When the Global Sumud Flotilla set sail towards Gaza, it was not just another humanitarian mission. It was a voyage of conscience, a collective cry against injustice, against silence, and against the ongoing breach of international law that the blockade of Gaza represents.

For Malaysians, this is not a distant story on the evening news. Our fellow citizens are on those boats. They are singers, students, activists, and volunteers, ordinary people doing extraordinary things to defend the dignity of a besieged population and their courage deserves not only our admiration, but our unwavering support.

Their mission was not merely about the tonnage of food and medical supplies, which were critically important but about the cost of empathy. They understood that the price of challenging a long-standing naval blockade was their own freedom, and they chose to pay it willingly to deliver a singular, powerful symbol of hope. They understood that a prayer and an action must come hand in hand.

Malaysians on Board: Ordinary Citizens, Extraordinary Courage

For the 23 Malaysians on board, the journey was a pilgrimage of conscience.

They traveled thousands of miles from a nation with deep, unwavering solidarity for the Palestinian people. Their training included preparing for communication blackout, water cannon assaults, and, ultimately, military interception. 

This was a non-violent strategy executed with military-like precision.

As the vessels were surrounded, the activists did not resist. They documented, they prayed, and they prepared their final video messages.

Malaysian celebrity, Zizi Kirana in a pre-recorded statement released upon interception, stated: “If you are watching this video, it means I have been abducted… Our mission was peaceful, non-violent, and fully in compliance with international law.”  

This message was the strategic core of the mission. By remaining unarmed and compliant, they forced the intercepting power to act against unarmed civilians delivering aid.

The commitment of the Malaysian delegation, organized under Sumud Nusantara, was measured not just in collective political will but in profound personal sacrifice.

A Personal Mission

For Abdul Rahim Azhari, a 33-year-old father, the mission to break the siege on Gaza demanded a commitment that transcended fundraising appeals.

Rahim made the ultimate donation, he sold his family car, a Proton X50, to personally fund his participation and contribute directly to the aid cargo.

“I needed to buy the basic food necessities for our brothers and sisters in Gaza,” Rahim stated before his departure.

Rahim’s choice to sell his car shows what the movement truly believes, that caring for the people trapped in Gaza is more important than his own comfort.

The Moral Weight of the Blockade

The Sumud (Steadfastness) of the Malaysian activists was not just personal, it was national. Their sacrifice has unified the country, with both the Prime Minister and His Majesty, Sultan Ibrahim strongly condemning the interception and demanding their immediate release.  

His Majesty Sultan Ibrahim described the mission as a “noble symbol of borderless humanitarianism,” noting that the detention of volunteers carrying only food supplies “goes against universal humanitarian values.”  

The moral insight here is crucial.

The flotilla’s act of defiance forced the blockade to become publicly visible again. It exposed the military measure as an effective instrument of collective punishment.

The true blockade is not merely a few nautical miles of sea, it is the wall of international silence that has long surrounded Gaza.

The boats may now be towed to port in Ashdod, and the activists awaiting deportation, but the core objective has been achieved, to break the silence for the world to know that this was an ultimate fight and justice for the humanity.

Sumud: More Than A Flotilla, A Reflection

The Global Sumud Flotilla is not just about boats, sails, or aid packages. It is about conscience. It is about whether the international order that says “rules matter” will mean anything when civilians suffer.

The word sumud in Arabic means “steadfastness.” It is the philosophy of enduring oppression with resilience and dignity. This flotilla embodies that spirit, carrying food, medical aid, and messages of solidarity to a population that has endured almost two decades of blockade.

The blockade has not only strangled Gaza’s economy but also denied its people access to adequate healthcare, electricity, and reconstruction materials. In doing so, it violates both international humanitarian law and basic principles of human rights.

For Malaysia, the flotilla has revealed bravery in ordinary people, artists, faith-leaders, students. It has revealed a moral alignment with what our law, our treaties, and our values demand. And it has revealed that an act of compassion at sea can shine a harsh light on violations that too often escape accountability.

Let us not allow the actions of 40 vessels to be treated as a fringe event. Let them be a mirror: reflecting what we stand for and what we are prepared to resist. – NMH

The post Global Sumud Flotilla, The Cost of Empathy & Why Malaysian Activists Accepted Detention first appeared on NMH.

On the other hand, social media has changed the way we experience the world. It has offered up new opportunities for activism, and forever altered the ways and means that we use to access information from parts of the world that are invariably different to those we live in. From the onset of Israel’s bombardment in October 2023: the young aspiring journalists of Gaza took to social media to share footage and stills of the devastation around them. Just as the images of Shani Luok’s broken body and videos of seemingly terrified Israelis being forced onto the backs of motorbikes by Hamas militants came to symbolise the horrors of 7 October, the suffering of Gaza’s people would be captured in the faces and cries of the individuals who featured in viral posts. The fact that such individuals—a terrified toddler still shaking in fear after his home had been bombed and his family killed, a grandfather opening his granddaughter’s eyes one last time as he bids her goodbye—would become the subjects of placards at anti-war protests is a testament to just how powerful this imagery has been. The reign of terror unleashed by Israel upon the population of Gaza is frequently referred to as the first genocide that occurred right before our eyes, enabled by social media platforms. It is incredibly telling that so many of those who have taken to the streets to oppose governmental inaction, and orchestrated other protests such as the university encampments, belong to the generations most active on Instagram and TikTok.

Social media has allowed us a direct relationship of sorts with the people of Gaza. Frequently this relationship is cited as a cause of distress, and this is a legitimate point: the suffering of children is and has always been incredibly unsettling. But more unsettling is the broader sense of apathy that we are faced with. In some cases, we have witnessed the expulsion of those who dare to speak up: think of (think of Senator Fatima Payman, Antoinette Lattouf). We have watched as those in power have not only refused to take action but dismissed our calls for them to show some semblance of humanity as trivial and lacking information. We are being gaslit. Worse still, protesters and those who support them are being accused of conjuring violence, of anti-Semitism. Police presence at protests continues to increase and become more heavy-handed. Every time a politician speaks on the issue it feels as though they are telling people who have taken a stand and spoken out against Israel to pipe down, and just let the people of Gaza die quietly. It’s as if our political leaders cannot rush to denounce us fast enough. Even White settler-Australians who are speaking up about Palestine are being treated with disdain. For those of us who are new to activism or have not faced significant social disadvantage, being treated as a political football is probably new, and jarring. But if White people should take anything from this, it’s that even as the favourite children of the settler-colonial state, we are not safe from its punitive reprimand.

The knock-on effect of this systemic indifference is cognitive dissonance and apathy in our communities. It is the averted eyes and shifting discomfort of when Palestine is mentioned. It is the routine claims from our friends and family that they simply cannot look at such horrors, and the advice to disconnect, take a break or look away. After watching eight months of genocide live on our phones, perhaps it is time that we ask ourselves who we are actually serving by defaulting to individualist notions of self-care as a solution to indifference and despair. Who are we really prioritising by turning away from settler-colonial brutality? The brilliant work of Saira Rao and Regina Jackson has highlighted the critical importance of the niceness of White women to maintaining White supremacy. They urge us to choose kindness when faced with a choice of remaining ‘nice’ or using our privilege to challenge the status quo. Now more than ever, we should take heed of such words of wisdom. After all, we are not left with a sense of despair because we ‘are not supposed to see’ such atrocities, as so many would have us believe, but because such atrocities are not supposed to happen. This anguish is compounded by the fact that our government, our media and so many in our communities are insisting that we just shut up and think of something else.

