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Tag: IDF

  • Israel is decimating Gaza’s health infrastructure as disease threatens the majority of its population

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    The public health situation among people displaced by Israeli attacks worsens by the day, as targeting of health workers and infrastructure continues

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

    Healthcare workers at Al-Awda hospital. Photo: Al-Awda

    The number of people infected with contagious diseases in Gaza continues to rise. The latest data from the World Health Organization (WHO) warns that 180,000 people are currently suffering from respiratory infections. Additionally, the UN’s health agency reports that 55,000 people have lice and scabies, 42,000 are experiencing various forms of skin rashes, and 136,000, half of whom are children under 5 years old, have contracted diarrhea.

    While these diseases would not be deadly under conditions with a functioning health system and adequate living conditions, in the current situation, they could be life-threatening. “Unless something changes, the world faces the prospect of almost a quarter of Gaza’s 2 million population – close to half a million human beings – dying within a year. These would be largely deaths from preventable health causes and the collapse of the health system,” estimated Devi Sridhar, Chair in Global Public Health at the University of Edinburgh, at the end of 2023.

    If a permanent ceasefire does not take immediate effect, though, things are unlikely to change, as reiterated by WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in a statement. WHO teams, now participating in fairly regular missions on the ground, are sending reports about overcrowding in Gaza’s hospitals and shelters. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, on January 4, only 9 out of 36 hospitals were partially functioning in the Strip, resulting in an average bed occupancy of 351% and 261% occupancy in intensive care units.

    Israel’s attacks on healthcare in Palestine are affecting everyone, especially the most vulnerable. Cancer and dialysis patients cannot access the specific care they need, and most have not yet been transferred to hospitals abroad as announced. The Ministry of Health estimates that 5,300 patients need to be transferred abroad for treatment, but until January 5, less than 1,000 were moved. This number includes 571 people injured in the attacks and 401 patients who required distinct forms of care, including cancer patients.

    Children and pregnant women are also groups most at risk from the attacks and their consequences. Over 5,000 babies were born in Gaza just last month, all requiring adequate care and nutrition. With mothers and families going hungry, it is evident that some of them are also lacking proper food. Among the newborns are about 130 premature babies dependent on incubators, yet most incubators are located in northern Gaza, which, in terms used by the WHO, has become a medical disaster zone.

    In addition to going hungry and sleeping in overcrowded tents, newborns and children are also not getting vaccinated. Recounting the experience of a woman who recently gave birth, Nareman, who was “taken from her tent in a temporary camp by horse-drawn carriage to a hospital to give birth to her daughter, before returning to her makeshift home straight after,” the WHO warned that the health system in Gaza is struggling to ensure standard immunization routines. Nareman’s baby is among those who are yet to receive planned vaccines, and she is staying with her sisters and brothers at the camp, who are reportedly in ill health themselves.

    The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) has managed to deliver 600,000 key vaccines into Gaza in the period between December 25-29, 2023, and is planning to deliver some 960,000 more together with WHO and UNICEF. Yet, this is no easy feat as Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF) continue to target health infrastructure and health workers. Since the beginning of the attacks on October 7, 326 health workers in Palestine were killed by Israeli attacks, 764 were injured, and 65 were arrested, according to Ministry of Health data.

    Many more experienced violence and intimidation by the IOF, including ambulances and partners of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS). On January 4, Israeli soldiers attacked a PRCS ambulance. Not long before that, the organization reported attacks targeting the house of Anwar Abu Holi, Director of the Central Gaza Ambulance Center, as well as multiple attacks on the Al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis.

    As shelling in the proximity of the hospital began, Al-Amal offered shelter to approximately 14,000 forcibly displaced people. The attacks, said the PRCS, endangered the lives of thousands. “The displaced persons are living in an atmosphere of horror and panic.”

    The attacks that have taken place since the beginning of January killed 7 people, including a days-old baby, injured 11 more, and were reported by the PRCS to be ongoing on January 5, without a meaningful indication they would stop anytime soon.

