THIS WAS NOT AN ACCIDENT

I couldn’t write about this yesterday because I was too apoplectic. I’m still apoplectic today.

THIS WAS NOT AN ACCIDENT.

That was the initial claim of the Israeli government.

This claim was challenged in the Guardian today in an article which (based on reporting in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz) states: “an Israeli drone fired three missiles, one after the other, at the convoy of three armoured cars – all of which were clearly marked on the roof and sides with the WCK’s logo – because of a suspicion that an armed militant was travelling with them”. A suspicion? Fuck you. 

This Haaretz headline is, I am sure, closer to the truth.

I’ve said it before and now I’m saying it again: The Israeli Defense Force is the best armed terrorist organisation on the planet.

A miniscule fraction of the humanitarian needs of the people of Gaza is allowed past IDF check points with the vast majority of aid trucks turned back for the most spurious reasons. (The list of what is and isn’t allowed in on trucks changes daily and without warning.)

The nice PR effort by the United States and others to air drop humanitarian supplies is woefully inefficient and wholly inadequate to meet the needs of a desperate and starving population. (In an interview I watched on BBC yesterday, a representative of Médecins Sans Frontières said doctors working in Gaza’a devastated healthcare facilities are now forced to decide whether to treat seriously wounded citizens or badly malnourished children.)

Biden, in his state of the union address, promised to build a port and send aid in by sea. God knows when that project will ever see the light of day. In the meantime, World Central Kitchen started doing the job. The seven WCK workers killed on Monday were attempting to deliver part of the 400 tonnes of food (enough to provide one million meals) and supplies which arrived on WCK-organised ships on Monday. This operation has now, and hardly surprisingly, been suspended as so many other aid operations have been before. 

Since last October 200 aid workers have been killed by Israeli air strikes. Most of them (including one of the WCK volunteers on Monday) were Palestinian. Hundreds of healthcare workers have been killed. And the list of innocent Palestinians slaughtered is now over 30,000 – mostly women and children.

The object of the exercise couldn’t be more blatant. It is to empty Gaza of its Palestinian population. Kill indiscriminately, starve and make the strip completely uninhabitable for the inhabitants who manage to survive this reign of terror.

SEND IN THE FUCKING MARINES.

Seriously. Fill US military trucks with all the aid others cannot get in and tell them to crash the fucking border. Let the IDF try to explain attacking the US military.

Of course this won’t happen. But it bloody well should.