On a personal note, as someone who has lived with a mental illness since my teens, my despondency does not improve when I turn away from the war crimes that are being perpetrated upon the people of Gaza on a daily basis. These horrors continue whether I bear witness to them or not—whether anyone does. If your heart is bleeding because of that, it should be, for the pain of having been alive while this happened lives there, and it always will. The humanity that we as a collective have lost in the decimation of Gaza and the Palestinian people cannot ever be reclaimed. It is only by sitting with and accepting this reality, by sharing it with those around us and by being compelled to action and solidarity that we are likely to find any sustained sense of relief.

We would do well to find inspiration in the words of the remarkable Gunditjmara writer and activist Sissy Austin, who writes that ‘Palestinians will forever have First Nations peoples’ from not just so-called Australia, but across the world, for generations to come, walking and fighting by their side’. Rather than finding comfort in switching off and turning away, I feel liberation in a newfound sense of connectedness with my brothers and sisters in Palestine and elsewhere in the world. I am solaced by having joined a global movement of fellow mothers whose activism is fired by our maternity rather than existing in spite of it. There is true hope in this sense of unity. As the Black Canadian writer and mother Bee Quammie tells us, ‘Lives have been taken, but beautiful children exist. The solidarity of motherhood is a global effort, and we carry each other’s pain and joy’. We cannot possibly wish for a better tomorrow for our own children unless that tomorrow also offers a safe and more loving world for ALL children.

The many Australians who have stood up for Palestine have an opportunity to continue on this journey, to cast aside the indoctrination that leads us to understand indifference as freedom and silence as comfort. For White settler-Australians like myself, who historically have been bystanders to imperialist violence, this feels particularly poignant. In humanising others (including the Indigenous people of this land we ourselves occupy), we honour own humanity. Now that we have come this far, we simply cannot go back. Like Sissy Austin, I would urge us to take hope from the words and music of Uncle Archie Roach, who once so beautifully compelled us to ‘Let Love Rule’:

Oh we hear the children crying

And we don’t know what to do

Gotta hold on to each other

And love will see us through

Let love rule, let it guide us through the night

That we may stay together and keep our spirits calm.

Free Palestine. And then the world.

About the author

Lora Chapman

Lora is a writer and practicing social worker. She holds a PhD in anthropology and is passionate about social issues that impact children and young people.

This article was originally published in Arena Online on 23 August 2024

The post Policing Protest In An Age Of Hypervisible Genocide: Lessons For Settler-Australia first appeared on NMH.

There is something about George Lucas’s seminal classic, Star Wars (1977), that easily connects to the Second World War, as most film fans and critics know, and to what’s happening now, thanks to the US and Israel.

It’s no secret that George Lucas’ Star Wars films (the original three) used Nazis as the models for the bad guys.

It’s no secret that the bunch of rebels against them were not too far removed from the ragtag bunch of Jewish resistance fighters that existed then.

It’s no secret that the evil emperor was modeled after Hitler (initially it was supposed to be Darth Vader, but when the whole dad-son plot came into being and redeemed Vader, the sneering emperor was kept as evil as possible).

It’s no secret that the wars took place in the desert in Star Wars, which is not unsimilar to the Middle East terrain.

It’s no secret that those rag tag rebels get the biggest AID from some foreign force (the Jedis) who uses …. The force. Or in Israel’s case, their own Jedi master, the US, which has three different forces (Air, sea and land) in fact.

It is no secret too that in the 80s Ronald Reagan, the president of the mother hen of a country that kept little chick like Israel by its wing, started a military program called Strategic Defence Initiative which is also referred to as …

…Star Wars.

It’s no secret at all.

Hitler’s Army

In fact, even the Stormtroopers, the evil soldiers in the Lucas films, were the name of Hitler’s army. How blatant is that?

But Lucas may be on to something there. The good guys, led by the swaggering, hatless cowboy Han Solo, is America herself (himself?). The Americans, forever thinking of themselves as the white-hat cowboys walking into some town and saving the town from some black-hat baddies, are still in that mode in this age of social media, gender pronoun confusion, and millions of cat videos.

I went to AI chat (on the Bing browser) and tried to query about the connection between the non-stop war and the US military industrial complex, but instead it gave me a Namaste (Indian/Southeast Asian welcoming and goodbye gesture), see for yourself:

Either it really sincerely didn’t want to talk about it, or the son of a gun was being sarcastic. So, I said “screw you, AI” in my best Schwarzenegger voice and did the old-fashioned googling.

The search result revealed pretty much what you expect and more. You see, the Gringos had given altogether more than US 260b since 1948 (the year of the formation of Israel), as it says here that the US has ”committed over $3.3 billion in foreign assistance to Israel in 2022, the most recent year for which data exists… About $8.8 million of that went toward the country’s economy, while 99.7% of the aid went to the Israeli military.”

Here’s a chart from USA Facts:

That’s overall aid; some of it may have been used to create pageant beauties, future Wonder Women, or both. How about the military, precisely?

I may be colour blind, but boy, I sure can see the length of the dark side of the force. Since 2000, over 86% of annual American aid to Israel has been used to fund military efforts.

Aid for Gaza?

And when talking about the military and Israel, thoughts will go to Gaza? Of course, US does contribute some aid to Gaza—a couple of million here and there, pocket changes for the Yanks. This will not occupy much space in this article. We all know how it has been difficult for Aid to reach the Gazans. And Gaza has been refused those aids, no thanks to Israel. In fact, even medical equipment like bloody scissors was turned away at the posts. Perhaps they are worried that some Hamas terrorists might creep up on some orthodox Jews and snip their side curls away.

What will all this amount to—apart from a dead Gazan or 35,000? Why? The entire world is in peril, of course. How can the US military industrial complex affect an ordinary Malaysian who’s currently, as you are reading, is taking a snapshot of his meal for Instagram?

Pollution

It is established that the US is the biggest polluter, especially with the military industrial complex, which is said to pollute more than 140 countries put together. And we don’t even know what exact amount of throat choking, lung puncturing poisons the Yankees are putting away because, at their own “behest,” the military emissions were exempted from the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, an international treaty where the member countries signed commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Meanwhile, take a gander at this:

Look at that again. That’s not the US  country. That’s pollution from her military alone that’s being compared to other nations.

It certainly makes one wish that Gretha Thunberg— that finger-pointing kid —would turn to the West and, instead of berating the third and developing world, yell “How dare you?” facing the turret of a M1 Abrams tank.

This is why the whole boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement is about as effective as yelling at the sky for rain. Instead, it may do damages, like killing businesses that are operated by locals and deprive employment for those who need it, like the disabled and elderly who work at McDonalds, for instance.

This needs a stronger voice from leaders, not those who throw stones and hide their hands. There must be constant bombardment of protesting words, like Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who probably has a pair of male vital organs made of brass, to the point that the US’s Bruce Wayne has to send his Robin the Wonder boy down to calm the Brazilian president down..