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

  • Maine Protest Urges General Dynamics to ‘Stop Arming Israel’s Genocide’

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

    Protesters gathered at a General Dynamics factory in Saco, Maine on January 3, 2024.  (Photo: Lisa Savage/X)

    “Why do we tolerate this massive bomb factory here in Maine, exploiting the toils of local workers to aid with the intentional mass murder and displacement of innocent children and families in Palestine?”

    Defenders of Palestinian rights on Wednesday organized a campout protest at a General Dynamics factory in the city of Saco, Maine to pressure the weapons giant to “stop arming Israel’s genocide in Gaza.”

    The demonstrators, led by the Maine Coalition for Palestine, arrived at the roadway leading into the factory before dawn in an effort to prevent workers from entering the facility.

    “Genocide in Gaza is currently supported by General Dynamics,” said organizer Lisa Savage of Solon in a statement. “It supplies Israel with the artillery ammunition and bombs used to kill and maim civilians and children in Gaza—which is illegal collective punishment.”

    Since the Hamas-led attack that set off the war on October 7, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have killed more than 22,000 Palestinians in Gaza, injured over 57,000 more, and devastated civilian infrastructure including homes, hospitals, schools, and mosques. A growing number of world leaders and legal scholars have accused Israel of genocide.

    General Dynamics—which is headquartered in Virginia but has locations across the United States and around the world—is among a few dozen companies identified in an American Friends Service Committee database as aiding the U.S.-backed Israeli war effort with 155mm caliber artillery shells and the metal bodies of the MK-80 bomb series.

    “Since October, more than 5,000 of the 500-lb MK-82 bombs—some made in Saco—have been given to Israel by the U.S.,” said Yusuf Ebrahim, an Iraqi American physician who participated in the protest. “These munitions play a particularly direct role in the ongoing criminal genocide of Palestinians by the IDF, targeting densely populated areas such as the Jabalia refugee camp.”

    “Why do we tolerate this massive bomb factory here in Maine, exploiting the toils of local workers to aid with the intentional mass murder and displacement of innocent children and families in Palestine?” Ebrahim continued. “Meanwhile, many local community members suffer from hunger and housing insecurity and cannot afford medical care.”

    https://twitter.com/SamPfeifle/status/1742533447837450706?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1742533447837450706%7Ctwgr%5E9ca38595cae7f14192bd123b87780f09e8a5ca59%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.commondreams.org%2Fnews%2Fgeneral-dynamics-israel

    Members of the Maine Coalition for Palestine include the groups Healthcare Workers for Palestine, the Maine Natural Guard, the Maine Party for Socialism & Liberation, Maine Voices for Palestinian Rights, Portland CONFRONT, and Students for Justice in Palestine from college campuses in the state.

    The coalition’s Wednesday action came after a demonstration last month that drew more than 100 protesters to Bath Iron Works, a General Dynamics subsidiary that builds ships for the U.S. military.

    The Bangor Daily News reported that Cecil Carey of Skowhegan, a teacher who spoke at the December event, said the group was protesting in Bath because the U.S. government has “got money for war but can’t feed the poor.”

    “I do not want my tax dollars going to bomb people in the Middle East,” Carey said. “I want my tax dollars helping my students and their families.”

    The United States gives Israel $3.8 billion in annual military aid each year and U.S. President Joe Biden has responded to the Israeli assault on Gaza by asking federal lawmakers for an additional $14.3 billion package that is still under consideration. Since the war began, the Biden administration has also twice bypassed Congress to enable arms sales to Israel.

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

  • Once Again, Biden Bypasses Congress to Approve Arms Sale to Israel

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

    An IDF soldier readies a 155mm artillery shell for loading in a howitzer. 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)

    “When Israel runs out of rockets to murder children with they simply hold their hand out to daddy for more,” said one critic.

    Citing “the urgency of Israel’s defensive needs,” the Biden administration on Friday said it would bypass Congress for the second time this month to approve an immediate arms sale to the key Middle East ally as it continues to wage a genocidal war against Gaza.

