Israel deploys water and starvation as weapons as it resumes its genocidal campaign
What a way to negotiate! Rather than engaging in talks about how to implement Phase II of the ‘temporary ceasefire’ agreement that calls for the return of the remaining 59 or so hostages and the full removal of Israeli troops from Gaza, Israel has demanded that Hamas immediately release all the hostages in an ‘extension’ of Phase I while its troops remain in place.
When Hamas refused to accept these terms, Netanyahu on March 2 announced it had barred the entry into Gaza of all humanitarian aid until Hamas acceded to Israel’s demands. Former National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir was delighted: “This policy should remain in place until the last hostage returns. Now is the time to open the gates of hell, cut electricity and water, and resume the war.” Four days later, President Trump added his own diplomatic flourish with a post on Truth Social: “Shalom Hamas means Hello and Goodbye - You can choose. Release all of the Hostages now, not later, and immediately return all of the dead bodies of the people you murdered, or it is OVER for you…. RELEASE THE HOSTAGES NOW, OR THERE WILL BE HELL TO PAY LATER!”
When these threats and the resumption of airstrikes failed to move Hamas which insisted on sticking to the original ceasefire agreement, Israel further ratcheted up the pressure by announcing on March 9 that not only was it blocking the entry of trucked food, fuel and water, but it was cutting off the entire electricity supplyto the Gaza Strip which would cause Gaza’s sole remaining desalination plant and wastewater treatment plant to cease functioning. If, before the ceasefire took effect on January 19, Gaza’s residents had for daily use the per capita equivalent of the amount of water needed for a single toilet flush, soon they would have nothing but seawater to drink. Five days later, Hamas offered to release an American-Israeli citizen, and return the bodies of four other dual nationals to induce Israel to enter Phase II negotiations. But Israel was having none of it and called the Hamas offer “manipulation” and “psychological warfare” while continuing to use snipers and drones against Palestinians. It has killed at least 150 Gaza residents since the ‘ceasefire’ began, according to Euro-Med Monitor. Nine people including three journalists were killed by a drone on March 15.
Both Netanyahu and Trump have summarily rejected the Egyptian plan for rebuilding Gaza which was endorsed by Arab leaders at an emergency summit in Cairo on March 4. The $53 billion, three-phased plan focuses on the reconstruction of Gaza under the administration of a committee of technocrats, while residents remain within the Gaza Strip. As a sweetener for Netanyahu, the plan includes security corridors and a wide ‘buffer zone’ all along Gaza’s perimeter boundary with Israel.
Instead of giving the plan serious consideration, the White House and Israel are reportedly discussing setting up a fund to expedite the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, possibly by inducing Sudan, Somalia or Somaliland to take in two million Palestinian refugees. Finance Minister Smotrich announced on March 9 that Israel would be establishing a ‘Migration Directorate’ to oversee the expulsion of Palestinians, and Environmental Protection Minister Idit Silman stated that the “only solution for the Gaza Strip is to empty it of Gazans” and that “God has sent us the US administration, and it is clearly telling us – it’s time to inherit the land.” She seemed undeterred by the fact that Israel has subjected that particular piece of land to such environmental destruction that it has been accused of committing ecocide. With pumping stations and sewage treatment plants again knocked out by Israel’s ban of electricity and fuel supplies, parts of northern Gaza are now flooded with sewage, raising fears that Gaza’s sole aquifer is being irreversibly damaged.
While Palestinians endure a miserable Ramadan under total siege conditions, some unusual dynamics have been taking place. Adam Boehler, nominated to be Trump’s Envoy for Hostage Affairs who had been Jared Kushner’s college roommate, caused consternation in Israel when he opened a back channel directly with Hamas and held what he called “very productive” discussions. Hamas, he said, agreed to a five-to-ten-year truce during which time it would lay down all weapons and the US could help ensure that no new tunnels were built. Before being sidelined, Boehler also stated that the US is “not an agent of Israel” but had its own interests, raising alarm bells in both Israel and the US and leading to the withdrawal of Boehler’s nomination. According to an article in Haaretz, Boehler had been shuttled around the region by Bashar al-Masri, the Palestinian-American billionaire who built the new Palestinian city of Rawabi near Ramallah which bears a close resemblance to an Israeli settlement. They reportedly flew in al-Masri’s private jet, which used to belong to Yasser Arafat.
