As early as October 9 top Israeli officials declared that they intended to block the delivery of food, water, and electricity, which is essential for purifying water and cooking. Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s words have become infamous: “I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we act accordingly.” The statement conveyed the view that has seemed to guide Israel’s approach throughout the conflict: that Gazans are collectively complicit for Hamas’s crimes on October 7.
This was my turning point as well, when it became completely obvious that the goal was the direct suffering and punishment of civilians collectively with government officials dehumanizing Palestinians openly. The repeated evacuations to “safe zones” that were then attacked just reinforced this, along with cutting off or murdering journalists to hide the genocide.
Yes, Hamas escalated the situation knowing the Israeli government would retaliate on this level, but that does not justify the IDF taking the bait.
More like “the goal was to get rid of all those filthy animals and raze their territory to get all that delicious free real estate”, but I agree.
good, more and louder.
Excellent article. Poignant and dense with citations. For those who would like to read Aryeh Neier’s full essay, here’s a link that will circumvent the paywall. I highly recommend it.
I think all this is eventually going to backfire on Israel. There’s breaking a bully’s nose in retaliation, and then there’s killing him and chopping him up and setting his pieces on fire, and then burning down the school with everyone in it and, and, and…
It’s like cartman and the chili, except it’s multiple generations of families.
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so, first off, stop with this homogenous ethnostate bullshit, just because someone lives in America and is American doesn’t make them a supporter of genocide
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