… on a quiet day, I can hear her breathing

Tag: starvation

  • ‘History Is Watching’: Gaza Doctors Urge Harris to Back Israel Arms Embargo at Democratic Convention

    Spread the love

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

    An injured Palestinian baby is treated in al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital after an Israeli attack on Bureij refugee camp in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on August 7, 2024.
     (Photo: Ashraf Amra/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    “We are here to deliver a policy that saves and improves lives,” Uncommitted National Movement co-founder Abbas Alawieh said in opening remarks at a press conference on the sidelines of the DNC.

    As humanitarians opposed to the U.S. government’s support for Israel’s assault on Gaza continued to protest during the Democratic National Convention in Chicago on Tuesday, American doctors who recently volunteered in the besieged enclave implored the party’s presidential nominee Kamala Harris—based on the carnage and heartache they have witnessed—to embrace an arms embargo on Israel and an immediate cease-fire.

    during the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, the Uncommitted National Movement held a Tuesday press conference at which American doctors who volunteered in Gaza implored Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, to embrace an arms embargo on Israel and an immediate cease-fire.

    “We are here to deliver a policy that saves and improves lives,” Uncommitted National Movement co-founder Abbas Alawieh said in opening remarks at Tuesday’s press conference. “We are here because we want to win a better world.”

    Alawieh slammed the “hypocritical action” of Biden administration officials who, while “saying they want a cease-fire,” continue “to send more and more weapons” to far-right Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “murderous government,” which “is using those weapons to kill civilians” and is “preventing any hope for all captives, Israeli and Palestinian, to be reunited with their families.”

    Such support, Alawieh added, is also “preventing any hope of a departure from the horrors that we are seeing our siblings in Gaza experience with more than 16,000 children… being killed using U.S. weapons.”

    “The Uncommitted National Movement mobilized Democratic voters—more than 740,000 nationally—specifically around the idea that our candidate, regardless of who they may be, needs an updated approach to their Gaza policy,” Alawieh continued. “Specifically, our stance is that our government should embrace an arms embargo. Stop sending weapons that are being used to kill civilians.”

    “Vice President Harris is engaging with us on this issue,” Alawieh added. “Her team is engaging with us on this issue. We do view that as a positive step in the right direction. We want to be very clear that what we need to see urgently is for the bombs to stop. Stop sending bombs if you want us to believe that you want a cease-fire.”

    There are 30 Uncommitted delegates attending the DNC after being elected in Democratic primaries in states like Minnesota, where the movement received 18.9% of the vote, and the key swing state of Wisconsin, where it won 13.3%. As polling reveals that Democratic and Independent voters in crucial swing states would be more likely to vote for Harris if she backs an arms embargo on Israel, her campaign has made some moves to accommodate Uncommitted voices, including providing space at the DNC.

    Dr. Tammy Abughnaim, a Chicago-based emergency physician, said she asked Palestinians what she should tell people in the United States about Gaza, where she saw the aftermath of “massacre after massacre” and “suffering on an entirely unprecedented scale.”

    “Tell the world what you saw,” she said they told her. “We cannot afford another day of this.”

    On Monday, the DNC held its first-ever panel on Palestinian rights, which featured testimony from some of those who spoke at Tuesday’s press conference, including Dr. Tanya Haj-Hassan, an American pediatric intensive care physician who volunteered for two weeks at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.

    On Tuesday, Haj-Hassan said that the American doctors who worked in Gaza “cannot unsee what we witnessed, it gives us nightmares.”

    “I can personally testify that I have never seen anything so horrific, so egregious, so inhumane,” she stated. “We decided to come here and bear moral witness with the unfortunate recognition that the only way to protect civilian life is through putting pressure on the U.S. government to stop militarily supporting Israel in its campaign.”