    The Associated Press reported that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken notified lawmakers of the new emergency determination involving the sale of $147.5 million in equipment including fuses, charges, and primers for 155mm artillery shells that Israel has already purchased from the United States.

    The unguided explosive rounds—which Israel is using in heavily populated urban areas—have a “kill radius” of about 50 meters, with shrapnel able to inflict lethal wounds on people hundreds of meters away.

    “The United States is committed to the security of Israel, and it is vital to U.S. national interests to ensure Israel is able to defend itself against the threats it faces,” the State Department explained.

    https://twitter.com/lilleyjuice/status/1740847948513341840?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1740847948513341840%7Ctwgr%5E620949b4d025f371f31e65cfbf2c06e20e06b8be%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.commondreams.org%2Fnews%2Fu-s-aid-to-israel-2666833315

    The move follows a similar State Department determination on December 9, which expedited 13,000 rounds of tank ammunition to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), whose troops have killed and maimed more than 80,000 Palestinians—mostly women, children, and elders—during 84 days of near-relentless attacks on Gaza.

    Some of the deadliest Israeli attacks of the war have been carried out with U.S. weapons, including an October 31 airstrike with 2,000-pound bombs on the densely populated Jabalia refugee camp. More than 120 civilians were killed.

    The State Department also said that “we continue to strongly emphasize to the government of Israel that they must not only comply with international humanitarian law, but also take every feasible step to prevent harm to civilians.”

    “The U.S. administration wholeheartedly supports the mass slaughter of Palestinians.”

    Critics pushed back against that language, with Ibrahim Zabad, a professor of international relations at St. Bonaventure University in upstate New York, asserting on social media that the State Department’s move to bypass Congress “shows the U.S. administration wholeheartedly supports the mass slaughter of Palestinians, their ethnic cleansing, and the demolition of Gaza.”

    British journalist Andy Worthington, known for his work chronicling the cases of Guantánamo Bay detainees, asked: “Do they think not enough Palestinian children are being orphaned or killed in Gaza?”

    Eli Clifton, a senior researcher at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, noted Blinken’s lamentation Thursday that 2023 “has been an extraordinarily dangerous year for press around the world.” Blinken’s statement did not mention the scores of journalists killed—sometimes allegedly on purpose—by Israeli troops during the war.

    The U.S. already gives Israel almost $4 billion in nearly unconditional military aid each year. Since the October 7 Hamas-led attacks and Israel’s retaliatory onslaught, U.S. President Joe Biden has repeatedly affirmed his “unwavering” support for Israel. His administration has blocked multiple global cease-fire efforts at the United Nations while seeking an additional $14.3 billion in armed assistance for Israel.

    The United States has given Israel more than $150 billion in inflation-adjusted aid since the nation was founded in 1948 following a yearslong campaign of terrorism and ethnic cleansing.

    While Biden recently decried Israel’s “indiscriminate bombing” of Gaza, he has refused to acknowledge what many international experts have called Israel’s genocide against the people of the besieged strip. Some activists have dubbed him “Genocide Joe.”

    On Friday, South Africa filed a genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice.

    Hundreds of rights groups and a handful of progressives in the U.S. Congress have implored the Biden administration to suspend military aid to Israel, while others including Democratic lawmakers have called for conditions to be placed on such assistance.

    Earlier this month, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) led a letter urging Biden to boost oversight of how American arms are used against Palestinian civilians. The letter specifically mentions 155mm artillery shells.

    “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,” the senators noted.

    According to a Quinnipiac University poll published on December 20, less than half of registered U.S. voters support sending military aid to Israel—an approximately 10-point decrease from the previous month.

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

  • ‘This Is What the US Chose’: Israel Targets Refugee Camps in Central 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 efforts for those trapped under rubble continue after Israel bombed the Maghazi refugee camp in central Gaza on December 25, 2023.  (Photo: Ali Jadallah/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    “So long as Netanyahu faces no consequences, even more innocent civilians will face death and starvation,” said one U.S. lawmaker.

