It is currently 32 degrees in Gaza – very hot! I am reading reports that Israel has once again turned off the water supply. This impacts all people living there – women and children.
Rosalia Bollen, a UNICEF official in Gaza, reported that 600,000 people who had regained access to drinking water in November 2024 are once again cut off. “It’s really vital for thousands of families and children to restore this connection,” she said.
What Hamas did was terrible but the ‘punishment’ for the whole Palestinian population is surely the biggest war crime of the century – up there with Putin’s actions in Ukraine!
To target children with a lack of water is horrendous. How can anybody justify that?
Israel is reaching new depths. They have bombed and shot the entire civilian population for years, driven them from one end of Gaza to the other, destroyed their homes, schools and hospitals on top of systematically starving them.
Anne sent me this response to an article I published. I hope she doesn’t mind me putting it up here. I will address it after.
Hi Opher, I realised you were away, celebrating your birthday when I posted this reply to a piece on your blog. Now, presumably, it’s too long ago for you to have noticed it. I would appreciate a comment on it, from you, though.I wonder where you stand? I was confused when I read this That’s why I’ve taken so long to reply. I couldn’t be sure how much was ‘our extreme right wing friend’ and how much was you. As you know, I am very committed to the struggle of Palestinians. I do not believe ‘Israel’ has any right to defend itself. The UN should never have made it into a country. The UK set the whole thing in motion with the Balfour Declaration (although that did state that Palestinians should not be displaced, or lose their rights).. The UK gave up its mandate because of a terrorist campaign by Zionists, and abstained in the vote that gave ‘Israel’ statehood. Ever since ‘Israel’ declared independence, it has displaced, killed, raped, imprisoned and humiliated Palestinians. I would not object to Jews being in Palestine, but only as part of a state where everyone was free and equal. They are almost all immigrants, or descended from immigrants. Palestinuans have been there all the time. The claims written in that old book they call the Bible aren’t worth the paper they are written on. It was in response to the horrible treatment Palestinians have suffered since 1948 that October 7th happened. That doesn’t justify it, but it does explain it. I am sure it was supposed to be a hostage-taking exercise, not what it turned out to be. The question of how many Jews were killed, and by whom, is still open. Many of us believe ‘the Hannibal Directive’ cost many lives. There is also the question of why one of the most heavily guarded borders in the world was so easily breached. At the very least, the IDF had been told there was no real threat and they could relax. At the worst: who knows? Hamas had not held elections for many years. When they were elected, there was a bitter struggle with the Palestinian Authority, which led to a severing of political relations. However, Hamas was a functioning civil authority as well as a militant organisation. It ran hospitals, police, schools and all infrastructure. It did not need to be bombed out of existence. ‘Israel’ has shown that it can assassinate people without much collateral damage. They could have killed the military leaders without flattening the country. ‘Israel’ only needs to defend itself because it has stolen the land of the indigenous people. Before the Zionists came to power, and before the huge waves of immigration after WWII (much of them brought about by ‘Israel!’ appealing to Jews worldwide, who were not refugees, to come to build the country) Jews and Muslims got along fairly well in Palestine. What ‘Israel’ seems to be doing is using Hamas as an excuse for a shameless land-grab – part of the ‘Greater Israel Project’. In short, I believe that the only viable solution is a single state one, with all people having equal rights. That would need to be very firmly controlled by an international peacekeeping force. That’s a pipedream It almost certainly won’t happen, but I can’t see anything else working.
b. Referring to ancient religious documents to justify taking land is absurd. It’s like Britain claiming the USA and Australia but even more ridiculous. Religion is a manmade fantasy to my mind. It can’t be used to justify anything. We might as well lay claim to France because of King Arthur and Merlin the wizard. The Old Testament is as much fairy tale in my view. It is no justification for stealing land. There is no legitimacy.
c. However, nearly all nations are built on conquest. Israel is no exception. They took the land by force and I believe that enough time has passed; they should be recognised as a sovereign country.
d. I believe the Palestinians, who owned the land, and have been displaced should now be properly compensated. I do not believe there will be an end to this conflict until that has been done.
e. I believe the Palestinians have been treated harshly, made into 2nd class citizens and have been subjected to racism. This long-term abuse is part of the problem.
f. I believe the war run by Hamas, with rockets and attacks on Israeli citizens is not the way to go. Hamas is a terrorist organisation and while I can understand the anger I cannot condone it.
g. I believe the attack by Hamas on on October 7th 2023 (from the accounts I have read) was barbaric and cannot be justified. Hamas should immediately return all hostages. Whether there was Israeli collusion (In order to justify the destruction of Gaza) is open to investigation. What Hamas did in killing, raping and torturing was disgusting.
h. I believe Israel has justification in going for Hamas.
