{"id":295750,"date":"2025-05-26T12:00:47","date_gmt":"2025-05-26T11:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=295750"},"modified":"2025-05-22T05:20:35","modified_gmt":"2025-05-22T04:20:35","slug":"turning-into-a-global-pariah-israel-starves-and-destroys-gaza","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2025\/05\/turning-into-a-global-pariah-israel-starves-and-destroys-gaza\/","title":{"rendered":"Turning into a Global Pariah Israel Starves and Destroys Gaza"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Demonstrators gather Sunday, 18 May, in The Hague, Netherlands, calling for action from policymakers on Israel.\u00a0 (Phil Nijhuis\/EPA-EFE\/Shutterstock)<\/p><\/div>\n

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21 May 2025 –<\/em> After more than 19 months of a brutal invasion, the patience of some of Israel\u2019s Western allies appears to be running out<\/b>. The renewed offensive on the Gaza Strip launched by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s government has provoked widespread anger and revulsion<\/a>, as governments and humanitarian organizations point to the desperate conditions in the embattled territory. Dozens of Gazans have been killed by Israeli bombardments in recent days, while tens of thousands have been yet again forced to flee within a besieged enclave bereft of shelter and basic infrastructure.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Since the collapse of a brief ceasefire, Israel has impeded the passage of food and humanitarian goods into the territory. The unrelenting blockade has put more than 2 million people at critical risk of famine<\/a>, my colleagues report.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In Brussels, the European Union announced<\/a> it would begin a formal review of its trade accord with Israel, a move backed by what Kaja Kallas, the E.U.\u2019s top diplomat, said was a \u201chuge majority\u201d of the 27-member bloc\u2019s foreign ministers. Britain, too, suspended ongoing free trade talks<\/a> with Israel and levied sanctions on a number of figures associated with Israel\u2019s pro-settler far right.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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On Monday [19 May], a joint statement from the leaders of Britain, France and Canada said \u201cthe level of human suffering in Gaza is intolerable\u201d and threatened Israel with punitive measures if it didn\u2019t relent from its campaign against the remnants of militant group Hamas. Israel\u2019s war \u2014 triggered by Hamas\u2019s Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack on Israel and abduction of hundreds of hostages \u2014 has killed more than 50,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to the local Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but says the majority of the dead are women and children.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cWe will not stand by while the Netanyahu Government pursues these egregious actions,\u201d the joint statement said. \u201cIf Israel does not cease the renewed military offensive and lift its restrictions on humanitarian aid, we will take further concrete actions in response.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy makes a statement on Israel and the war in Gaza in the House of Commons in London on Tuesday. (House of Commons\/AFP\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Facing pressure, Netanyahu\u2019s government signaled that it would allow \u201cminimal\u201d aid into Gaza, <\/b>though U.N. officials on Tuesday stressed that the urgent need was exponentially greater than what Israel seemed willing to permit. Netanyahu, meanwhile, appears compelled to placate his allies in the Israeli far right, who openly call for the destruction and ethnic cleansing<\/a> of Gaza and oppose allowing humanitarian relief to enter the territory.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In a video uploaded to social media Monday, Netanyahu explained<\/a> his decision to let a paltry amount of aid into Gaza was one of optics, saying the Israeli campaign in Gaza \u201ccannot reach a point of starvation, for practical and diplomatic reasons.\u201d The prime minister faces an ongoing investigation for war crimes at the International Criminal Court due in part to Israel\u2019s record of denying vital food aid to Gaza. (Netanyahu has rejected<\/a> the charges.)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Israeli officials insist that the current calls for restraint play into Hamas\u2019s hands. A spokesman for Israel\u2019s foreign ministry, Oren Marmorstein, said Kallas\u2019s remarks reflected \u201ca total misunderstanding of the complex reality Israel is facing.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIgnoring these realities and criticising Israel only hardens Hamas\u2019s position and encourages Hamas to stick to its guns,\u201d he wrote on X.<\/p>\n

TO CONTINUE READING Go to Original – washingtonpost.com<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

21 May 2025 – After more than 19 months of a brutal invasion, the patience of some of Israel\u2019s Western allies appears to be running out amid a renewed Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":295751,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[1854,1199,2242,87,865,1966,88,715,475,427,2159,965],"class_list":["post-295750","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-palestine-israel-gaza-genocide","tag-crimes-against-humanity","tag-ethnic-cleansing","tag-famine","tag-gaza","tag-genocide","tag-hunger","tag-israel","tag-massacre","tag-netanyahu","tag-palestine","tag-rogue-states","tag-war-crimes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295750","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=295750"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295750\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":295753,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295750\/revisions\/295753"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/295751"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=295750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=295750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=295750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}