You see, this is not only a humanitarian issue, it’s also about physical global health. Everyone has the right to speak out about the spread of war and the growth of the military industrial complex, which exists only for one reason and one reason alone: death and destruction. Sacrificing Prosperity Burgers ain’t gonna cut it. – NMH

Articles by the same writer:

The Boycott Issue: More Than Just Socks!

Greenwashing: Consigning Conscience to Consumers

The post US, Israel, and Greta Thunberg’s Nightmare first appeared on NMH.

The past five months have been clarifying. What was supposed to be hidden has been thrust into the light. What was supposed to be obscured has come sharply into focus.

Liberal democracy is not what it seems.

It has always defined itself in contrast to what it says it is not. Where other regimes are savage, it is humanitarian. Where others are authoritarian, it is open and tolerant. Where others are criminal, it is law-abiding. When others are belligerent, it seeks peace. Or so the manuals of liberal democracy argue.

But how to keep the faith when the world’s leading liberal democracies – invariably referred to as “the West” – are complicit in the crime of crimes: genocide?

Not just law-breaking or a misdemeanour, but the extermination of a people. And not just quickly, before the mind has time to absorb and weigh the gravity and extent of the crime, but in slow motion, day after day, week after week, month after month.

What kind of system of values can allow for five months the crushing of children under rubble, the detonation of fragile bodies, the wasting away of babies, while still claiming to be humanitarian, tolerant, peace-seeking?

And not just allow all this, but actively assist in it. Supply the bombs that blow those children to pieces or bring houses down on them, and sever ties to the only aid agency that can hope to keep them alive.

The answer, it seems, is the West’s system of values.

The mask has not just slipped, it has been ripped off. What lies beneath is ugly indeed.

Depravity on show

The West is desperately trying to cope. When Western depravity is fully on show, the public’s gaze has to be firmly directed elsewhere: to the truly evil ones.

They are given a name. It is Russia. It is Al Qaeda, and Islamic State. It is China. And right now, it is Hamas.

There must be an enemy. But this time, the West’s own evil is so hard to disguise, and the enemy so paltry – a few thousand fighters underground inside a prison besieged for 17 years – that the asymmetry is difficult to ignore. The excuses are hard to swallow.

Is Hamas really so evil, so cunning, so much of a threat that it requires mass slaughter? Does the West really believe that the attack of 7 October warrants the killing, maiming and orphaning of many, many tens of thousands of children as a response?

To stamp out such thoughts, Western elites have had to do two things. First, they have tried to persuade their publics that the acts they collude in are not as bad as they look. And then that the evil perpetrated by the enemy is so exceptional, so unconscionable it justifies a response in kind.

Which is exactly the role Western media has played over the past five months.

Starved by Israel

To understand how Western publics are being manipulated, just look to the coverage – especially from those outlets most closely aligned not with the right but with supposedly liberal values.

How have the media dealt with the 2.3 million Palestinians of Gaza being gradually starved to death by an Israeli aid blockade, an action that lacks any obvious military purpose beyond inflicting a savage vengeance on Palestinian civilians? After all, Hamas fighters will outlast the young, the sick and the elderly in any mediaeval-style, attritional war denying Gaza food, water and medicines.

A headline in the New York Times, for example, told readers last month, “Starvation is stalking Gaza’s children”, as if this were a famine in Africa – a natural disaster, or an unexpected humanitarian catastrophe – rather than a policy declared in advance and carefully orchestrated by Israel’s top echelons.

The Financial Times offered the same perverse framing: “Starvation stalks children of northern Gaza”.

But starvation is not an actor in Gaza. Israel is. Israel is choosing to starve Gaza’s children. It renews that policy each day afresh, fully aware of the terrible price being inflicted on the population.

As the head of Medical Aid for Palestinians warned of developments in Gaza: “Children are being starved at the fastest rate the world has ever seen.”

Last week Unicef, the United Nations children’s emergency fund, declared that a third of children aged under two in northern Gaza were acutely malnourished. Its executive director, Catherine Russell, was clear: “An immediate humanitarian cease-fire continues to provide the only chance to save children’s lives and end their suffering.”

Were it really starvation doing the stalking, rather than Israel imposing starvation, the West’s powerlessness would be more understandable. Which is what the media presumably want their readers to infer.

But the West isn’t powerless. It is enabling this crime against humanity – day after day, week after week – by refusing to exert its power to punish Israel, or even to threaten to punish it, for blocking aid. 

Not only that, but the US and Europe have helped Israel starve Gaza’s children by denying funding to the UN refugee agency, UNRWA, the main humanitarian lifeline in the enclave. 

All of this is obscured – meant to be obscured – by headlines that transfer the agency for starving children to an abstract noun rather than a country with a large, vengeful army.

Attack on aid convoy

Such misdirection is everywhere – and it is entirely intentional. It is a playbook being used by every single Western media outlet. It was all too visible when an aid convoy last month reached Gaza City, where levels of Israeli-induced famine are most extreme.

In what has come to be known by Palestinians as the “Flour Massacre”, Israel shot into large crowds desperately trying to get food parcels from a rare aid convoy to feed their starving families. More than 100 Palestinians were killed by the gunfire, or crushed by Israeli tanks or hit by trucks fleeing the scene. Many hundreds more were seriously wounded.

It was an Israeli war crime – shooting on civilians – that came on top of an Israeli crime against humanity – starving two million civilians to death.

“The Israeli attack on those waiting for aid was not a one-off”

The Israeli attack on those waiting for aid was not a one-off. It has been repeated several times, though you would barely know it, given the paucity of coverage.

The depravity of using aid convoys as traps to lure Palestinians to their deaths is almost too much to grasp.

But that is not the reason the headlines that greeted this horrifying incident so uniformly obscured or soft-soaped Israel’s crime.  

For any journalist, the headline should have written itself: “Israel accused of killing over 100 as crowd waits for Gaza aid.” Or: “Israel fires into food aid crowd. Hundreds killed and injured”

But that would have accurately transferred agency to Israel – Gaza’s occupier for more than half a century, and its besieger for the last 17 years – in the deaths of those it has been occupying and besieging. Something inconceivable for the Western media.

So the focus had to be shifted elsewhere.

BBC contortions

The Guardian’s contortions were particularly spectacular: “Biden says Gaza food aid-related deaths complicate ceasefire talks”. 

The massacre by Israel was disappeared as mysterious “food aid-related deaths”, which in turn became secondary to the Guardian’s focus on the diplomatic fallout.

Readers were steered by the headline into assuming that the true victims were not the hundreds of Palestinians killed and maimed by Israel but the Israeli hostages whose chances of being freed had been “complicated” by “food aid-related deaths”.

The headline on a BBC analysis of the same war crime – now reframed as an author-less “tragedy” – repeated the New York Times’ trick: “Aid convoy tragedy shows fear of starvation haunts Gaza”.

Another favourite manoeuvre, again pioneered by the Guardian, was to cloud responsibility for a clear-cut war crime. Its front-page headline read: “More than 100 Palestinians die in chaos surrounding Gaza aid convoy”. 

“The massacre by Israel was disappeared as mysterious ‘food aid-related deaths’”

Once again, Israel was removed from the crime scene. In fact, worse, the crime scene was removed too. Palestinians “died” apparently because of poor aid management. Maybe UNRWA was to blame.