    The Israeli military on Tuesday expanded its ground assault to refugee camps in central Gaza, forcing displaced people to flee in terror from an area that was once considered a relative safe zone as the rest of the strip came under near-constant bombardment.

    Over the weekend, U.S.-armed Israeli forces pummeled central Gaza with airstrikes, reducing the Maghazi refugee camp to ruins and killing more than 100 people in one of the deadliest bombings since the devastating military campaign began in early October. Many more people are believed to be trapped under the rubble in Maghazi.

    The Associated Press reported Tuesday that the Israeli military has “ordered residents to evacuate a belt of territory the width of central Gaza, urging them to move to nearby Deir al-Balah.” According to the United Nations, more than 61,000 people were sheltering in the area Israel is now targeting.

    “Residents of central Gaza described shelling and airstrikes shaking the Nuseirat, Maghazi, and Bureij camps,” AP reported. “The built-up towns hold Palestinians driven from their homes in what is now Israel during the 1948 war, along with their descendants.”

    One mother of four told Middle East Eye that she “started crying hysterically” when she heard the news that Israel had deemed areas of central Gaza battle zones and issued evacuation orders.

    “Where would I go with these children?” she asked. “We do not have any relatives in Deir al-Balah.”

    Seif Magango, a spokesperson for the U.N. Human Rights Office, said in a statement Tuesday that he is “gravely concerned about the continued bombardment of Middle Gaza by Israeli forces.”

    “It is particularly concerning that this latest intense bombardment comes after Israeli forces ordered residents from the south of Wadi Gaza to move to Middle Gaza and Tal al-Sultan in Rafah,” Magango continued. “Israeli forces must take all measures available to protect civilians. Warnings and evacuation orders do not absolve them of the full range of their international humanitarian law obligations.”

    Israel’s expansion of its ground assault came days after the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) approved a binding resolution calling for an increase in humanitarian aid to Gaza and urgent steps to “create the conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities.”

    An initial draft of the resolution called for an “urgent and sustainable cessation of hostilities,” but the U.S.—which has veto power at the UNSC—watered the measure down. The U.S. ultimately abstained from the final vote, allowing it to pass.

    Passage of the U.N. resolution has done nothing to deter the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) from intensifying their attacks on areas packed with civilians, many of whom have been displaced multiple times in less than three months.

    More than 90% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million has been forced to flee their homes due to Israel’s airstrikes and ground invasion, which began following a deadly Hamas-led attack on southern Israel. Around 60% of Gaza’s housing infrastructure has been destroyed or damaged by Israeli forces, leaving displaced people with nothing to return to—if they’re able to return at all.

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly suggested Monday that he’s looking for countries to “absorb” displaced Gazans, intensifying fears that a goal of the ongoing assault on Gaza is the permanent removal of the Palestinian population.

    The U.S., meanwhile, has not wavered in its unconditional military support for Israel, even as the country’s government has defied its meager calls for the protection of Gaza civilians. The Biden administration has reportedly delivered more than 10,000 tons of military equipment to Israel since October, including 2,000-pound bombs that Israel has dropped on densely populated areas.

    In a social media post on Tuesday, U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) argued that the Biden administration’s “begging Netanyahu to safeguard civilians while sending him weapons and abstaining on even the most modest U.N. resolution has failed.”

    “So long as Netanyahu faces no consequences,” Doggett added, “even more innocent civilians will face death and starvation.”

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

  • UN Condemns Israel’s ‘Unlawful Killings’ and Settler Violence in West Bank

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

    A Palestinian child stands next to a damaged building following a three-day Israeli army raid on the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank on December 14, 2023.  (Photo: Zain Jaafar/AFP via Getty Images)

    The U.N. high commissioner for human rights called surging settler attacks on Palestinians “very disturbing.”