    Haj-Hassan continued:

    For the past 10 months, we have witnessed civilian casualty after civilian massacre after civilian massacre. The bread massacre. The Nuseirat massacre. The multiple school massacres, where internally displaced people, who have been forcibly transferred, a war crime in and of itself… finally sought shelter only to be massacred. Entire families exterminated. Humanitarian workers and healthcare workers and journalists killed in record numbers. Children with their extremities amputated traumatically in record numbers…

    Over 17,000 children have lost one or both parents in Gaza since October. We have treated children who are the only surviving members of their entire family who were killed in the same bombing. I have personally held the hands of children taking their last final gasps with no family alive… unable to comfort them during their final agonizing breaths… This phenomenon of children having their entire families killed and arriving to the emergency department is so frequent it actually has an acronym… wounded child, no surviving family, given the acronym WCNSF.

    Children who are fortunate enough to survive their injuries are discharged into a Russian roulette of a hundred different ways that they could be killed… another bombing, starvation, dehydration, disease. Now we have alarming reports of an outbreak of polio. Polio is something that we were able to eradicate on the majority of this planet decades ago.

    “And yet we continue to fund this,” Haj-Hassan added. “History is watching us. The world is watching us. I cannot make sense of this. I suspect you cannot too. And I hope that the Democratic Party recognizes the irony and the hypocrisy of what we continue to fund and chooses to finally stand by the values of human rights and justice that we claim to stand by.”

    Harris has expressed sympathy for Palestinians suffering what she called a “humanitarian catastrophe” in Gaza. However, like Biden, she’s also proclaimed her “unwavering” support for Israel. When asked earlier this month if Harris would support a suspension in weapons transfers, one of her national security advisers said that “she will always ensure Israel is able to defend itself against Iran and Iran-backed terrorist groups” and “does not support an arms embargo on Israel.”

    Human rights advocates fear that if elected to a second term, former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, would be even more supportive of Israel’s obliteration of Gaza than the Biden-Harris administration.

    According to Palestinian and international officials, at least 40,173 Palestinians have been killed—most of them women and children—and nearly 93,000 others have been wounded during Israel’s 319-day assault and siege on Gaza. Gaza officials say that at least 10,000 other Palestinians are missing, believed to be dead and buried under the rubble of hundreds of thousands of bombed-out homes and other buildings.

    Almost the entire Gaza population of 2.3 million has been forcibly displaced. Hundreds of thousands of Gazans are starving; dozens have died from malnutrition, dehydration, and lack of medicines and healthcare amid a crippling Israeli siege that has been cited as evidence during Israel’s genocide trial at the International Court of Justice. The blockade has also exacerbated the spread of contagious diseases including measles, hepatitis, and polio.

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

  • Yemen: half-a-million children severely emaciated

    Spread the love

    Original article republished from MEMO under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. 

    The World Health Organisation (WHO) announced on Monday that 540,000 Yemeni children under the age of five are severely emaciated. The WHO made its announcement in a post on X to mark World Humanitarian Day.

    “Yemen faces a double burden of disease and conflict, whereby 17.8 million need health assistance, including 540,000 children under 5 with severe wasting,” said the UN-affiliated organisation. “With ongoing conflict and a collapsing healthcare system, it is crucial that we #ActForHumanity.”

    The health sector in Yemen faces difficult challenges, amid great suffering experienced by most citizens who are in dire need of assistance due to the repercussions of the war that has been ongoing for a decade.

    READ: Acute malnutrition in areas controlled by Yemeni gov’t increases by 34% in 2024: UN

    Original article republished from MEMO under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. 

  • Number of aid workers killed more than doubled in 2023, and over half were in Gaza, says UN

    Spread the love

    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/number-aid-workers-killed-more-doubled-2023-and-over-half-were-gaza-says-un

    Indiscriminate killing: Mourners pray at the funeral for more than 15 people, including several children and women, killed in an Israeli strike, at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah at the weekend

    THE number of aid workers killed in conflict zones more than doubled last year, the UN reported today.

    Its Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs said that 280 aid workers were killed in 33 countries in 2023, compared to 118 in 2022.

    Over half the killings took place in Gaza following Israel’s invasion, which began in October following a Hamas cross-border attack, with the majority of these down to Israeli air strikes, the office said.

