It’s November 11, 2023, and the Times of Israel acknowledges that a lot of Gazans have died in the month since the October 7 terrorist attacks. Citing the “Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza,” and rightly arguing that the numbers cannot be confirmed and doubtlessly include Hamas fighters and victims of misfired Hamas rockets, they put the number of dead north of 11,000. That’s not the full report from the ministry, however. There are also allegedly 26,000 who have been injured and more than 3,000 that are missing. That adds up to 40,000.
That is carnage.
But I think the full picture only begins to come into view when you consider the recently issued report from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). It estimates, based on aerial surveillance, that 45 percent of Gaza’s housing units have been damaged or destroyed. The CIA estimates that Gaza began 2023 with a population of 2,098,389, so we can calculate that nearly a million people have had their homes damaged or destroyed in the last five weeks. As of November 5, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) estimated that 70 percent of Gazans had been displaced from their homes.
Now, on Friday, French President Emmanuel Macron went on the BBC and argued that there is “no justification” for Israel’s bombing of “these babies, these ladies, these old people” in Gaza and that there must be a cease fire. “There is no reason for that and no legitimacy. So we do urge Israel to stop.”
In response, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu argued that “Israel is doing everything to refrain from harming civilians.”
I don’t care where you come down on Israel, Gaza and Hamas, it’s very clear that Netanyahu is lying. Maybe you think he’s justified in lying. But you can’t destroy 45 percent of the housing units of a population of 2 million people in a mere five weeks and argue that you are refraining from harming civilians. That’s preposterous.
Now, Netanyahu argues that Hamas is to blame for all this death and damage, and I agree to the extent that they instigated this fight and they are prolonging it by refusing to release the over 200 hostages they’re keeping in holes in the ground. I don’t dispute that Hamas is hiding in bunkers and tunnels under schools, hospitals, mosques and residential buildings. When it comes to assigning blame, Hamas deserves the lion’s share of it.
Having said that, however, it’s very clear to me that Israel is following a very deliberate policy of absolutely wrecking Gaza. For proof of this, I cite Netanyahu himself, who said on October 7 that the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) would turn parts of Gaza’s densely populated urban centers ‘into rubble.” On October 10, Maj. Gen. Ghassan Alian, the Israeli Army’s coordinator of government activities in the territories, stated “Human animals must be treated as such. There will be no electricity and no water. There will only be destruction. You wanted hell, you will get hell.”
Also on October 10, Maj. Gen. Giora Eland, who is admittedly retired, wrote that “The State of Israel has no choice but to turn Gaza into a place that is temporarily or permanently impossible to live in. Creating a severe humanitarian crisis in Gaza is a necessary means to achieving the goal.” He later wrote that “Gaza will become a place where no human being can exist.”
Writing in the Washington Post, Ishaan Tharoor proposes that Israel is following something called the “Dahiya Doctrine.”
The so-called “Dahiya Doctrine” took shape in the wake of the bruising 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Dahiya refers to the southern Beirut suburbs where Hezbollah maintained its strongholds and which were pummeled by Israeli jets after hostilities began when Hezbollah fighters abducted two Israeli soldiers…
…The doctrine that emerged out of the conflict was most famously articulated by IDF commander Gadi Eisenkot. “We will wield disproportionate power against every village from which shots are fired on Israel, and cause immense damage and destruction.
The philosophy behind this strategy was articulated in a paper former Israeli colonel Gabriel Siboni wrote for Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies.
…the necessary response to militant provocations from Lebanon, Syria or Gaza were “disproportionate” strikes that aim only secondarily to hit the enemy’s capacity to launch rockets or other attacks. Rather, the goal should be to inflict lasting damage, no matter the civilian consequences, as a future deterrent.
“With an outbreak of hostilities, the IDF will need to act immediately, decisively, and with force that is disproportionate to the enemy’s actions and the threat it poses,” he wrote. “Such a response aims at inflicting damage and meting out punishment to an extent that will demand long and expensive reconstruction processes.”
When you consider these ideas, it makes more sense that almost half the housing in Gaza has been damaged or destroyed since October 7. It’s well beyond the point of a “long and expensive reconstruction process” already. It’s approaching the point where Gaza is “a place where no human being can exist.”
It’s not just the housing and destruction of infrastructure. There’s no water. There’s no food. There’s no electricity. And, increasingly, there are no medical facilities or supplies. All of this makes living impossible.
Now, Hamas brought this upon the Palestinian people, and they continue to hold hostages which provides Israel with justification for fighting into the heart of Gaza City. If they cared about their people, they would do something to stop it.
