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Here's a summary of some of the latest developments in Gaza and the West Bank, and we'll also share some reportage highlights from the electronic Andaas contributors there.
Israel is tightening the noose around Palestinians by forcibly transferring them into an increasingly narrow area, no more than 10% of the Gaza Strip. Even before the war, the Gaza Strip was one of the most densely populated places in the world, with 2.3 million Palestinians, two-thirds of them refugees from areas conquered by Zionist forces in 1948, concentrated in 141 square miles. Since October, 2% of Gaza's population has been killed, injured, or gone missing, but nearly everyone has been displaced, many multiple times.
The government media office in Gaza published a timeline demonstrating how Israeli evacuation orders, beginning in November, have forced Palestinians from the north of the territory to the south, under the threat of death, pushing much of the population to a so-called humanitarian zone along the coast of southern Gaza. Since August 16th, the Israeli Army has issued at least five evacuation orders directly directing Palestinians in central Gaza, primarily in the town of Deir al-Balah, to flee to an ever-shrinking area of the Gaza Strip.
On Sunday, patients, staff, and displaced families inside and around the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah picked up what they could and fled. Dr. Muhammad Al-Nair, a doctor in the Intensive Care Unit at the hospital, posted this photo of himself in the ICU on Sunday, saying that this was the last photo of the unit and that patients will be left to inevitably die, as there are no doctors or nurses. He added, "Please, anyone who can see this post, do anything to stop this genocide. I will not leave the hospital." Physicians caring for premature newborn babies in the hospital had to delicately evacuate them to nearby medical facilities that have been bombed, besieged, and attacked by Israeli forces over the last 10 months and rebuilt to be at least partially functional by Palestinians.
The Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza stated on Monday that despite the panic that Israel's order caused among patients, who are fearful that Israel would repeat the procedure of storming and attacking Al-Aqsa Hospital as it has done to every other hospital in Gaza, the ministry would continue to operate and that there were still approximately 100 patients inside the hospital, seven of whom were in intensive care. Three leading Palestinian rights groups—Al-Haq, the Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights, and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights—stated on Tuesday that along with the five displacement orders over the last two weeks in central Gaza, Israel has issued nine other orders "targeting various areas of Khan Younis and an additional four orders for southern Gaza."
Samir Zaqout, Al-Mezan's deputy director, who is displaced in central Gaza, stated, "Israel's continued cycle of forced displacement has left the people of Gaza with nowhere to go. The so-called safe humanitarian area, which is neither safe nor humanitarian, covers only about 11% of Gaza. There is no space left for new tents, and some people have been displaced up to 15 times. Additionally, there is no transportation available to move around. People are in a state of panic and fear, unsure of what to do or where to go. We are all waiting for the next displacement order, wondering when it will come and where people will be forced to go next."
The rights groups say that the recent displacement orders in and around Deir al-Balah are having a devastating impact on humanitarian operations on the ground. Following the Israeli displacement order affecting Rafah in May, the groups add, most UN agencies and international NGOs relocated their operational centers and staff to Deir al-Balah. Consequently, the UN and various international NGOs were forced to vacate their operational centers, significantly disrupting their ability to provide essential support and services on the ground.
From Deir al-Balah, the UN announced on Monday that it was being forced to halt all of its humanitarian aid operations in Gaza because of the displacement orders. Speaking on condition of anonymity, a senior UN official told the Reuters news agency that, "We're unable to deliver today with the conditions that we're in. We're not leaving Gaza because the people need us there. We're trying to balance the need of the population with the need for safety and security of the UN personnel. Where do we move now?" The official told Reuters that UN staff had to be moved so quickly that equipment was left behind.
This comes as the UN prepares to vaccinate 640,000 Palestinian children against the polio virus, which has already paralyzed a 10-month-old baby, the first case in 25 years. The aforementioned Palestinian human rights groups say that "over a million children are at risk of contracting polio. The delay in the vaccination campaign due to Israel's displacement orders highlights the trend of weaponizing previously eradicated, highly infectious diseases as a tool of genocide. This strategy deliberately uses such diseases to inflict permanent disability or death on Palestinian residents of Gaza."
