Writing about Israel’s war crimes continues getting harder and harder.
Just as I finish writing this on Day 429 of the Israeli government’s genocidal onslaught in Gaza, another added level of death and destruction will take place at the hands of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
Whether you want to look at the Gaza Health Ministry’s official death toll of over 45,000 Palestinians killed, or The Lancet medical journal’s projected estimate of 186,000 deaths published back in July, the bloodshed and suffering has reached inhumane, unimaginable and senseless levels of misery before our very eyes. Amnesty International just recently concluded that the Israeli government is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.
Let’s remember that when this genocide first began, Israeli ministers, politicians and officials made no secret of their intentions. How can we forget that Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant declared a complete and total siege of food, water and electricity of 2.2 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip that he called “human animals” in his own words? Shall we also reference Israeli President Isaac Herzog stating that “it’s an entire nation that is responsible (for Oct. 7)?”
Keep in mind that over half of this “entire nation” is children. All of this was followed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu referring to Israel’s actions as “a struggle between children of light and children of darkness” in a now-deleted tweet. The words of those respective statesmen represent clear intent to collectively punish the entire Gaza Strip. Nevermind the Israeli government’s baseless claims that Hamas beheaded 40 babies on Oct. 7 among several other lies as a means of justifying the slaughter soon to follow.
With where things now stand, the Israeli government has destroyed or damaged more than half of all homes in Gaza, 80 percent of commercial facilities, 87 percent of school buildings, and over two-thirds of Gaza’s roads and croplands, respectively. More than half of Gaza’s 36 hospitals are out of service after the IDF targeted them, with the other half only barely functioning. Over 100,000 Palestinians are injured and thousands more are missing under the rubble, possibly dead.
That rubble is so deep that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees
said that the dangerous task of clearing Gaza’s rubble could take at least 15 years alone. While the Israeli government claims it minimizes civilian casualties and justifies the death toll by falsely labeling Palestinian deaths as human shields and collateral damage, Israeli soldiers openly document themselves going into Palestinian homes mockingly wearing lingerie, stealing food, setting homes ablaze and celebrating the destruction of civilian and commercial infrastructure.
Claiming that the Israeli government isn’t committing genocide has become a logistical impossibility. The reason why calling this a genocide is appropriate is because the aforementioned statements by Israeli officials and their intentions to pummel Gaza have been backed by the ferocious scale and magnitude of destruction on Palestinian culture that we’ve witnessed based on the projected death toll and statistics.
Furthermore, If the IDF claims that only about 15 percent of Gaza’s 141 square miles is declared “safe,” despite bombing safe zones anyway, that theoretically leaves 2.2 million Palestinians with only 1 square mile for every 110,000 people. If you factor in the space needed for roads, cemeteries, trees and other urban necessities, then that becomes unrealistic.
Israeli leaders are also actively trying to ethnically cleanse over 300,000 Palestinians from Northern Gaza and annex it under a draconian directive called “The General’s Plan.” Even Netanyahu’s former defense minister, Moshe Yaalon, warned that Netanyahu’s government is engaging in ethnic cleansing in North Gaza. Famine is imminent in North Gaza and the last fully functioning hospital in that part of the besieged strip, the Kamal Adwan Hospital, has been repeatedly subjected to bombardment, assaults and killings of staff and medical personnel.
None of these numbers are normal. None of these atrocities are normal. None of these behaviors are normal. Targeting children with snipers, dropping 2,000 pound bombs of tents in safe zones, beheading babies with those bombs, burning people alive with IV needles hooked up to their arms outside of a hospital, intentionally starving an entire population, unearthing mass graves, killing over 120 journalists, bombing humanitarian aid envoys and raping Palestinians on camera in Israeli detention centers is not normal.
Nothing about this genocide is normal.
Every human being with a conscience should be gravely concerned and disgusted by all of this. The disregard for international law and ensuing personal apathy towards Palestinians is a threat to our collective humanity. What becomes of us when we’re able to look away and not treat genocide as a red line? When we as American taxpayers are ok with our government funding at least 70 percent of the cost of Israel’s genocide, we’re allowing for anything to happen to anyone – including ourselves.
Neutrality toward an American-funded genocide is a complicit silent endorsement. Whether or not we like what’s happening, this does concern us. We have a collective responsibility to ensure that we don’t normalize living in a world where this bloodshed is acceptable. Gaza is not some faraway fantasy that only serves as an imaginary horror film. It’s a real apocalypse happening due in part to our learned helplessness that apathy generates.
Feeling helpless and powerless are normal emotions. But we cannot succumb to those feelings. Doing so paves the path for the Israeli government to continue its slaughter uninterrupted. The truth is that if more Americans stood up and did even just the bare minimum to condemn the Israeli government’s crimes, whether that’s through protesting and divesting from Israel, or collectively amplifying Palestinians, more could be done to stop this genocide.
This isn’t to say that there hasn’t been any positive progress towards the Palestinian cause. College encampments across the country have given Palestine visibility once long hidden to the American public. Young Americans have become champions of the cause by breaking the social media algorithms – which explains why Meta is trying to suppress those voices on Facebook and Instagram. Global pressure through UN sanctions and South Africa presenting evidence of Israel’s genocide to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) is helping isolate Israel into a pariah state.
But we have to do more. We must do more. Because what will we tell our children when they ask us why we’re silent in the face of injustice? How do you explain to your child that you love them but don’t see them through 6-year-old Hind Rajab’s body that was murdered with over 335 bullets? Will you choose to selfishly protect your peace or will you channel that righteous rage to save our shared humanity? Choose wisely.
Letting Palestinians die silently means letting our humanity die with us.
Mohammad Ahmad is a Covington, Kentucky, resident and Kentucky native who has lived all over the Commonwealth before planting his roots in Northern Kentucky. A Lexington native and first-generation Palestinian American, Mohammad attended the University of Kentucky and graduated with a degree in Broadcast Journalism. He spent two years working as a sportscaster in Montana and Western Kentucky before moving here to cover the Cincinnati Bengals for cleveland.com.
Now looking for his new career outside of journalism, Mohammad has led the Northern Kentucky for Palestine Coalition and proudly advocates for Palestinian rights and liberation. He also participates in the Kentucky Rural-Urban Exchange Program (RUX) and loves exploring all of the precious gems and treasures that Covington has to offer.
This article appears in Nov 27 – Dec 10, 2024.