Chaos and confusion became useful refrains for media outlets keener to shroud culpability. The Washington Post declared: “Chaotic aid delivery turns deadly as Israeli, Gazan officials trade blame”. CNN took the same line, downgrading a war crime to a “chaotic incident”. 

But even these failings were better than the media’s rapidly waning interest as Israel’s massacres of Palestinians seeking aid became routine – and therefore harder to mystify.

A few days after the Flour Massacre, an Israeli air strike on an aid truck in Deir al-Balah killed at least nine Palestinians, while last week more than 20 hungry Palestinians were killed by Israeli helicopter gunfire as they waited for aid. 

“Food aid-related” massacres – which had quickly become as normalised as Israel’s invasions of hospitals – no longer merited serious attention. A search suggests the BBC managed to avoid giving significant coverage to either incident online.

Food-drop theatrics

Meanwhile, the media has ably assisted Washington in its various deflections from the collaborative crime against humanity of Israel imposing a famine on Gaza compounded by the US and Europe de-funding UNRWA, the only agency that could mitigate that famine.

British and US broadcasters excitedly joined air crews as their militaries flew big-bellied planes over Gaza’s beaches, at great expense, to drop one-off ready-made meals to a few of the starving Palestinians below.

Given that many hundreds of truckloads of aid a day are needed just to stop Gaza sliding deeper into famine, the drops were no more than theatrics. Each delivered at best a solitary truckload of aid – and then only if the palettes didn’t end up falling into the sea, or killing the Palestinians they were meant to benefit.

The operation deserved little more than ridicule.

Instead, dramatic visuals of heroic airmen, interspersed with expressions of concern about the difficulties of addressing the “humanitarian crisis” in Gaza, usefully distracted viewers’ attention not only from the operations’ futility but from the fact that, were the West really determined to help, it could strong-arm Israel into letting in far more plentiful aid by land at a moment’s notice.

The media were equally swept up by the Biden administration’s second, even more outlandish scheme to help starving Palestinians. The US is to build a temporary floating pier off Gaza’s coast so that aid shipments can be delivered from Cyprus.

The plot holes were gaping. The pier will take two months or more to construct, when the aid is needed now. In Cyprus, as at the land crossings into Gaza, Israel will be in charge of inspections – the main cause of hold-ups.

And if the US now thinks Gaza needs a port, why not also get to work on a more permanent one?

The answer, of course, might remind audiences of the situation before 7 October, when Gaza was under a stifling 17-year siege by Israel – the context for Hamas’ attack that the Western media never quite finds the space to mention.

For decades, Israel has denied Gaza any connections to the outside world it cannot control, including preventing a sea port from being built and bombing the enclave’s only airport way back in 2001, shortly after it was opened.

And yet, at the same time, Israel’s insistence that it no longer occupies Gaza – just because it has done so at arm’s length since 2005 – is accepted unquestioningly in media coverage.

Again, the US has decisive leverage over Israel, its client state, should it decide to exercise it – not least billions in aid and the diplomatic veto it wields so regularly on Israel’s behalf.

The question that needs asking by the media on every piece about “starvation stalking Gaza” is why is the US not using that leverage.

In a typical breathless piece titled “How the US military plans to construct a pier and get food into Gaza”, the BBC ignored the big picture to drill down enthusiastically on the details of “huge logistical” and “security challenges” facing Biden’s project. 

The article revisited precedents from disaster relief operations in Somalia and Haiti to the D-Day Normandy landings in the Second World War. 

Credulous journalists

In support of these diversionary tactics, the media have also had to accentuate the atrocities of Hamas’ 7 October attack – and the need to condemn the group at every turn – to contrast those crimes from what might otherwise appear even worse atrocities committed by Israel on the Palestinians. 

That has required an unusually large dose of credulousness from journalists who more usually present as hard-bitten sceptics.

Babies being beheaded, or put in ovens, or hung out on clothes lines. No invented outrage by Hamas has been too improbable to have been denied front-page treatment, only to be quietly dropped later when each has turned out to be just as fabricated as it should have sounded to any reporter familiar with the way propagandists exploit the fog of war. 

Similarly, the entire Western press corps has studiously ignored months of Israeli media revelations that have gradually shifted responsibility for some of the the most gruesome incidents of 7 October – such as the burning of hundreds of bodies – off Hamas’ shoulders and on to Israel’s.

Though Western media outlets failed to note the significance of his remarks, Israeli spokesman Mark Regev admitted that Israel’s numbering of its dead from 7 October had to be reduced by 200 because many of the badly charred remains turned out to be Hamas fighters. 

Testimonies from Israeli commanders and officials show that, blindsided by the Hamas attack, Israeli forces struck out wildly with tank shells and Hellfire missiles, incinerating Hamas fighters and their Israeli captives indiscriminately. The burnt cars piled up as a visual signifier of Hamas’ sadism are, in fact, evidence of, at best, Israel’s incompetence and, at worst, its savagery.

The secret military protocol that directed Israel’s scorched-earth policy on 7 October – the notorious Hannibal procedure to stop any Israeli being taken captive – appears not to have merited mention by either the Guardian or the BBC in their acres of 7 October coverage.

Despite their endless revisiting of the 7 October events, neither has seen fit to report on the growing demands from Israeli families for an investigation into whether their loved ones were killed under Israel’s Hannibal procedure. 

Nor have either the BBC or the Guardian reported on the comments of the Israeli military’s ethics chief, Prof Asa Kasher, bewailing the army’s resort to the Hannibal procedure on 7 October as “horrifying” and “unlawful”. 

Claims of bestiality

Instead, liberal Western media outlets have repeatedly revisited claims that they have seen evidence – evidence they seem unwilling to share – that Hamas ordered rape to be used systematically by its fighters as a weapon of war. The barely veiled implication is that such depths of depravity explain, and possibly justify, the scale and savagery of Israel’s response.

Note that this claim is quite different from the argument that there may have been instances of rape on 7 October.

That is for good reason: There are plenty of indications that Israeli soldiers regularly use rape and sexual violence against Palestinians. A UN report in February addressing allegations that Israeli solders and officials had weaponised sexual violence against Palestinian women and girls since 7 October elicited none of the headlines and outrage from the Western media directed at Hamas. 

To make a plausible case that Hamas changed the rules of war that day, much greater deviance and sinfulness has been required. And the liberal Western media have willingly played their part by recycling claims of mass, systematic rape by Hamas, combined with lurid claims of necrophilic perversions – while suggesting anyone who asks for evidence is condoning such bestiality.

But the liberal media’s claims of Hamas “mass rapes” – initiated by an agenda-setting piece by the New York Times and closely echoed by the Guardian weeks later – have crumbled on closer inspection.

Independent outlets such as Mondoweiss, Electronic Intifada, the Grayzone and others have gradually pulled apart the Hamas mass rape narrative.

But perhaps most damaging of all has been an investigation by the Intercept that revealed it was senior Times editors who recruited a novice Israeli journalist – a former Israeli intelligence official with a history of supporting genocidal statements against the people of Gaza – to do the field work.

More shocking still, it was the paper’s editors who then pressured her to find the story. In violation of investigative norms, the narrative was reverse engineered: imposed from the top, not found through on-the-ground reporting.