    Israel’s military has been accused of deliberately murdering aid workers, with the killing of seven working for World Central Kitchen on April 1 causing headlines around the world because they included US, Canadian, British and Australian citizens.

    It has also been accused of attempting to starve Gaza by blocking or delaying aid convoys. Its National Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, caused uproar in June when he told police not to interfere with mobs attacking aid convoys headed for Gaza.

    THE number of aid workers killed in conflict zones more than doubled last year, the UN reported today.

    Its Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs said that 280 aid workers were killed in 33 countries in 2023, compared to 118 in 2022.

    Over half the killings took place in Gaza following Israel’s invasion, which began in October following a Hamas cross-border attack, with the majority of these down to Israeli air strikes, the office said.

    Israel’s military has been accused of deliberately murdering aid workers, with the killing of seven working for World Central Kitchen on April 1 causing headlines around the world because they included US, Canadian, British and Australian citizens.

    It has also been accused of attempting to starve Gaza by blocking or delaying aid convoys. Its National Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, caused uproar in June when he told police not to interfere with mobs attacking aid convoys headed for Gaza.

    …

    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/number-aid-workers-killed-more-doubled-2023-and-over-half-were-gaza-says-un

  • US oil company ran 1977 article predicting climate crisis could cause starvation

    Spread the love

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/18/us-oil-marathon-petroleum-climate-change

    A Guardian collage of images from industry 1970s industry periodical Marathon World published by a corporate predecessor of Marathon Petroleum Composite: The Guardian/Getty Images/Marathon Oil Company

    Marathon Petroleum predecessor warned of potential for ‘social and economic calamities’ in decades-old publication

    The corporate predecessor to America’s largest refiner of oil, Marathon Petroleum, explained in a company periodical nearly 50 years ago that global temperature rise potentially linked to “industrial expansion” could one day cause “widespread starvation and other social and economic calamities”.

    This decades-old description of climate breakdown is from a 1977 issue of the magazine Marathon World and is attributed in the article by an unnamed author to several experts including a scientist working for a top US agency.

    “Although climatologists disagree on the underlying reasons, many see a future climate of greater variability, bringing with it areas of extreme drought,” said the magazine, previously published by Marathon Oil Company, which later split into Marathon Petroleum as well as the exploration and production company Marathon Oil.

    Marathon Petroleum is among several oil and gas companies – including Exxon, Shell and BP – currently being sued by the city of Honolulu for allegedly engaging in a coordinated communications effort “to conceal and deny their own knowledge” of catastrophic climate impacts caused by burning their products.

    That lawsuit alleges that Marathon knew of the dangers of global temperature rise long before the general public due to its membership in the American Petroleum Institute, which began studying the link between fossil fuels and global heating decades ago.

    This newly surfaced article shows the company was undertaking efforts on its own to stay up to date on the latest climate science and the threats a more volatile climate could pose to humankind.

    …

    The current Honolulu lawsuit alleges that Marathon contributed to climate obstruction by belonging to industry associations that spent decades trying to convince the public that science linking coal, oil and gas to climate change was shaky and unreliable.

    “Pestilence, starvation, drought. To know one’s product may bring that about, and bury the evidence, is unspeakable,” Timmons Roberts, a professor of environment and sociology at Brown University, who’s an expert in climate disinformation, wrote in an email to the Guardian after viewing the 1977 article.

    Marathon and other companies named in the litigation are currently petitioning the US supreme court to throw out the case.

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/18/us-oil-marathon-petroleum-climate-change

  • World ‘Cannot Remain Silent in the Face of This Endless Massacre,’ Says Lula

    Spread the love

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

    Palestinians, including children, wounded by Israeli airstrikes are pictured at Al-Aqsa Martyr’s Hospital in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on July 15, 2024. 
    (Photo: Ashraf Amra/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    “The Israeli government continues to sabotage the peace process and the cease-fire in the Middle East,” said the Brazilian president after a deadly weekend of bombings.

    Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva condemned the Israeli government on Sunday after bombings across the Gaza Strip killed more than 140 people and wounded hundreds more, adding to the gruesome death toll and worsening the enclave’s humanitarian emergency as cease-fire talks continue.

