Al Jazeera English: “One year of Israel’s war on Gaza – what you need to know”
Excerpt from Transcript:
Let’s talk about one year of war in Gaza. For Palestinians, it has been 12 months of unprecedented loss and suffering. Living here in Gaza feels like being trapped in a never-ending cycle of trauma.
Everything you hear or see about Gaza is just the tip of the iceberg. No photo or video can convey the smell of death, the sound of 24/7 drones, or the uncertainty of whether you or your family will make it through another day. This uncertainty hangs over every moment of each day. The number of journalists killed, medical workers killed, schools destroyed, and the percentage of amputated children make this the worst war in modern history.
A lot has happened since October 7th, 2023, so I am going to run you through some of the main updates on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, what’s going on with the Israeli captives, what’s going on with Hamas, and where things are at with the ceasefire.
Let’s start with the human cost in Gaza. Remember, we are talking about a tiny strip of land densely packed with more than 2 million people who cannot leave, where Israel has dropped thousands of bombs. More than 40,000 people have been killed according to Gaza’s health ministry. It recently published a list naming more than 30,000 of the dead. The list is 649 pages long. The first 13 pages are all babies under one. It is not until page 215 that you see the name of an adult. This year has been a relentless cycle of loss: loss of loved ones, loss of homes, and loss of livelihoods.
Right now, the UN’s highest court is deciding whether Israel’s actions in Gaza amount to genocide—an accusation Israel rejects. Gaza has been devastated by Israel’s bombing. By May 2024, more than half of all of Gaza’s buildings had been damaged or destroyed according to the UN. Thousands of residential buildings, roads, farmlands, mosques, churches, hospitals, universities, and schools have been destroyed. The landscape is totally decimated and destroyed. Nearly everyone in Gaza, 90% of the population, has been forced to leave their home. Many people have had to pack up and move over and over again, living in bombed-out buildings, tents, and out in the streets.
The Israeli military has issued dozens of evacuation orders telling civilians to go to so-called safe zones while it says it goes after Hamas fighters. But even those zones are coming under fire. Humanitarian agencies say nowhere in Gaza is safe. Daylight gives you a sense of the power that came from the air. Israel says it targeted various Hamas field commanders, but what that means is that Israel targeted a camp for the internally displaced. Their tarp or tents have no protection against Israel’s military might. Israel deemed this a safe zone, but it was not. In September, at least 19 people were killed. Time and time again, we have seen Israel justifying massacres in order to pursue the alleged killing of militants. But by this token, Israel is given license to kill everyone in Gaza by simply claiming it was to kill a Hamas member. This is indecent and beyond unlawful.
So what is happening with aid delivery? Remember, at the start of the war Israel imposed a complete siege on Gaza. Israel has been accused of using starvation as a weapon of war, including by the UN’s special rapporteur on the right to food. In a report to the UN General Assembly, he said Israel made its intentions to starve everyone in Gaza explicit. Then Israel used starvation to induce forcible transfer, harm, and death against people in the north, pushing people into the south only to starve, bombard, and kill people in newly created refugee camps in the south. Around half a million people are facing catastrophic levels of food insecurity. In other words, they are facing famine. In August, an average of just 69 aid trucks entered Gaza per day, which is a record low. Aid groups say Israel is blocking 83% of the required food aid from reaching Gaza.
On top of all that, disease is spreading because there is not enough clean water. The lack of clean water has led to 1.7 million cases of infectious diseases that can trigger massive and deadly epidemics, making water scarcity and contamination a silent bomb, far less visible than those that destroy buildings but no less lethal. The risk of disease is coupled with a desperate lack of medical care. Doctors Without Borders says Gaza’s healthcare system is being methodically dismantled through Israeli attacks, the blocking of aid, and the lack of protection for medical staff. Before the war, Gaza had 36 hospitals. Now just 17 are partially functioning according to the UN. It feels like people are waiting for death. Death seems to be the only certainty in this situation. That is a horrific reality for people on the ground here.