‘Conspiracy of silence’

The New York Times’ story appeared in late December under the headline “‘Screams Without Words’: How Hamas Weaponized Sexual Violence on Oct. 7”. The Guardian’s follow-up in mid-January draws so closely on the Times’ reporting that the paper has been accused of plagiarism. Its headline was: “Evidence points to systematic use of rape and sexual violence by Hamas in 7 October attacks”. 

However, under questioning from the Intercept, a spokesperson for the New York Times readily walked back the paper’s original certainty, conceding instead that “there may have been systematic use of sexual assault.” [emphasis added] Even that appears too strong a conclusion.

Holes in the Times’ reporting quickly proved so glaring that its popular daily podcast pulled the plug on an episode dedicated to the story after its own fact check.

The rookie reporter assigned to the task, Anat Schwartz, has admitted that despite scouring the relevant institutions in Israel – from medical institutions to rape crisis centres – she found no one who could confirm a single example of sexual assault that day. She was also unable to find any forensic corroboration.

She later told a podcast with Israel’s Channel 12 that she viewed the lack of evidence to be proof of “a conspiracy of silence”.

Instead, Schwartz’s reporting relied on a handful of testimonies from witnesses whose other easily disprovable assertions should have called into question their credibility. Worse, their accounts of instances of sexual assault failed to tally with the known facts.

One paramedic, for example, claimed two teenage girls had been raped and killed at Kibbutz Nahal Oz. When it became clear nobody fitted the description there, he changed the crime scene to Kibbutz Beeri. None of the dead there fitted the description either.

Nonetheless, Schwartz believed she finally had her story. She told Channel 12: “One person saw it happen in Be’eri, so it can’t be just one person, because it’s two girls. It’s sisters. It’s in the room. Something about it is systematic, something about it feels to me that it’s not random.”

Schwartz got further confirmation from Zaka, a private ultra-Orthodox rescue organisation, whose officials were already known to have fabricated Hamas atrocities on 7 October, including the various claims of depraved acts against babies.

No forensic evidence

Interestingly, though the main claims of Hamas rape have focused on the Nova music festival attacked by Hamas, Schwartz was initially sceptical – and for good reason – that it was the site of any sexual violence.

As Israeli reporting has revealed, the festival quickly turned into a battlefield, with Israeli security guards and Hamas exchanging gunfire and Israeli attack helicopters circling overhead firing at anything that moved.

Schwartz concluded: “Everyone I spoke to among the survivors told me about a chase, a race, like, about moving from place to place. How would they [have had the time] to mess with a woman, like – it is impossible. Either you hide, or you – or you die. Also it’s public, the Nova … such an open space.”

But Schwartz dropped her scepticism as soon as Raz Cohen, a veteran of Israel’s special forces, agreed to speak to her. He had already claimed in earlier interviews a few days after 7 October that he had witnessed multiple rapes at Nova, including corpses being raped.

But when he spoke to Schwartz he could only recall one incident – a horrific attack that involved raping a woman and then knifing her to death. Undermining the New York Times’ central claim, he attributed the rape not to Hamas but to five civilians, Palestinians who poured into Israel after Hamas fighters broke through the fence around Gaza.

Notably, Schwartz admitted to Channel 12 that none of the other four people hiding in the bush with Cohen saw the attack. “Everyone else is looking in a different direction,” she said.

And yet in the Times’ story, Cohen’s account is corroborated by Shoam Gueta, a friend who has since deployed to Gaza where, as the Intercept notes, he has been posting videos of himself rummaging through destroyed Palestinian homes.

Another witness, identified only as Sapir, is quoted by Schwartz as witnessing a woman being raped at Nova at the same time as her breast is amputated with a box cutter. That account became central to the Guardian’s follow-up report in January.

Yet, no forensic evidence has been produced to support this account.

Story invented

But the most damning criticism of the Times’ reporting came from the family of Gal Abdush, the headline victim in the “Screams without Words” story. Her parents and brother accused the New York Times of inventing the story that she had been raped at the Nova festival.

Moments before she was killed by a grenade, Abdush had messaged her family and made no mention of a rape or even a direct attack on her group. The family had heard no suggestion that rape was a factor in Abdush’s death.

A woman who had given the paper access to photos and video of Abdush taken that day said Schwartz had pressured her to do so on the grounds it would help “Israeli hasbara” – a term meaning propaganda designed to sway foreign audiences.

Schwartz cited the Israeli welfare ministry as claiming there were four survivors of sexual assault from 7 October, though no more details have been forthcoming from the ministry.

Back in early December, before the Times story, Israeli officials promised they had “gathered ‘tens of thousands’ of testimonies of sexual violence committed by Hamas”. None of those testimonies has materialised.

None ever will, according to Schwartz’s conversation with Channel 12. “There is nothing. There was no collection of evidence from the scene,” she said.

Nonetheless, Israeli officials continue to use the reports by the New York Times, the Guardian and others to try to bully major human rights bodies into agreeing that Hamas used sexual violence systematically.

Which may explain why the media eagerly seized on the chance to resurrect its threadbare narrative when UN official Pramila Patten, its special representative on sexual violence in conflict, echoed some of their discredited claims in a report published this month. 

The media happily ignored the fact that Patten had no investigative mandate and that she heads what is in effect an advocacy group inside the UN. While Israel has obstructed UN bodies that do have such investigative powers, it welcomed Patten, presumably on the assumption that she would be more pliable. 

In fact, she did little more than repeat the same unevidenced claims from Israel that formed the basis of the Times and Guardian’s discredited reporting.

Statements retracted

Even so, Patten included important caveats in the small print of her report that the media were keen to overlook.

At a press conference, she reiterated that she had seen no evidence of a pattern of behaviour by Hamas, or of the use of rape as a weapon of war – the very claims the Western media had been stressing for weeks.

She concluded in the report that she was unable to “establish the prevalence of sexual violence”. And further, she conceded it was not clear if any sexual violence occurring on 7 October was the responsibility of Hamas, or other groups or individuals.

All of that was ignored by the media. In typical fashion, a Guardian article on her report asserted wrongly in its headline: “UN finds ‘convincing information’ that Hamas raped and tortured Israeli hostages”. 

Patten’s primary source of information, she conceded, were Israeli “national institutions” – state officials who had every incentive to mislead her in the furtherance of the country’s war aims, as they had earlier done with a compliant media.  

As the US Jewish scholar Normal Finkelstein has pointed out, Patten also relied on open-source material: 5,000 photos and 50 hours of video footage from bodycams, dashcams, cellphones, CCTV and traffic surveillance cameras. And yet that visual evidence yielded not a single image of sexual violence. Or as Patten phrased it: “No tangible indications of rape could be identified.”

She admitted she had seen no forensic evidence of sexual violence, and had not met a single survivor of rape or sexual assault.

And she noted that the witnesses and sources her team spoke to – the same individuals the media had relied on – proved unreliable. They “adopted over time an increasingly cautious and circumspect approach regarding past accounts, including in some cases retracting statements made previously”.

Collusion in genocide

If anything has been found to be systematic, it is the failings in the Western media’s coverage of a plausible genocide unfolding in Gaza.

