Ghifari, and their children.

Together with the increasing risk of the spread of infectious diseases and food deprivation, the escalating attacks against health services and health workers in Palestine are making Gaza completely unlivable, providing further evidence of the genocidal intention behind Israeli attacks.

People’s Health Dispatch is a fortnightly bulletin published by the People’s Health Movement and Peoples Dispatch. For more articles and subscription to People’s Health Dispatch, click here.

Original article by Ana Vračar at peoples dispatch republished under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

Continue ReadingWorld faces days of “moral decay” as Israel bulldozes hospital grounds, detains more doctors

Warren Leads Letter Pressing Biden on Israel’s Use of US Arms

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Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

An Israeli soldier carries a 155mm artillery shell near a self-propelled howitzer deployed at a position near the border with Lebanon in the upper Galilee region of northern Israel on October 18, 2023. (Photo: Jalaa Marey/AFP via Getty Images)

The senators—who are seeking improved oversight—sounded the alarm on the “staggering number of civilian deaths” caused by Israeli bombing with U.S.-supplied ordnance.

As the number of Gazans killed, maimed, or left missing by Israeli bombs and bullets—many of them manufactured in the United States— tops 60,000, a group of U.S. senators on Tuesday urged President Joe Biden to boost oversight of how American arms are used against Palestinian civilians.

Noting that Israel’s response to the Hamas-led attacks of October 7 “has killed over 15,000 Palestinians in Gaza, the vast majority of whom are civilians,” Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), and Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) asked the White House for “information on the accountability and oversight measures that ensure any use of U.S. weapons is in accordance with U.S. policy and international law.”

“U.S. allies and human rights groups have argued many of these deaths were preventable,” the senators wrote in their letter. “In its campaign, Israel has also repeatedly targeted areas it previously designated as ‘safe zones,’ after telling Palestinians to move to these locations for safety.”

“[Israel Defense Forces] airstrikes have also hit the densely populated Jabalia refugee camp multiple times,” the lawmakers noted. “The first strike killed ‘more than 100 people’ and injured ‘hundreds’ more. The second strike left dozens wounded and rescuers said those killed included ‘whole families’… Other strikes and operations have targeted hospitals.”

A growing number of legal, human rights, and other experts have called Israel’s war on Gaza a genocide.

The senators’ letter continues:

While these strikes were aimed at Hamas, we have concerns that strikes on civilian infrastructure have not been proportional, particularly given the predictable harm to civilians. The United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has said these strikes are ‘clear violations of international humanitarian law.’ Even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has admitted that his government’s efforts to minimize civilian casualties to date are ‘not successful.’

The letter singles out 155mm artillery shells, unguided explosive rounds with a “kill radius” of about 50 meters, with shrapnel able to kill and wound people hundreds of meters away.

“The IDF requires its ground forces to stay 250 meters away to protect its own forces,” the letter states. “The IDF has previously used these shells to ‘hit populated areas including neighborhoods, hospitals, schools, shelters, and safe zones,’ causing a staggering number of civilian deaths.”

“Over 30 U.S.-based civil society organizations warned against providing Israel 155mm shells in an open letter to [U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd] Austin calling the shells ‘inherently indiscriminate’ and ‘a grave risk to civilians,'” the lawmakers added.

Claiming that “civilian harm prevention is a cornerstone of American foreign policy”—a curious assertion given that the United States has killed more foreign civilians by far than any other armed force on the planet since the end of World War II—the senators argued that “we must ensure accountability for the use of U.S. weapons we provided to our ally.”

“As you have acknowledged, Israel’s military campaign has included ‘indiscriminate bombing,'” they wrote. “Your administration must ensure that existing guidance and standards are being used to evaluate the reports of Israel using U.S. weapons in attacks that harm civilians in order to more rigorously protect civilian safety during Israel’s operations in Gaza.”

To that end, the senators ask Biden to answer 13 questions, including:

  • Are U.S. officials aware of the IDF’s current policy on preventing civilian harm?
  • What insights does the U.S. government have into how the Israeli military assesses issues of proportionality?
  • What systems does the Israeli government have in place to investigate allegations of civilian harm?
  • Does the U.S. Defense Department or State Department plan to provide Israel with guidance on how 155mm shells should be
    used when civilians are nearby?
  • Are you aware of any requests for inspector general reviews or audits of U.S. military assistance provided to Israel?