I. I do not believe they are justified in going for hospitals, schools, refugee camps or civilian areas. These are war crimes.
J. I believe that deliberately withholding food, water and medicine as weapons of war against civilians is barbaric, definite war crimes and amounts to genocide.
K. I believe Netanyahu and his extreme cabinet are war criminals and their actions are fascist to the extreme. They should be tried for their crimes. They put all Palestinians in the same category (as terrorist Hamas supporters) and that justifies killing them all in their eyes.
L. I believe in a negotiated two nation solution with land and reparation given to the Palestinian people. The alternative – a single-nation state, based on complete equality, is nigh-on impossible given the level of hatred on both sides.
M. I believe violence on both sides is wrong. Negotiation and reparation are the only way forward.
N. I believe Trump has made things worse by empowering Netanyahu to do as he pleases. Netanyahu is being used by extreme religious groups and has to keep going at war to hold his fascist coalition together and keep himself out of court.
O. I believe the UN needs to step in.
P. I believe that violence perpetuates more violence; death generates hate and we are locked in a cycle of revenge.
2h · Deliberately provocative attacks on the Al-Aqsa mosque and the ongoing home invasions in #SheikhJarrah and other neighbourhoods have led to horrendous violence and loss of life in Jerusalem and most recently Gaza where 25 people including children are reported dead following an Israeli Defence Force Operation codenamed ‘Guardian of the Walls.’ This is a deeply worrying sign of the decision to use air strikes to respond to rockets from the Palestinian side. I am profoundly saddened by the reports of deaths and injuries on both sides. I call on the Israeli government to stop land expropriations and settler expansion. I also call on those responsible for the missile attacks to stop. A cessation of both, crucially, will save lives and should enable negotiations in good faith to begin. As the occupying power, the Israeli government has it in its gift to rectify the current situation and not exacerbate it.
Islam is in a mess!!
Once again the politics is messed up with the religion!! It’s all about power.
Hamas praises killers who attack unarmed worshippers in a synagogue!
How can any sane person praise someone for attacking innocent people with an axe?
Is that religion?
The Palestinian situation is terrible but the answer is not terrorism!
From my perspective the Israeli’s were wrong to seize land and displace people whose families had lived there for hundreds of years. They are wrong to continue to expand and set up settlements in occupied territories in which they should not be. The justification that god gave them these lands and this is written in the bible is nonsense. I do not recognise the existence of any such god. As an atheist I do not believe in the existence of any such supernatural entity or the worth of the bible old testament as anything other than a fascinating collection of poetry, historical writing and religious ramblings of a minor middle eastern cult. The writings have many sources and authors. The people they came from were largely ignorant and superstitious. They cannot be used as justification for seizing land and callously displacing other people.
However – two wrongs do not make a right.
As the farmer famously said when asked directions ‘If I was going there I wouldn’t start from here.’
But we do have to start from here.
The Israeli State does exist and will continue to exist. As with most countries its conception was based in blood and crime but it breathes. It cannot be wiped off the map.
The wrongness of Israeli actions cannot justify equally abhorrent reactions. The continuing terrorism of the Palestinians is not just unhelpful; it is creating a worse problem. No sane person can justify firing rockets into civilian areas, sending indoctrinated suicide bombers into civilian markets, or kidnapping three innocent young boys and cruelly, callously and cynically murdering them in cold blood.
Two wrongs can never make a right.
The continuing situation has created vicious, heartless monsters out of people on both sides. Hatred has eaten away their humanity.
The only way forward is for both sides to stop the cycle of hatred and retaliation and reach a settlement in which the State of Israel is recognised, the expansion halted, the Palestinian people are allowed their own State and have adequate compensation and restitution. The alternative is to continue in a vitriolic cycle of violence and retaliation in which all are losers.