Last week a computational analysis of the New York Times’ reporting revealed it continued to focus heavily on Israeli perspectives, even as the death-toll ratio showed that 30 times as many Palestinians had been killed by Israel in Gaza than Hamas had killed Israelis on 7 October. 

The paper quoted Israelis and Americans many times more regularly than they did Palestinians, and when Palestinians were referred to it was invariably in the passive voice. 

In Britain, the Muslim Council of Britain’s Centre for Media Monitoring has analysed nearly 177,000 clips from TV broadcasts covering the first month after the 7 October attack. It found Israeli perspectives were three times more common than Palestinian ones.

A similar study by the Glasgow Media Group found that journalists regularly used condemnatory language for the killing of Israelis – “murderous”, “mass murder”, “brutal murder” and “merciless murder” – but never when Palestinians were being killed by Israel. “Massacres”, “atrocities” and “slaughter” were only ever carried out against Israelis, not against Palestinians.

Faced with a plausible case of genocide – one being televised for months on end – even the liberal elements of the Western media have shown they have no serious commitment to the liberal democratic values they are supposedly there to uphold.  

They are not a watchdog on power, either the power of the Israeli military or Western states colluding in Israel’s slaughter. Rather the media are central to making the collusion possible. They are there to disguise and whitewash it, to make it look acceptable.

Indeed, the truth is that, without that help, Israel’s allies would long ago have been shamed into action, into stopping the slaughter and starvation. The Western media’s hands are stained in Gaza’s blood.

This article was originally published on Declassified.org

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jonathan Cook is the author of three books on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and a winner of the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His website and blog can be found at www.jonathan-cook.net

The post How The Western Media Helped Build The Case For Genocide In Gaza first appeared on NMH.

Towards the weekend, my editor sent me this clip and asked me if I could write something out of it. Both of us share (sometimes bombard) posts on Facebook, especially on the genocide committed by Israel in Gaza (now they have set their vicious sights on Rafa).

I am not familiar with this guy, but his Twitter handle was his name, and he has an official site, www.matthewcooke.com, and he is a documentary filmmaker, among others.

Message of Peace

Cooke’s message was the usual one, of peace. But I understand why my editor was touched—the writer/director spoke eloquently about the three Abrahamic religions, the factors that unite the three, and also included Buddha and Hinduism for a greater measure.

Here are some of the things he noted:

“I think it was the idea, the guidance of what’s now called Islam … and Christianity and Judaism came from three people after each fasted for a month, to reduce influence of this material world. To leave themselves empty. To receive something from the highest good, which they did.”

Each had revelation that human beings should not associate anything physical or that springs from desire, of self-interest, with an unfathomable all-encompassing ones, God, Yahweh, All, which all mean the same things, regardless of the religion or tradition. A word that means, “that which is everything”. That which surrounds and exists inside and outside all that exists.

Mentioning the likes of Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Prophet Muhammad (PBH), Cooke said they came in successions because “the world was not listening to the sibling who had come prior.”.

“It turns out all the children of humanity are also completely compatible with Gauthama Buddha, who reminded humankind that our attachment to material things will lead to suffering,” he noted, adding that it is also compatible with Hinduism, which advised that humankind must be aware of our karma, which can simply be interpreted as “that which we hate, we become, and that which we love, loves us back.”

Peaceful Co-Existence

Cooke speaks for many of us. But Cooke and those yearning for the days of peaceful co-existence between many faiths and races should come to Malaysia.

When the founding father, Tunku Abdul Rahman, set out to work for our country’s independence, he consulted the community leaders and brought them along during the negotiations. He also benefits from the culture of these races, not religion, for the peace-loving Malays had no issues accepting hordes of Indian labourers or the settling Chinese migrants in this country.

I firmly believe that if the Malays had been some warring tribes that gargled blood before breakfast, Indians and Chinese would probably just be found at the embassy offices. The Malays are the pizza base for many fillings. But now, thanks to intermarriages, we have the Mamaks, Babas, and Nyonyas. Every family has someone who has married someone from another racial or religious background. It’s difficult to hate someone of another race or religion because he or she could be related to us, for heaven’s sake.

Yes, those damned westerners and that puny country in the Middle East with the worst serial killer with traumatic past syndrome should look at us. Sure, our neighbouring country (the island of Singapore) too has those three ingredients. And I have not even mentioned Sabah and Sarawak and all the colours they bring to the canvas.

Focus

Cooke ends his clip thus: “May we focus on the job we have in front of us, which among others at this time, is to always speak and act and vote against violence, and against all those sins so clearly described by our mothers and fathers. May we devote ourselves to peace outwardly and inwardly, for as long as they are wars in ourselves, there will be war in the world.“

Malaysia has had some issues in the past; a couple of race riots and lots of tensions between the races often would just end up as newspaper headlines and disappear come the festive seasons. We may squabble like siblings, have tensions like relatives, and be dissatisfied with each other like neighbors of different economic backgrounds.

Only, we don’t bomb their houses and kill their children. – NMH

Also read:

This New Year It Is Time To Reflect Upon Ourselves And Palestine

Gaza: Crimson-Tinted Brands And Their Roles In The Genocide

The post Peace Inwards And Outwards, Within And Without first appeared on NMH.

THE HAGUE – Malaysia’s Foreign Minister, Datuk Seri Mohamad Hasan emphasised that Israel must, first of all, cease all the relevant “policies and practices” that individually breach a number of rules of public international law, determine the rights of the Palestinians, and MUST immediately withdraw from the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT).

Delivering Malaysia’s oral submission during public hearings over Israel’s actions at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Netherlands on early Friday morning, Mohamad said Israel must cease all its relevant “policies and practices” in Palestine and withdraw immediately from the OPT.

Mohamad added that “Israel must offer assurances and guarantees of non-repetition.

“Israel is under an obligation to offer full reparation. This means that it must provide both actual and juridical restitution, including the annulment or repeal of all offending legislative and regulatory measures it has adopted for the OPT.”

Compensation

The Foreign Minister, who is also the Member of Parliament for Rembau, said that Israel must also offer compensation for all material and moral damage caused by the breach of the right to self-determination, to the extent that this is not made good by restitution.

“The legal consequences arising for Israel from its serious breach of the right to self-determination are, in principle, no more burdensome than the legal consequences arising for any State that has committed even a trivial breach of international law.

“It is rather for other States – indeed, for all other States – that special legal consequences arise out of this serious breach of jus cogens. It is for this reason that Malaysia felt it was under a duty to participate in these advisory proceedings.”

Mohamad added that all States must cooperate to bring to an end through lawful means the serious breach of the right to self-determination, and consequently the unlawful occupation of the Palestinian territory and must not recognise as lawful the situation created by the serious breach of the right to self-determination, that is, the occupation of the Palestinian territory.

Right of Palestinians to Self-Determination

He added that it is imperative that no country should render aid or assistance to Israel in maintaining the unlawful denial of the right of Palestinians to self-determination, thus the occupation of the Palestinian territory.

“Malaysia stresses the obligation of all States to support UNRWA, and to halt any financial or military support to Israel that aids or assists in the denial of the right to self-determination and the unlawful occupation.

“As for the legal consequences that arise for the United Nations, these are none other than the obligation to pursue with vigour its “permanent responsibility” towards the question of Palestine, including its responsibility to ensure UNRWA’s continued effective functioning.”