Meanwhile, Israeli forces attacked areas across the Gaza Strip this past week, including in Gaza City in the north, Deir al-Balah, Nuseirat, and Bureij refugee camps in the center, and Khan Younis and Rafah in the south. Early this morning, Israeli forces also attacked the Jabalia refugee camp in the north, targeting homes while people were sleeping. Images and video on social media, which I will not display here, show children once again torn to shreds during and since Sunday's displacement orders. On dead Israeli airstrikes, tanks, and armed drones have continuously attacked people in the city.
Our contributor Abu Bakr Abed said on Tuesday that along with airstrikes, Israeli tanks and bulldozers have been destroying and demolishing homes in the eastern part of the city for days. Due to the ongoing military operations, about 85% of the water wells in Deir al-Balah are nonfunctional, according to the UN, making it harder for people to meet their basic needs.
This past week, Abu Bakr wrote a piece for the electronic Intifada about the killing of a teenager by an Israeli sniper in February. I'll read from that now:
"Abdul Karim Omar Al-Ramlawi had just turned 18 years old. He always dressed well in jeans and jackets, and he dreamed of going to university to study mechatronics. He loved riding motorcycles and playing and watching soccer. He supported Real Madrid and considered his favorite player to be Luka Modric, a legend of the game, and would frequently praise him. He was also a pet lover, especially cats. At school, he told jokes to his classmates and studied during breaks. After school, he helped his father at the nylon factory and would run errands for his mother. He loved befriending and helping all," said Hassan Al-Ramlawi, Abdul Karim's cousin. "He was so ambitious and passionate; everybody cherished him."
"In February, the family lived through 12 days of relentless attacks by Israeli occupation forces in their rental home in West Gaza City. 'Our days were filled with panic and death,' said Khalil, Abdul Karim's brother. 'Drones buzzed over our heads, Israeli tanks relentlessly bombed around us, and F-16 warplanes randomly leveled houses.' Amid these 12 days of Israeli attacks, the morning of February 8th was especially bleak and freezing. Al-Khalil recalls that he and Abdul Karim had woken up early for Fajr, or Dawn prayers, in their home. Afterward, around 9:00 a.m., Khalil said Abdul Karim approached a window. 'He wanted to look from the window to see if the Israeli forces withdrew or not,' said Khalil. Once he approached the window, a sniper on a tank shot him. Two bullets pierced his chest and head. As he was taking his final breaths, he raised his finger and pointed to me to tell me not to come over.' Khalil took cover from the sniper's bullets, but the sniper kept firing. 'The sniper was shooting him for fun,' he said. 'There was like a blood fountain around him.' Hours passed, and each time the family tried to go to Abdul Karim, Israeli snipers would fire their weapons. As my younger brother Ahmed and I got close to pull him, a bomb blew up the room, and a bullet hit Abdul Karim's chest again,' he said. 'Minutes later, a quadcopter came to make sure he was killed, even though he was clearly dead. The quadcopter shot his corpse nonstop.'"
That's from Abu Bakr Abed's latest feature, "The sniper was shooting him for fun," on electronic Intifada.net.
Israel has killed at least three more journalists this week in Gaza. The Gaza government media office stated on Tuesday that reporter Ali Naif Taima was killed on Tuesday in an airstrike on Al-Maghazi, west of Khan Younis. Reporter Hussam Al-Baka was killed last Thursday along with his wife and children when Israel bombed their home in the Maghazi refugee camp. And early this morning, Israel killed journalist Muhammad Abu Abed in a bombing of a residential building in Nuseirat camp in the central Gaza Strip. More than 170 Palestinian journalists have been killed by Israel since October.