Now for Israelis, one of the biggest concerns since Hamas’s attack in October last year when more than a thousand people were killed has been the fate of the captives. 251 Israelis and foreigners were taken by Hamas and other groups into Gaza. 117 have gotten out alive through a prisoner swap, Israeli Army operations, or because Hamas released them. The bodies of 37 captives have been recovered and returned to Israel. Some of them were killed by Israeli forces, according to various reports. In August, Israeli soldiers located the bodies of six captives in a Hamas tunnel. Israel accused Hamas of killing them. Hamas said it held Israel responsible because it had refused to sign a ceasefire deal. 97 captives remain unaccounted for.
There have been protests in Israel led by some of the captives’ families, calling on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to agree to a ceasefire that would save their loved ones. The incident in August when six captives were found dead triggered the biggest protest so far. The life of more than 100 Israelis—men, women, young girls—their lives are not the first priority of the Israeli government. This makes you think, where are they taking us? Where are they taking the Israeli people, Jews and Arabs? Despite the big street protests, Netanyahu looks pretty secure politically. A poll in May showed that 39% of Israelis thought the government’s military response against Hamas in Gaza had been about right, and 34% thought it had not gone far enough.
What about Hamas? Israel has always said the aim of its war is to eliminate the group. Twelve months on, that has not happened. Israel has said that it killed a senior Hamas commander, Muhammad Dief, in July, although Hamas says he is still alive. Then, Hamas’s political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, was assassinated in Iran. Most people think Israel was behind it. Hamas’s military leader, Yahya Sinwar, has replaced Haniyeh. Sinwar is thought to be in Gaza. When it comes to Hamas’ fighting capability, we do not have exact numbers on things like ammunition or the number of fighters they’ve lost. Before the war, Israeli officials estimated that Hamas had around 30,000 fighters. Recently, the Israeli Army said it had killed 17,000 fighters but gave no details about how it arrived at that number. Hamas itself has not released any figures but says it still has the capacity to keep up the fight.
We do not really know the details of what condition Hamas is in. They have been very good at hiding their abilities or the damage done to them. But clearly, Hamas has been damaged. You cannot sustain a year of the most intense aerial bombing in modern history and come out totally intact. But they are still fighting and carrying out operations in Gaza.
Where do things stand with the ceasefire deal? Remember, Israel and Hamas are not speaking directly to each other. The U.S., along with mediators from Qatar and Egypt, are driving the negotiations. In late May, U.S. President Joe Biden presented a three-stage ceasefire plan. It involved Israeli forces withdrawing from Gaza and all the captives eventually being released in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. The final stage was ending the war and reconstructing Gaza. At the time, Hamas said they would agree if Israel did, but Netanyahu said he would not sign up to a deal that included a permanent end to the war. Since then, there have been more negotiations, and another obstacle has emerged. This is the Philadelphia Corridor. Netanyahu started insisting that Israeli troops should remain in a strip of land along Gaza’s southern border with Egypt, known as the Philadelphia Corridor, which Hamas is against. All this makes the prospect of a ceasefire anytime soon look increasingly slim. In early September, the U.S. Secretary of State said a deal was 90% there, but a recent report in the Wall Street Journal quotes U.S. officials saying they no longer believe a deal is likely before the end of Joe Biden’s presidency in January.
Now the backdrop is even more fraught with what is going on in Lebanon and the escalation in the fight between Israel and Hezbollah which is an ally of Hamas. Israel’s bombing campaign and ground offensive in Lebanon have displaced one million Lebanese people, about a fifth of the population. More than 2,000 people have been killed, including hundreds of women and children, and several Hezbollah commanders.
I need to bring you some breaking news. The Israeli Army has officially announced that it has killed the head of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah. This is probably the most significant point that could represent a very high likelihood of a major escalation. Unfortunately, this means we are in a likely scenario of an even worse level of warfare and escalation than we have seen over the last almost 12 months since October 7th.
One year into the Gaza war, the outlook is really bleak. Unless something big changes, it is hard to see where the answers will come from. People need to know that Gaza is more than just a war zone. It is home to over 2 million people trying to survive amid unbearable conditions. We are resilient, but we are not superheroes, and we need the world’s help to end this suffering.
One of the big features of this war has been the role of international law. We have explained how it works and why some people feel the whole system is failing the people of Gaza and elsewhere.
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