But the bigger problem is that they shattered Israel’s sense of security. The Israelis thought they could live next to Gaza and manage the security risk. They no longer believe this. That’s why calls for a cease fire are unrealistic. Israel isn’t going to stop while their people are still held underground and while Hamas is still launching rockets at them. Israel isn’t going to be satisfied until there are no more rockets and there is no imminent threat of cross-border raids.
How can the international community accelerate the process by which that security is reached? To begin with, by getting the hostages released. But then something else needs to be created. It has to police Gaza. It has to reconstruct Gaza. It has to lead to a political autonomy for Palestinians.
If can’t be Fatah or the Palestinian Authority. It has to be an international force.
As for America, figuring this out is urgent, because we can’t be a party to what Israel is doing. It’s immoral and bad for our national security, and it’s ultimately bad for Israel, too. Above all, Netanyahu needs to go. His policies brought this ruin on both Israel and Palestine, and he cannot be a partner or a leader for peace.
Year 72 of the slow-motion genocide continues as planned.
Nothing to see here, folks.
I despair at how useless the world agencies are as this evil display of destruction of human life plays out, as if Palestinians are not even worth considering and out elected House of Representatives censor the only elected Palestinian serving there. Even she is not considered human for her pain oozing from her heritage. br
Israel needs to get their foot off the collective Palestinian neck. Where it has been for 80+ yrs. Then there will not be a Hamas.
“How can the international community accelerate the process by which that security is reached? To begin with, by getting the hostages released. But then something else needs to be created. It has to police Gaza. It has to reconstruct Gaza. It has to lead to a political autonomy for Palestinians.”
I am glad that Martin is putting forward some ideas for how to avoid more bloodshed. I don’t have any answers myself, but I do have questions.
I agree with Martin that hostage release is of paramount importance to Israel, and the international community has apparently played a role in negotiations for the few that have been released so far. Bur hostage release is, I think, not the only consideration. The danger posed by Hamas must also be dealt with. Netanyahu’s government, asleep at the switch, ignored the danger Hamas posed and Oct. 7 is the result. There can be no effective international military or police presence in Gaza without first disarming Hamas, otherwise it would be Falluja 2.0. And Hamas is not going to go away gently. How can Hamas be disarmed without Israel doing what it is doing now? It seems to me that the army must go house to house, under and through the buildings, into the tunnels. Of course there will be terrible casualties among civilians trapped between the forces, even when one side at least *tries* to minimize them, but what is the alternative?
The allies in WWII had to make similar horrible compromises, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians across Europe and in Japan in order to defeat the fascist threat. Will the result in the case of Israel and Palestine be a continuation of the seemingly unending cycle of violence? Maybe, maybe not. Germany and Japan today are better places than they were, and they could only get there after complete defeat of the fascists, and a rebuilding and reeducation of their societies. I don’t know whether thats possible in the Middle east, but could there be any path forward towards peace that leaves Hamas in place? Could there have been such a path forward after WWII with the Nazis still in power in Germany? (Yes, this is just the sort of thing the US tried in Iraq and Afghanistan. Maybe Israel can do better? Why did it work in Germany and Japan? And BTW I have no confidence that Netanyahu is the man to carry this program forward. But once the fighting is over, I expect him and his cronies to be ejected if not imprisoned for their gross incompetence and corruption leading up to Oct. 7.)
My father and his sisters (barely) lived through the pogroms of Eastern Europe in the early 1920s, before they and their friends were able to escape to Canada and Israel. My aunt lived her life with a scar across her face, a present from a Cossack sword. Escape was their only option as they and their friends had no power to resist the Polish and White Russian army’s depredations. Now, for the first time in many decades, we have seen another pogrom on a similar scale, unleashed by Hamas on an unsuspecting population. But there is nowhere to escape for Israel when Hamas comes again, as they have promised to do. So Israel is going to fight, what choice do they have?
Despite the security problem, Israel has choices, and it’s making choices. One choice is not to focus narrowly on dismantling Hamas but more broadly on making Gaza a place where people cannot live. But there’s a day after tomorrow, and I can’t see how this ends well for anyone.
Palestine is so fragmented now I don’t see how this will end well either.
This reminds me of the Netflix series Fauda. However, unlike Fauda it is not releasing only one hostage, and even in that case, it had terrible consequences!
As Gandhi said “An eye for an eye will leave the world blind”.
President Carter is going to pass possibly within 24hrs of Rossalyn. I read his book Peace not Apartheid. This will resonate through the left. The pressure is going to increase on Netanyahu and Israel in all facets of this nightmare. Present and Future. I may be wrong but I’m feeling a bit of emotion.
Despite security challenges, Israel is making choices, opting not just to address issues with Hamas but to improve living conditions in Gaza. Looking ahead, the situation seems uncertain, and it’s hard to see a positive outcome for everyone involved.