The Minister stressed that Malaysia remains steadfast in the pursuit of a world where compassion and justice prevail and that the UN must continue to serve as a forum of institutionalised cooperation for States working towards fulfilling their secondary obligations of bringing to an end the ongoing violation of the Palestinians’ right to self-determination and the unlawful occupation of the Palestinian territory.

The principal judicial organ of the United Nations is asked today to do its part in that noble pursuit. Malaysia sincerely hopes that it will agree to do so.

Devastation

“As I stand here today, Gaza is facing devastation, including in Rafah, at the southern end of the Strip. The West Bank is also at risk. Safeguarding Palestine from destruction is crucial, especially in light of Israel’s non-compliance with the recent Order of Provisional Measures of this Court of 26 January 2024 in the case brought by South Africa. The matter before you today is of grave concern to the General Assembly, all States, and the Palestinian people.

“The Palestinian people have long suffered dehumanisation, demonisation, brutal collective punishment. They have endured, and are still enduring, the denial of their right to self-determination due to the “policies and practices” of Israel in the OPT. It is incumbent upon each of us to do our part in ending their decades-long suffering and to work towards peace in their land.

“Malaysia has consistently supported peace for the Palestinian people, aligning itself with relevant General Assembly and Security Council Resolutions. As was the case in the Advisory Opinion on the Wall, this Court is uniquely positioned to give authoritative guidance on the legal questions submitted by the General Assembly. With a firm belief in this Court’s role as the custodian of international law, we remain confident that justice and peace will prevail for Palestine.”

More than 50 countries are presenting their arguments on the legal consequences of the Israeli occupation in Palestine during the public hearings that began on Monday.

Advisory Opinion Procedure

Earlier, Mohamad said that Malaysia is participating in this Advisory Opinion procedure with the aim of assisting the ICJ in the examination of the legal questions put to it by the General Assembly where the request for the Advisory Opinion emanates from the United Nations General Assembly’s (UNGA) Resolution 77/247 adopted on Dec 30, 2022, where Malaysia co-sponsored and voted in favour of the resolution.

The Advisory Opinion is a separate procedure from the application by South Africa to institute proceedings against Israel, which was filed before the ICJ on Dec 29, 2023, he said.

He pointed out that while the South African application was filed over alleged violations by Israel of its obligations under the 1948 Genocide Convention against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, particularly since Oct 7, 2023, the Advisory Opinion derives from the request by the UNGA.

Important Process

The Advisory Opinion is an important process to obtain legal advice from the ICJ, the principal judicial organ of the UN, in accordance with Article 96 of the UN Charter and Article 65 of the ICJ Statute, he said.

“The Advisory Opinion carries great legal weight and moral authority and contributes to the elucidation and development of international law, thereby to the strengthening of peaceful relations between states,” he said.

This is the second time that Malaysia has been involved in the ICJ Advisory Opinion procedure in support of Palestine.

In 2004, Malaysia participated in the request for the ICJ’s Advisory Opinion on the legal consequences of the construction of a wall in the occupied Palestinian territory, where the court found that such action by Israel was contrary to international law.

According to Mohamad, in the current Advisory Opinion proceeding, the General Assembly posed several questions for ICJ to render its opinion including the legal consequences arising from Israel’s violation of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. It also posed questions on the policies and practices of Israel affecting the legal status of the occupation and the legal consequences that arise for all states and the United Nations.

Written Proceedings

Before the upcoming public hearings, Mohamad said Malaysia participated in the written proceedings by submitting a written statement, which was deposited with the ICJ on July 25, 2023.

Mohamad said participation in the current Advisory Opinion procedure signifies Malaysia’s ongoing concerted efforts at various multilateral platforms including the UN Security Council, Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) and Association of South-East Asian Nations (Asean) in support of Palestine and to bring Israel to justice. – NMH

Also read:

Gaza: Crimson-Tinted Brands And Their Roles In The Genocide

Malaysia Condemns Israel Attack On Rafah

The post Malaysia: Palestinians SHOULD Be Granted The Right To Self-Determination first appeared on NMH.

PUTRAJAYA – Malaysia condemns in the strongest terms the large-scale offensive in Rafa where millions of displaced civilians are seeking refuge. This irresponsible, illegal and inhumane assault will worsen the current humanitarian catastrophe, exacerbate tension in the region, and further derail efforts towards immediate cessation of hostilities and permanent ceasefire.

Malaysia demands Israel to immediately desist and abide by its obligations under international law. This dastardly military operation clearly vindicates the key goal by the Zionist regime to annihilate the Palestinians from their own land. It again demonstrates their blatant disregard of fundamental principles of international law and a clear contempt of the rulings by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on 26 January 2024 on the six provisional measures. The international community cannot let this belligerent act by one of its members continue without impunity.

Malaysia Demands The Massacre Be Stopped

In this regard, Malaysia echoes the calls by the United Nations Secretary-General for an immediate halt to the vile plan and urges the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to take swift and decisive action to stop the massacre being perpetrated by the Zionist regime. This includes compelling responsible members of the international community to suspend support to the regime.

Malaysia’s resolute support and solidarity with the Palestinian people remain unwavering, including towards their right to self-determination, the establishment of an independent and sovereign State of Palestine, based on pre-1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine and accepted as a full member of the UN. – NMH

The post Malaysia Condemns Israel Attack On Rafah first appeared on NMH.

Imagine your family is brutally murdered in front of you. Their only crime was they were fleeing from harm from people you don’t know. Imagine you being so scared and you’re begging for help. This was what 6 year old Palestinian child Rind Hajab endured before she was brutally murdered by Israeli forces.

“I’m so scared, please come. Please call someone to come and take me,” she was heard crying desperately in the call that PRCS said lasted three hours in an effort to calm frightened Hind.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) and the family of the girl, Hind Rajab, confirmed on Saturday that all seven people inside the car were killed, with the Palestinian relief organisation saying it lost crew members Yusuf Zeino and Ahmed al-Madhoun in the Israeli attack on civilians in Gaza City.

Family members found Hind’s body along with those of her uncle and aunt and their three children near a roundabout in the city’s Tal al-Hawa suburb, the Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.

Another of Hind’s uncles, Sameeh Hamadeh, said the car was peppered with bullet holes.

“The occupation deliberately targeted the ambulance upon its arrival at the scene, where it was found just metres away from the vehicle containing the trapped child Hind,” said the PRCS statement.

The most dangerous place in the world to be a child.

That devastating description is now being applied to Gaza by UNICEF as the true extent of the catastrophe of this war emerges.

That devastation is leading to one of the worst humanitarian crises of our time – where, for example, a nurse has had to perform emergency caesarean operations on six dead pregnant women to try to save their babies.

The horrors of Gaza are almost unspeakable. As difficult as all this is to read and to watch, the world mustn’t look away.

Rarely, if ever, have so many children been killed, injured, or orphaned as quickly as Israel is doing so in Gaza right now.

“The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child,” says UNICEF’s James Elder. “And day after day, that brutal reality is reinforced.”

Israel’s military has killed nearly 28,000 people – mostly women and children – since October 7

UNICEF’s James Elder said: “In my 20 years with UNICEF, travelling the world from one humanitarian crisis to the next, from famines to floods and war zones to refugee camps, I’ve simply never seen such devastation and despair as is happening in Gaza.” 