    A United Nations report released Thursday warned that conditions in the occupied West Bank have worsened rapidly since October, with Israeli settlers and soldiers ramping up violent attacks on the Palestinian population and subjecting people across the territory to frequent abuse, movement restrictions, arbitrary detention, and “unlawful killings.”

    The report by the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights found that since October 7, settler attacks—including shootings and the burning of homes—have surged to an average of six per day, up from three per day previously. The report notes that in many cases, the settlers were “accompanied” by Israeli forces, wearing Israeli military uniforms, and carrying weapons supplied by the army.

    Between October 7 and December 27, Israeli forces and settlers killed at least 300 Palestinians in the West Bank, according to the U.N. Israeli soldiers arrested more than 4,700 Palestinians during that period, holding many of them in so-called administrative detention without charge or trial.

    Palestinian detainees have faced grotesque abuse and torture at the hands of Israeli soldiers, who have raided West Bank homes and refugee camps with increased frequency in recent weeks. Six Palestinian men died in Israeli detention between October 7 and November 20, the U.N. found. One of the men was reportedly insulin-dependent; he, along with others detained at the same time, was physically assaulted by Israeli soldiers.

    The new report notes that members of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have filmed and photographed themselves “abusing, degrading, and humiliating Palestinians apprehended in the West Bank, including pictures of detainees stripped naked or half-naked, blindfolded and handcuffed, and screaming in pain while physically abused and humiliated including by being forced to pose with the Israeli flag, sing songs in Hebrew or forced to dance with soldiers.”

    “In one of the videos, a Palestinian man, subsequently identified through monitoring as having been arrested on 31 October, is seen kneeling, blindfolded, and with hands tied behind his back, being kicked several times in the stomach by a soldier who spits on him and insults him,” the report continues. “On 1 November, IDF reportedly stated they would investigate the abuses and that one reserve soldier had been dismissed from reserve service.”

    “The intensity of the violence and repression is something that has not been seen in years.”

    Volker Türk, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, said in a statement Thursday that “the violations documented in this report repeat the pattern and nature of violations reported in the past in the context of the longstanding Israeli occupation of the West Bank.”

    “However,” Türk added, “the intensity of the violence and repression is something that has not been seen in years.”

    Since October 7—when Hamas launched a deadly attack on southern Israel and the IDF responded with a catastrophic bombing campaign—violence by Israeli settlers in the West Bank has surged. Israeli officials have tallied at least 120 hate crimes committed in the occupied West Bank, but no charges have been brought in any of the cases, the U.N. said.

    The report observed that Israeli settlers—with the support of the far-right government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—are “taking advantage of a generally permissive environment to accelerate displacement of Palestinians from their land, raising concerns of forcible transfer seeking to create facts on the ground making the existence of a viable Palestinian state almost impossible.”

    “According to Israeli organizations monitoring settlement expansion, settlers have built at least four new outposts since 7 October and at least nine new roads leading to settlements, marking a growth in illegal construction by settlers unprecedented since the second Intifada,” the U.N. report says.

    Türk called settlers’ “dehumanization” of Palestinians “very disturbing” and said the attacks and illegal settlement expansions “must cease immediately.”

    “Israeli authorities should strongly censure and prevent settler violence and prosecute both its instigators and perpetrators,” said Türk.

    The U.N.’s findings were published as Al Jazeera reported that Israeli forces have “launched their most intense raids yet on cities in the occupied West Bank as they pressed on with one of the largest incursions in the territory since Israel’s war on Gaza began in October.”

    “At least one person was killed after Israeli troops launched a coordinated overnight assault on 10 cities including Hebron, Halhul, Nablus, Jenin, Tulkarem, el-Bireh, Jericho, and notably the center of Ramallah, which is the administrative headquarters of the Palestinian Authority,” the outlet reported. “Israeli forces used tear gas and stun grenades to clear a street and then blocked off the area, before using a ‘controlled explosion’ to enter a money exchange shop. The soldiers seized documents and arrested business owners.”

    An Al Jazeera correspondent said that Israeli soldiers seized around $2.5 million in the raids.

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