As I write this blog on Sunday November 5th, the situation in Gaza is increasingly tragic and heartbreaking.
Israel’s massive bombing campaign on this totally defenseless population continues, wiping out families, destroying communities, and repeatedly collapsing Gaza’s telecommunications infrastructure, leaving residents under siege unable to call for help, keep in touch with relatives, or communicate with the outside world.
Some of the targets are indefensible. For example, many completely innocent individuals have been killed or injured in recent bombings of a number of refugee camps, an ambulance convoy and a United Nations school which was reportedly sheltering displaced women and children.
Food is scarce and starvation is widespread. The healthcare system is crumbling and Gaza’s entire society is now collapsing.
Israel has finally and reluctantly agreed to permit a limited number of humanitarian aid trucks to enter Gaza through the Rafah border crossing with Egypt. However Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues to resist international pressure for a temporary cease-fire to allow more relief and supplies to reach Gaza’s residents.
At present, only limited food supplies and medicines are allowed to enter. Desperately needed fuel supplies are banned, critically leaving hospitals with generators unable to function and electrical equipment such as incubators shutting down.
Since the beginning of the hostilities, the Israeli bombardment has resulted in the deaths of at least 4,008 children and a reported total death toll of 9,770, This total grows daily. The only way now to bury the dead is in mass graves.
The Israel/Gaza war is also impacting the situation in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where Palestinian residents are increasingly fearing settler attacks, and in recent days, Israeli raids at three refugee camps there have killed ten Palestinians, while Lebanese Hezbollah forces are bombing border areas in Israel. There is a real risk that major conflict will explode in this region.
The conflict is also reverberating across the Middle East. Fears are growing that this war may spread to other countries.
In 2006, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter published a book titled Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, which spoke directly and frankly about what Israel was doing to Palestinians and his recommendations to resolve the situation. Sadly, his analysis fell on deaf ears and since then, conditions in Gaza and the West Bank have only worsened.
For more information and my comments on the Israeli treatment of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, you can read my blogs from May 22nd, 2021, June 25th 2021, January 14th 2023 to give some background, and October17th, October 26th, and November 1st about the current war.
As I have advocated repeatedly, we must all do everything possible to bring pressure to bear on all governments — particularly our own federal government — to publicly call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
And this blog would not be complete without me congratulating the very honest and brave Ontario MPP Sarah Jama, who has been expelled from the Ontario NDP after she posted a controversial statement on social media, calling for a cease-fire and criticizing Israeli actions without mentioning the actions of Hamas.
Daily atmospheric CO2 [Courtesy of CO2.Earth]
Latest daily total (November 7, 2023): 419.18ppm
One year ago (November 8, 2022): 416.64ppm
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