The post Hind Rajab Killed By Israeli Occupying Forces first appeared on NMH.

The court’s demands were clear: Israel must take immediate steps to prevent genocidal actions in Gaza; prevent and punish incitement to genocide; allow access to humanitarian aid; and prevent the destruction and ensure the preservation of evidence of alleged crimes. It must also report back to the court within a month on the implementation of these measures.

There’s little evidence Israel has changed course, despite these clear orders. In fact, reports from Gaza suggest escalated violence and increased civilian casualties each day.

No adherence

In the days since the Jan. 26 ICJ ruling, Israel has intensified its military operations. According to the Health Ministry in Gaza, more than 27,000 Palestinians have now been killed and more than 66,000 injured since the Hamas attacks against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

Israel has also targeted several medical facilities in Gaza, including Nasser hospital, since the ICJ ruling. Instead of halting acts that could constitute genocide under Article II of the Genocide Convention, Israel’s military operations have expanded towards Rafah, intensifying the already dire situation in the last refuge for Gaza’s displaced — despite being labelled as a safe zone for civilians.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) called Rafah a “pressure cooker of despair.”

In direct contravention

On Feb. 5, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) published an image on social media showing its damaged food convoy, waiting to travel towards northern Gaza, after it said it was struck by Israeli naval gunfire. Such action would be in direct contravention of ICJ’s explicit order that Israel ensures basic services and humanitarian aid reaches civilians in Gaza.

Israel is continuing to pump seawater into tunnels throughout Gaza in its assault on Hamas’s labyrinth of tunnels, which experts warn could render Gaza uninhabitable for 100 years by contaminating underground fresh water.

These developments underscore the gravity of the conditions in Gaza following the ICJ ruling, and highlight the urgent need for Israel to comply with the orders.

Despite this, there is hope of a potential reprieve as, according to Qatar, Hamas has received a new ceasefire proposal and is reportedly responding positively to it.

What’s next?

The ICJ’s decision is legally binding, compelling Israel to adhere not only to the specific provisional measures, but also to the broader mandates of the Genocide Convention and the Geneva Conventions.

But the ICJ relies on the United Nations Security Council to ensure compliance with its decisions, a process complicated by geopolitical realities, namely the United States’ longstanding support of Israel and its potential use of its veto power at the Security Council.

Nonetheless, the ICJ ruling sends a clear message to the international community, especially to states allied with Israel, reminding them of the collective responsibility to respect and uphold international law.

As such, the implications of the decision extend well beyond the immediate parties involved. It raises concerns about Canada’s military exports, especially the $21 million of military equipment sent to Israel in 2022.

Legal experts remind us that, in alignment with the Export and Import Permits Act, such transactions should cease if there’s a substantial risk the exported goods could contribute to violations of international humanitarian or human rights law.

After weeks of silence by the Canadian government, Global Affairs Canada says it’s authorized, and continues to authorize, new permits for military exports to Israel since Oct. 7

The ICJ ruling places Canada in a difficult spot. Continuing military exports under these circumstances would not only breach Canadian law, but also contravene the country’s commitment to preventing genocide, potentially implicating Canadian officials in these acts.

The Global South strikes back?

In a broader context, the ICJ’s involvement represents an example of the Global South striking back, as international law expert Heidi Matthews argues in her podcast. South Africa’s historical fight against apartheid has made the Palestinian cause resonate for South Africans, lending credibility and moral weight to its case against Israel.

Nonetheless, despite the hope that the Global South may begin to effectively hold powerful nations to account, the international reaction to the ICJ ruling has been notably ambivalent.

Within hours of the ICJ decision, the White House paused its funding to the UNRWA in the wake of Israeli allegations that 12 of its staff were involved in the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks in southern Israel. Canada soon followed suit.

Josep Borrell, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, recently noted that the total suspended funds amount to more than US$440 million, which makes up half the agency’s expected funds for 2024.

Some nations aren’t following the U.S. lead. Spain has announced an urgent aid package of $3.8 million to UNRWA to ensure the organization can maintain its activities during this desperate situation.

Australia has also signalled it will resume its funding to UNRWA to prevent more children from starving given the lack of any sustainable alternative agencies to deliver aid to Gaza. Belgium has also announced it will continue to provide funds to UNRWA while monitoring the UN’s internal investigation.

Canada, meantime, says it will allocate an additional $40 million to support the humanitarian efforts of other organizations. But the specifics haven’t been disclosed, and there are few other organizations with the expertise and infrastructure to meet the needs of Palestinians in Gaza.

Upholding international law

The ICJ ruling calls for urgent action, not just from Israel, but also from the wider international community — including Canada — to uphold the tenets of international law and support humanitarian efforts.

Global Affairs Canada recently stated on social media that “Canada rejects any proposal that calls for the forced displacement of Palestinians from Gaza and the establishment of additional settlements. Such inflammatory rhetoric undermines prospects for lasting peace.”

Some have labelled this statement as “empty words,” given that Canada has yet to take clear actions following the ICJ decision, such as issuing sanctions against Israel or stopping arms exports.

Gazans are now eating grass and drinking polluted water to stave off death. By choosing not to resume its financial support for UNRWA during this pivotal time, Canada is intensifying its complicity in potential genocidal acts.

It’s time to reinforce, not weaken the UNRWA. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has urged governments to resume funding, otherwise UNRWA will be forced to shut down operations by the end of February — not only in Gaza, but across the region.

The world is watching, and Canada’s actions now must showcase its commitment to justice, human rights and the rule of law.

Originally published in The Conversation

The post Israel isn’t complying with the International Court of Justice ruling — what happens next? first appeared on NMH.

The suspension of funding by a growing number of Western countries for a United Nations agency for Palestinians has raised questions about the fate of the 5.9 million refugees it serves.

The United States and at least 13 of its allies have pulled funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), following allegations by Israel that some of its staff were involved in Hamas’ October 7 attack, which killed 1,200 and saw more than 250 others taken hostage.

The defunding was announced immediately after the result of near unanimous verdict, the court was convinced that South Africa made a plausible case demonstrating that Israel has displayed the intent to execute genocide.

As a result, the court is required, by international law, to proceed with a full hearing and, ultimately, to render a verdict on the seminal question: Is Israel guilty of the crime of genocide in Gaza? It seems that the defunding whats a knee jerk reaction to further punish Palestinians for resisting the brutal occupation.

The UN’s agency for the welfare of Palestinians – UNRWA – is under massive coordinated attack. Israeli claims about a tiny proportion of staff have been used to justify Western countries pulling the plug on funding – catastrophic collective punishment during a humanitarian disaster.

This man knows the truth – he knows UNRWA inside out. He’s Chris Gunness, who was UNRWA spokesman until 2020 for 14 years. Listening to him is so important – it’s a matter of life and death – as he takes apart the false claims and gives us the truth.

Israel calls for disbanding UNRWA, the United Nations agency that aids Palestinians, after Israel presented unverified evidence that at least 12 UNRWA staffers participated in the Oct. 7 massacre. The information was not shared with UNRWA for verification.

The post Israel Lied About UNWRA first appeared on NMH.