The senators’ letter came ahead of Wednesday’s procedural vote on whether to begin debating a $106 billion “national security” spending package requested by Biden, which includes more than $10 billion in additional U.S. military aid to Israel atop the nearly $4 billion it receives each year from Washington.

On Tuesday, Sanders—who has angered progressives by failing to demand a Gaza cease-fire—said he opposes sending billions of dollars in unconditional U.S. armed aid to the “right-wing, extremist” Israeli government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“Israel must dramatically change its approach to minimize civilian harm,” he said, “and lay out a wider political process that can secure lasting peace.”

Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

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Continue ReadingWarren Leads Letter Pressing Biden on Israel’s Use of US Arms

‘Nightmarish Situation’ as Israel Resumes Assault on Gaza

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Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Search and rescue teams and civilians gather among the rubble of buildings in Deir Al Balah, Gaza on December 1, 2023. (Photo: Ashraf Amra/Anadolu via Getty Images)

“Anything other than sustained peace and at-scale emergency aid will mean catastrophe for the children of Gaza,” said a UNICEF spokesperson.

Israel resumed its assault on the Gaza Strip Friday morning just minutes after the pause with Hamas officially expired, ending a fragile seven-day truce that created conditions for the release of hundreds of Israeli and Palestinian captives and allowed additional—but still inadequate—humanitarian aid to enter the besieged territory.

Gaza’s health ministry said that Israel’s post-pause airstrikes killed more than 30 people and wounded dozens more, hitting a multi-story residential building and other civilian infrastructure in the southern part of the strip, where many Gazans sought refuge as Israeli forces targeted the north in earlier stages of its attack.

The Associated Press reported that Israeli forces “dropped leaflets over parts of southern Gaza urging people to leave their homes, suggesting it was preparing to widen its offensive.”

“The Israeli military also released a map carving up the Gaza Strip into hundreds of numbered parcels, and asked residents to learn the number associated with their location in case of an eventual evacuation,” AP added. “It said the map would eventually be interactive, but it was not immediately clear how Palestinians would be updated on their designated parcel numbers and calls for evacuation.”

Robert Mardini, director general of the International Committee of the Red Cross, toldAgence France-Presse that the resumption of bombing drags Gazans “back to the nightmarish situation they were in before the truce took place,” with millions of people in desperate need of food, medicine, clean water, and sanitary living conditions.

“People are at a breaking point, hospitals are at a breaking point, the whole Gaza Strip is in a very precarious state,” said Mardini. “There is nowhere safe to go for civilians. We have seen in the hospitals where our teams have been working, that over the past days, hundreds of severely injured people have arrived. The influx of severely wounded outpaced the real capacity of hospitals to absorb and treat the wounded, so there is a massive challenge.”

James Elder, spokesperson for the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), warned Friday that “the humanitarian situation in Gaza is so perilous that anything other than sustained peace and at-scale emergency aid will mean catastrophe for the children of Gaza.”

“To accept the sacrifice of the children in Gaza is humanity giving up,” said Elder. “This is our last chance, before we delve into seeking to explain yet another utterly avoidable tragedy.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is clinging to his job amid plummeting approval ratings, had pledged to continue assailing Gaza following the end of the truce, which marked the first pause in fighting since the war began in the wake of a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel in early October.

The Financial Times reported Friday that Israel’s government is preparing for a war that “will stretch for a year or more, with the most intensive phase of the ground offensive continuing into early 2024.”

“The multi-phase strategy envisages Israeli forces, who are garrisoned inside north Gaza, making an imminent push deep into the south of the besieged Palestinian enclave,” FT reported, citing unnamed sources familiar with the planning. “The goals include killing the three top Hamas leaders—Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Deif, and Marwan Issa—while securing ‘a decisive’ military victory against the group’s 24 battalions and underground tunnel network and destroying its ‘governing capability in Gaza.'”

An investigation published Thursday by +972 Magazine and Local Call found that Israeli forces have used “expanded authorization for bombing non-military targets” and “the loosening of constraints regarding expected civilian casualties,” as well as “an artificial intelligence system to generate more potential targets than ever,” to wage its devastating war on Gaza, killing more than 14,500 people in less than two months and displacing 70% of the territory’s population.

In one case that anonymous Israeli sources described to the two outlets, Israel’s military command “knowingly approved the killing of hundreds of Palestinian civilians in an attempt to assassinate a single top Hamas military commander.”

