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By: Joshua Scheer/ Columnist
I’ve been reading this Juan Cole article from November 28, titled “Amnesty: So-Called Gaza ‘Ceasefire’ Becoming a Smokescreen for Continued Israeli Genocide.”
Cole, the great scholar, writes an Amnesty International report in which Secretary General Agnès Callamard warns:
“Palestinians remain held within less than half of the territory of Gaza, in the areas least capable of supporting life, with humanitarian aid still severely restricted.”
Callamard further cautions:
“The ceasefire risks creating a dangerous illusion that life in Gaza is returning to normal. But while Israeli authorities and forces have reduced the scale of their attacks and allowed limited amounts of humanitarian aid into Gaza, the world must not be fooled. Israel’s genocide is not over.”
Here is the full report by Amnesty International
Amnesty reports that the Israeli military continues to occupy roughly 55% of the Gaza Strip. There has been no effort to rehabilitate the farmland deliberately destroyed over the past two years or to rebuild livestock. Israeli forces routinely fire on Palestinian fishing boats, preventing them from accessing protein from the sea.
In which they report that “Palestinians are left virtually totally deprived of independent access to forms of sustenance.”
Cole also details the harsh realities on the ground — food trucks unable to enter, aid convoys delayed, and basic supplies blocked despite repeated pleas for expanded access.
After reading that, I received an alert from Democracy Now! about today’s interview with Sari Bashi, an Israeli American human rights lawyer, co-founder of Gisha, and former program director at Human Rights Watch. It’s worth a listen.
The ceasefire encourages people to assume the best — and certainly that’s the framing the U.S. administration wants — but the truth is far more muddled. The reality feels like the same destructive policies, just with a different tagline.
I wanted to include these key points from today’s Democracy Now! conversation with Amy and Juan, where Bashi describes the Israeli government’s intent to make life so unlivable that people are effectively forced to leave:
Some Key Quotes Being:
“This is decentralized violence, but it is also state-sponsored violence
“The Israeli announcement that it will not allow people to return to Gaza validates the fears … that the ceasefire plan … is essentially to continue the ethnic cleansing of Gaza.”
And:
“The violence in Gaza, the violence in the West Bank … it’s not random. It’s directed toward ethnic cleansing. It’s directed toward getting Palestinians to leave.”
Watch it here:
I complied a list of just some of the recent articles on Gaza from the past few weeks — all are linked and all should be shared far and wide. This list doesn’t even start with the heinous claim by Hillary Clinton that somehow this was faked for TikTok. Yesterday, I posted about the indisputable fact that this is a genocide.
Firstly, a report from The Real News Network on the last hospital in Gaza.
“Hospitals have become targets for the Israeli occupation and the Israeli army. Many hospitals have been destroyed… Doctors, nurses, and medical teams have been kidnapped from hospital premises.”
When Your City Becomes a Target: The Human Experience Behind Gaza’s Ruins
Donald Trump Gaza Plan Condemned as ‘Concentration Camps Within a Mass Concentration Camp’
New Research Shows True Death Toll From Israeli Genocide in Gaza Could Be 126,000 or Even Higher
United Nations Condemns ‘Brazen’ Israeli Killing of Surrendering Palestinians in West Bank
Im Looking Through the Skulls to Find My Sons’: Palestinians Dig Through Gaza’s Rubble to Search for Their Missing Loved Ones
Over 92 Percent of Homes in Gaza Are Rubble. How Do We Even Start Rebuilding?
One more video from Chris Hedges Report we posted yesterday: “How Palestinian History Is Systemically Forgotten (w/ Micaela Sahhar).”
Like many, I need a history lesson—may we never forget that lesson, and may we never forget the lessons we are learning now.
The President of the United States would have us believe that the ceasefire is working and effective, and that his dream of a Nobel Peace Prize is attainable. But reports from Gaza over the past few weeks paint a sad, though not unfamiliar, picture: the ceasefire being used as cover while Israel acts with impunity, ultimately facing no repercussions for what the world at large sees as genocidal actions.
Sadly, we don’t know how much will change, as the impetus from our leadership is lacking; they can’t even use the word genocide. Yet the work must continue, even when it feels hopeless and as if nothing will change because nothing has changed-YET