Human Rights Watch published a report this week documenting the systematic torture and abuse of Palestinian healthcare workers in Gaza since October. According to the group, released doctors, nurses, and paramedics described to Human Rights Watch their mistreatment in Israeli custody, including humiliation, beatings, forced stress positions, prolonged cuffing and blindfolding, and denial of medical care. They also reported torture, including rape and sexual abuse by Israeli forces, denial of medical care, and poor detention conditions for the general detainee population. After being taken from Gaza, the health workers told Human Rights Watch that they were then deported to detention facilities in Israel, including the Sde Teiman military base in the Negev desert and Ashkelon prison, or forcibly transferred to the Anatot military base near East Jerusalem and the Ofer Detention Facility in the occupied West Bank.
"All said that they were stripped, beaten, and blindfolded and handcuffed for many weeks on end and pressured to confess to being members of the Hamas movement with various threats of indefinite detention, rape, and killing their families in Gaza." One paramedic said that when soldiers removed his blindfold at the Sde Teiman facility, he saw that he was in a large building like a warehouse with chains hanging from the ceiling. Dozens of detainees in diapers were suspended from the ceiling with the chains attached to their square metal handcuffs. He said that personnel at the facility then suspended him from a chain so his feet were not touching the ground, dressed him in a garment and a headband that were attached to wires, and shocked him with electricity.
My colleague Tamar Nassar will be publishing an extensive report on the systemic torture inflicted on Palestinians inside Israeli prisons and concentration camps. Please look out for that this week on electronic Intifada.net.
Turning to the occupied West Bank, Israeli settlers killed 37-year-old Al-Salim Zada and injured at least six other Palestinians during a pogrom targeting the village of Wad Rahal near Bethlehem on Monday night. It was one of several settler pogroms this week. The Wafa news agency reported that Israeli settlers assaulted Palestinian farmers in Al-Mughayyir village, also near Bethlehem, on Tuesday. The head of the village council said that approximately 150 armed Israeli settlers attacked the farmers and opened fire on them. Later on in the evening, a Palestinian man was injured in an attack by Israeli settlers south of Nablus. Wafa news agency says that settlers pelted Palestinian cars with stones close to a checkpoint, hitting a man in the head.
On Monday, Israeli forces, using an armed drone, struck a house and killed five Palestinians, including two children, in the Nur Shams refugee camp near Tulkarm. In the pre-dawn hours of this morning, the Israeli Army launched a widespread military offensive across the northern West Bank, targeting areas of resistance in Jenin, Tubas, and Tulkarm. As of this report, at least 10 Palestinians have been reported killed since the raids began.
Early on Wednesday, Wafa news agency reports that Palestinian fighters were assassinated in Jenin, and two others were killed and several others were injured following a drone strike by Israeli occupation forces on the Far'a refugee camp south of Tubas. Israeli forces have been preventing ambulances from accessing wounded people and obstructing rescue operations. The Palestine Red Crescent Society stated earlier today that Israeli forces also detained medical teams in Far'a camp and prevented them from using communication devices. They also fired shots inside the medical point and assaulted the director of the Tulkarm Emergency Center. The medical group stated that in Jenin, the Jenin Governmental Hospital was blocked by Israeli soldiers, preventing medical teams and ambulances from entering and/or leaving the hospital.
And finally, we wanted to bring you some images and videos from journalists and others in Gaza that highlight the resilience, joy, and determination of the Palestinian people. Journalist Hussam Shabat, who is still reporting from the north of Gaza, posted this video of an initiative he's part of to build and distribute small carts to sell food or other essentials in order for people to support their families.
Members of the Gaza Sunbirds Paras cycling team shot this video of their new project in a camp for displaced people. They say, "Welcome to our humble barbershop. Hygiene has been tough recently with little water, no soap, and no chances for a trim. But we were able to set up a popup barbershop in our camp. We try our best to cherish joyous moments together whenever we can."
And that's it for the news roundup. As always, go to electronic Intifada.net for much more, especially to read our new features by our brave writers in Gaza.