“Another reason for the large number of targets, and the extensive harm to civilian life in Gaza, is the widespread use of a system called ‘Habsora’ (‘The Gospel’), which is largely built on artificial intelligence and can ‘generate’ targets almost automatically at a rate that far exceeds what was previously possible,” +972 and Local Call found. “This AI system, as described by a former intelligence officer, essentially facilitates a ‘mass assassination factory.'”

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reportedly urged Israel to do more to protect civilians in Gaza during a meeting with the nation’s leaders on Thursday, but the Israeli government has repeatedly brushed aside public and private concerns expressed by the Biden administration, which continues to provide unconditional support for the assault.

“Blinken suggested that his call for protecting Palestinian civilians had reached receptive ears, at least in general terms,” The New York Times reported. “He did not cite any specific commitments by Israel, however.”

Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Continue Reading‘Nightmarish Situation’ as Israel Resumes Assault on Gaza

Newborns in Gaza Dying From Preventable Causes Due to Israeli Siege: Oxfam

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Original article by JULIA CONLEY republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

“Oxfam is urgently calling for a full cease-fire and unimpeded humanitarian access,” said the group, explaining that a four-day pause in fighting is not sufficient.

Humanitarian workers in Gaza on Thursday said their daily experiences struggling to take care of pregnant people and babies demonstrate why a four-day pause in fighting is far from sufficient to save the lives of the blockaded enclave’s most vulnerable residents, including newborns who have begun to die from preventable causes.

As Israel’s blockade continues to keep Gaza authorities from providing clean water, food, sanitation, and heat to homes and hospitals, babies aged three months and younger “are dying of diarrhea, hypothermia, dehydration, and infection,” said Oxfam International.

Juzoor, an organization partnering with Oxfam in northern Gaza, said premature births have increased by 25-30% since October 7 when Israel began its bombardment of Gaza in retaliation for an attack by Hamas.

The group has been supporting about 500 pregnant women in 13 shelters—where a total of 35,000 people are living—and many have gone into labor prematurely as they have the ongoing trauma of “walking long distances in search of safety, running away from bombs, and being crowded into shelters with squalid conditions.”

Humanitarian workers are struggling to adequately care for thousands of people who have taken refuge in shelters, with waste piling up due to a lack of sanitation services and up to 600 people sharing one toilet.

Sally Abi Khalil, Middle East regional director for Oxfam, said the fact that the crisis has reached a stage where babies are dying of preventable illnesses is “abhorrent.”

“Last month we lost at least one baby in every shelter, it’s heartbreaking,” said Umaiyeh Khammash, director of Juzoor. “Access to hospitals is extremely dangerous and virtually impossible, so many women are having to give birth with little or no maternity support in shelters.”

As Common Dreams has reported, more than 50,000 Gaza residents are facing Israel’s onslaught while pregnant, and more than 5,500 are expected to give birth within a month. Juzoor estimates that 30% of women will face pregnancy complications that require extra medical attention, putting their babies at greater risk—particularly in the first 28 days of life, when newborns are most vulnerable.

Khammash expressed fear that the group will soon be entirely out of food for residents.

“The absence of fuel has affected hospitals in the north and the shelters where we operate,” he said. “There is no light, there is no heat. Now winter is coming and it’s cold. It is really a disaster for everyone, but especially for expectant mothers.”

Some women have given birth in recent weeks in repurposed classrooms surrounded by dozens of refugees, without qualified medical personnel present or any capacity for providing “basic hygiene,” Khalil said.

“I don’t think there is anyone anywhere in the world that would disagree that is simply inhumane,” she added.

Oxfam is working to provide the Juzoor shelters with hygiene kits and food, while 60 health professionals have been mobilized to work with thousands of displaced people.

“But the ongoing violence, siege, and acute shortages of fuel and clean water severely hinder these efforts,” said Oxfam as it called on officials to go further than negotiating only a four-day “humanitarian pause.”

“Oxfam is urgently calling for a full cease-fire and unimpeded humanitarian access in order to restore vital services and provide desperately needed medical support particularly to pregnant women and newborn babies,” said the group.

Original article by JULIA CONLEY republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Continue ReadingNewborns in Gaza Dying From Preventable Causes Due to Israeli Siege: Oxfam