    Lula specifically decried Israel’s Saturday attack on al-Mawasi, an overcrowded town on Gaza’s southern coast to which Israeli forces previously ordered Palestinians to flee. Israel claimed to be targeting Hamas’ military chief in the attack; Hamas said Sunday that the commander was not harmed in the strikes, which killed around 90 people—including children.

    The New York Times reported that one of the Israeli strikes “exploded directly in front of two vehicles clearly marked as belonging to Gaza Civil Defense, an emergency services agency, spraying them with shrapnel and apparently killing and injuring first responders.”

    Lula said Sunday that “the Israeli government continues to sabotage the peace process and the cease-fire [negotiations] in the Middle East” with its relentless bombing campaign in the Gaza Strip, which has been utterly decimated by Israel’s assault—a military campaign fueled by billions of dollars of weaponry from the United States, Germany, and other major countries.

    “It is appalling that they continue to collectively punish the Palestinian people,” Brazil’s president said. “There have already been tens of thousands of deaths in consecutive attacks since last year, many of them in delimited humanitarian zones that should be protected.”

    “We, the political leaders of the democratic world, cannot remain silent in the face of this endless massacre,” he added. “The cease-fire and peace in the region need to be priorities on the international agenda. All our efforts must be focused on securing the release of the Israeli hostages and ending the attacks on the Gaza Strip.”

    Brazil under Lula’s leadership has backed the South Africa-led genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice and been a vocal supporter of a permanent cease-fire and an end to Israel’s decadeslong occupation of Palestinian territory.

    “I saw toddlers who are double amputees, children paralyzed and unable to receive treatment, and others separated from their parents.”

    Israel’s weekend onslaught in Gaza came as “Hamas and Israel appear closer to some form of a Gaza cease-fire deal than at any time since the brief truce last November,” as Drop Site‘s Jeremy Scahill put it late last week.

    “Hamas is considering an approach that would not immediately require a commitment to a permanent cease-fire and complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza as a precondition to move forward in phased negotiations,” Scahill reported. “This would mark a significant concession by Hamas, which has long insisted any agreement must include defined steps that end Israel’s war. Instead, Hamas officials said, they would consider entering an initial six-week phase that would include a conditional cease-fire and an exchange of Israeli civilian and female soldiers held in Gaza in return for the release of hundreds of Palestinians.”

    The Associated Press reported Sunday that Hamas—which led the deadly October 7 attack on Israel—intends to keep participating in cease-fire talks in the face of incessant Israeli airstrikes, though a spokesperson for the group said there is “no doubt that the horrific massacres will impact any efforts in the negotiations.”

    Scott Anderson, the United Nations’ deputy humanitarian coordinator, described the appalling scene he witnessed over the weekend at Nasser Hospital, the overwhelmed medical facility in southern Gaza where many wounded Palestinians were taken following Israel’s Saturday attack on al-Mawasi.

    “With not enough beds, hygiene equipment, sheeting, or scrubs, many patients were treated on the ground without disinfectants,” said Anderson. “Ventilation systems were switched off due to a lack of electricity and fuel, and the air was filled with the smell of blood. I saw toddlers who are double amputees, children paralyzed and unable to receive treatment, and others separated from their parents. I also saw mothers and fathers who were unsure if their children were alive. Parents told me in despair that they had moved into the ‘so-called humanitarian zone’ in the hope that their children would be safe there.”

    “Impediments to humanitarian operations prevent us from supporting people anywhere near the scale necessary,” Anderson continued. “Civilians must be protected at all times. We urgently need a cease-fire, the release of all remaining hostages, respite for the people of Gaza, and a meaningful opportunity for healing to begin.”

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

    Zionist Keir Starmer is quoted "I support Zionism without qualification." He's asked whether that means that he supports Zionism under all circumstances, whatever Zionists do.
    Zionist Keir Starmer is quoted “I support Zionism without qualification.” He’s asked whether that means that he supports Zionism under all circumstances, whatever Zionists do.