As food prices skyrocket in Gaza and its desperate residents again face impending starvation, a new reportdrafted by the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory describes how Israel has committed one of the five genocidal acts enumerated under Article II of the Genocide Convention: “Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group.” Entitled “More than a human can bear”: Israel’s systematic use of sexual, reproductive and other forms of gender-based violence since 7 October 2023, the 49-page report details the direct military targeting of Palestinian women and girls, the destruction of sexual and reproductive health care facilities, and the rape and systematic sexual violence, forced nudity and humiliation, beatings and other forms of physical abuse to which women have been subjected. The report concludes: “Israel’s use of starvation as a method of war, the denial of humanitarian assistance and the concerted policy to destroy Gaza’s healthcare system, compounded by the lack of water and access to sanitation facilities, have caused severe reproductive harms to women and girls, impacting all aspects of reproduction, including pregnancy, childbirth, post-partum recovery and lactation.” The sexual violence used against male Palestinians in Gaza and by soldiers and settlers in the post-October 7th West Bank is also documented in the report.
In the West Bank Ramadan has been marked by at least ten Israeli attacks on mosques, including the burning of the historic Al-Nasr Mosque in the old city of Nablus that dates back to 1187, and tight restrictionson who could attend Al-Aqsa in Jerusalem for Friday prayers. The forced displacements and military assault on refugee camps and northern towns are ongoing, with five Palestinians killed in Jenin on March 10-11 alone. As parts of the West Bank are steadily emptied, Itamar Ben-Gvir has presented the Knessetwith a bill that would annul the Oslo Accords and subsequent agreements and pave the way for its annexation.
Meanwhile Israel’s Ministry for Diaspora Affairs and Combatting Antisemitism has invited members of Europe’s far right parties to attend its International Conference on Combatting Antisemitism, which will be held in late March. The Commissioner for Jewish Life in Germany, along with some other Europeans, reportedly pulled out of the event after learning about the far right invitees.
In the US the weaponization of ‘antisemitism’ to repress dissent and intimidate universities went into high gear after Trump on March 4 warned students involved in pro Palestinian protests that “agitators will be imprisoned/or permanently sent back to the country from which they came. American students will be permanently expelled or…arrested.” On March 6 Axios reported that the State Department was using AI to implement a ‘Catch and Revoke’ policy to locate and cancel the visas of ‘pro-Hamas’ foreign students.
Two days later plainclothes ICE agents, including one who had recently been honored by Trump, seized Columbia University master’s graduate Mahmoud Khalil from his home in New York. They appeared unaware that Khalil, a Palestinian refugee from Syria who had served as a negotiator between the Columbia administration and students participating in its encampment, is not on a student visa, but is instead a legal permanent resident and green card holder married to an American who is eight months pregnant. He is not accused of any crime but was nevertheless immediately ‘disappeared’ to a detention camp in Louisiana where he is being held under an obscure provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 that permits the deportation of “an alien whose presence or activities in the United States the Secretary of State has reasonable ground to believe would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences.” The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) immediately commended “the swift and severe consequences for those who provide material support for foreign terrorist organizations” although there is no evidence that Khalil did anything other than exercise his First Amendment rights. Those rights are now being targeted by the Trump Administration with potentially dire implications for higher education – some 60 universities have been listedfor investigation for “Antisemitic Discrimination and Harassment” – and for the entire country.
Foreign countries that challenge US policy on Israel are also in the line of fire – quite literally in Yemen, which the US bombed on March 15/16 killing over 30 people including children, and less bloodily in the case of South Africa, whose ambassador has been expelled for what Secretary of State Rubio called “anti-American behavior.” President Trump has meanwhile turned the very word ‘Palestinian’ into a weapon and racial slur. On March 12 he declared about Senator Chuck Schumer – who had just affirmed that Democrats were united against the “terrible” Republican spending bill - that he is “a Palestinian, as far as I’m concerned. He’s become a Palestinian. He used to be Jewish. He’s not Jewish anymore. He’s a Palestinian.”
The very next day Schumer stunned his party when he reversed himself and said he would be supporting the Republican bill after all. Will he now be Jewish again in Trump’s eyes?
Nancy Murray, Alliance for Water Justice in Palestine
Saturday, March 22, is World Water Day. We hope you will join us for a Standout and Procession to protest Israel’s genocidal attacks on Palestine’s water resources: 1 PM at Downtown Crossing in Boston.