Day 600

It’s been 600 days since Hamas and other resistance groups in Gaza broke through the fence that keeps them in Gaza, and returned to Gaza with more than 200 Israeli and foreign national as hostages.

About 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals died that day, which is horrific number on the Israeli side – a number that was unfathomable. It has become clear that Israel killed many of those 1,200 people, many of who were civilians, as they enacted the Hannibal Doctrine which allows Israelis forces to fire on on their own solders and civilians in order to prevent soldiers and civilians falling into enemy hands.

We’ll never know exactly how many of the 1,200 were killed by Israel. We do know that at this point, more than 50,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza by Israeli forces. The number may be several times higher, because only bodies who have been identified are counted, but not the thousands buried under the rubble or crushed to death beyond recognition. More than 75% of the Palestinians killed are officially woman and children. More than half of Gaza’s population is under the age of 18. Israel is waging a war on children.

All elements of life have been targeted and destroyed in Gaza. Schools, colleges, hospitals, mosques, churches, and every other element of society. Israel has been accused of targeting hospitals and medical workers and journalists, as well as scholasticide and genocide. Israel succeeded, with the help of the United States, to defund UNRWA, the UN Refugee of War Agency responsible for providing the basic education, healthcare, and food, that, as the occupying power Israel has a responsibility to provide to the people of Gaza. Since the last ceasefire, designed in Israel’s favor to allow the release of hostages, collapsed in February of this year Israel has prevented food, fuel, or anything else to be allowed into Gaza over the last two and a half months.

Efforts to outsource the distribution of food to U.S. paramilitary forces is ongoing while it’s estimated that thousands of Palestinians will starve to death.

In response to the humanitarian situation in Gaza, the UN Office of the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) issued a statement about Israel’s obligations under international law.