The images of a child with a skeletal structure currently pouring from Gaza are shocking, but not surprising. Humanitarian groups with decades of experience since Israel began washing away aid have been warning about this scenario for months.
Unforgettable footage of a vibrant body with sharp bones that penetrate the extended skin can be seen all over the world. Gaza’s star pics are horrifying, painful and inevitable.
A major UN agency for Palestinians said Thursday that “people are hungry, but supermarkets a few kilometres away are packed with food.”
On this week’s popular US-Canadian podcast, listeners learned that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prefers Burger King over McDonald’s. Netanyahu did not introduce the topic, but the public debate on fast food by the person in charge of putting food into Gaza is deaf in its most generous tone.
A US correspondent for Israeli newspaper Haaretz noted that Netanyahu “had “expended valuable time” on hamburger chats rather than answering legitimate questions about Gaza’s humanitarian crisis and delays in hostage trade and ceasefire.
World leaders see the same hunger photos as everyone else, but stopping them seems helpless.
It is true that criticism is becoming more collective and targeted. More than 20 European foreign ministers jointly criticised Israel’s “drips of aid and inhuman murders of civilians,” and Israel’s Foreign Ministry was rejected, saying it was “separated from reality.”
Over 100 international humanitarian organisations warn Israel’s restrictions on aid are putting the lives of physicians and aid workers at risk.
But these are words, and words can be ignored.
Writing about the EU’s response, former Israeli hostage negotiator Gershon Baskin said it was “still a piece of paper. The trash can of history is how Israeli state handles it.”
So, what can reverse what the UN chief calls Gaza’s “horror show”?
In a nutshell, it’s Trump.
The US president had publicly scathed Netanyahu when Israel ravaged Iran in the last hour before the ceasefire. After the call, Israel was pulled back.
When Israel struck Gaza’s only Catholic church, Trump had no “positive response” called Netanyahu, according to the White House. The Israeli leader said he deeply regretted it and called the strike a mistake.
An infuriating call from leaders in the free world appears to be the quickest way to induce a change of heart from leaders who appear to be in motion by increasing international criticism.
A White House spokesman said Trump “want to end the murders” but that visible anger, frustration and criticism from the US president over the humanitarian crisis is at least publicly minimal.
The US focus has been on securing ceasefires and hostage deals, but despite words of hope and optimism from the Trump administration in recent weeks, it is still elusive.
Arab leaders denounced Israel, sought an immediate ceasefire, devised plans to rebuild postwar Gaza, and countered plans to drive Trump’s entire population off the strip. The Gulf Cooperation Council’s executive director this week called Israeli policy “crimes of the century.”
Israel has long rejected accusations of humanitarian blockade, claiming that its policy was designed to prevent Hamas from stealing supplies, aid agencies have refused.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog, who visited Gaza on Wednesday, says Israel is observing international law and it is Hamas that is trying to hamper the aid process.
Cogat, the agency responsible for aid to Gaza, says the military is “working to allow and promote the transfer of aid, including food.”
Israel also pushed the phone back to allow more assistance. They say there are trucks waiting to be collected at the border by aid agencies. The United Nations and others on earth have rebutted that Israel does not always grant permission to move aid or approve routes deemed dangerous.
Comments from the far right of Netanyahu’s Union seeking starving Gaza until the hostages are released.
Hamas’ brutal attack on October 7, 2023 killed around 1,200 Israelis and was lured as about 250 hostages, reinforcing Israel’s views on its Palestinian neighbors. However, recent polls show that 71% of Israelis asked to end the war.
Netanyahu has lost his mission to continue the fight, but there are no indications of plans for his coalition to ease the restrictions on aid to Gaza, where nearly 60,000 people have been killed since the start of the war. And Israeli media is focusing on concerns about the remaining hostages and soldiers fighting in Gaza rather than in the light of the besieged Palestinians. For them, hope now rests on a ceasefire. This is a transaction that allows for flooding of supplies into devastated territory.
But it is agreed to how quickly it opens up to life-saving aid, and how many will die in the meantime?
Malnutrition tolls have been rising recently this week as directors at Alsifa Hospital warned that they were “towards a horrific death.”
The UN workers on earth added, “The Gaza people are not dead (and are alive), they are walking their bodies.”
