"A military invasion in Rafah would be CATASTROPHIC... There can be no more 'evacuations.' There is no safe place to go," said Oxfam, calling for an immediate cease-fire.
"Such an invasion could lead to horrific massacres and raise scenarios of a second Nakba," the Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human Rights said recently. "After 200 days of horrific genocidal acts in Gaza, the real objectives of the attack are the continuation of the 76-year-long ongoing Nakba and the erasure and genocidal destruction of the Palestinian people in Gaza. Israel is laying the groundwork to fulfill its settler-colonial plan of colonizing Gaza."
Human rights defenders have warned that Israel may ultimately seek to ethnically cleanse as many Palestinians as possible from Gaza.
Israel would "move people out of Rafah, the main humanitarian hub in the enclave, to al-Mawasi
Yeah, that's not their plan. There's 1.42 million people in Rafah right now, which is 25 square miles. That gives it a population density of 56,800 per square mile, making it the 25th most densely populated city in the world - and with intact infrastructure enough for only a tiny fraction of that number.
So, Israel supposedly wants to move all these people to al-Mawasi. Now, al-Mawasi is barren, with; the last official count I could find said there were about 1500 people living there in a small Bedouin town. It's also only about six square miles total.
Let's say that Hamas is 10% of the population - I don't think it is, but let's use that number. That means there's 1,278,000 innocent civilians they want to move to al-Mawasi. That would mean a population density of 213,000 per square mile. That would be twice the population density of Manila. And there is no infrastructure. They're just taking a million people and throwing them into a barren desert next to the sea and saying, "Not our problem." There's no food, no water, no toilets, no shelter, no medical facilities, no electricity, no shelter from the heat - and no way to quickly make any of these things appear in enough quantity to matter.
The Palestinians are already on the verge of famine. This will make things worse, and disease is absolutely going to decimate the population. And then they'll decide that al-Mawasi is hiding Hamas, and they'll go after that as well.
Let’s say that Hamas is 10% of the population - I don’t think it is, but let’s use that number.
The Palestinians are already on the verge of famine. This will make things worse, and disease is absolutely going to decimate the population.
Decimation was the Roman practice of killing 1 out of every 10 mutinous/deserter (i.e., guilty of something) soldiers to punish an entire legion while still keeping it operational as a combat unit. Here we have the opposite. It is killing 9 innocents to get to also kill 1 additional (very hypothetically) guilty person.
This is the saddest "um ackchyually" I have ever written.
More aid enters Gaza every day. The situation has been improving for months and there is zero reason to think it will not continue to improve. Daily death totals have been dropping since what, the second or third week of the war?
Tell Hamas to surrender and come out. Watch the daily deaths drop to zero.
I Just wanted to add that Northern Gaza, where the IDF physically controls all entrances, is officially in famine. Southern Gaza is fed by the entrance in Rafah.
The motive for taking Rafah could not be more clear. They intend to destroy the international aid supply line for southern Gaza. Moving so many people to a purposefully mismanaged IDP camp is just the cherry on top.
Common Dreams can be a little much some times. Here's Politico's take which is a bit more dry.
Some important notes though. Aid groups absolutely dispute that there's an ability to fit everyone in the designated area; feed the people that can fit; and that Israel will allow everyone who wants to evacuate to do so in good faith.
So there are very good objections to this plan. If the IDF let people pass without mass arrests or randomly deciding to shoot at the people crossing their lines then that would be good. But it has not been the norm. Which brings us to the next problem. The IDF has behaved so criminally, the people of Gaza do not trust their announcements of where to go for safety.
At this point the only correct answer is an immediate ceasefire. The removal of all IDF troops from Gaza. And an international war crimes tribunal.
Only correct answer is an multi-national subjugation force to kill the IDF forces in Gaza, then push into Israel and take the current government into custody to be put on Nuremberg-style trials while setting up an interim government in Israel.
Yeah, I'm not a fan of Netanyahu's war crimes, but that's something that's never going to happen. Far more likely is evidence continues to go to the ICC and arrest warrants rain from the skies. Then there's a bunch of conservative Israelis who are stuck in Israel or Russia/China aligned countries. And they have to live with the knowledge that they are the new low hanging political piñata for every American president who needs a polling bump.
If there is some sort of cease fire, the UN needs to bring in a Cyprus style peace keeping force to physically stand between Israel and Palestine for a generation (or probably more).
Anything less will just lead to the same repeated outbursts of violence that we've seen for the past 70 years.
I agree. Nobody should be getting forced to go anywhere. In a "normal" war humanitarian routes would be established along with Internally Displaced People camps run to the UN standards. Those routes would be inviolate except for checkpoints to search people, and every stray round impacting near them would result in a full investigation. Aid would be flooding these camps and the entire zone behind the front lines. People would be encouraged but not required to leave within a distinct timeline.
The IDF has not done that. They've basically done the opposite of that. They want to force people to leave the area with the aid, into a camp that mathematically cannot meet UN standards. They've already said they're going to detain all men attempting to leave the area. And they routinely fire into their own humanitarian corridors. This entire operation is a war crime from the top down to the sergeants.
“Many of us like to ask ourselves, ‘What would I do if I was alive during slavery? Or the Jim Crow South? Or apartheid? What would I do if my country was committing genocide?’ The answer is, you’re doing it. Right now.”
I don't doubt for one second that Israel is likely planning something like this. But let's be careful about using sources that are just as biased as the ones that the other side uses.
If you're reporting on news from some far-left website while at the same time decrying right-wing bias like Fox News and it's ilk, then you lose the moral high ground.
There's plenty of regular journalism that documents Israel's bullshit without having to resort to non-credible sources. Stick to that or there's no point in fighting because we've already lost.
You could if the title does not match the article.
Israel may forcibly displace 1.2 million prior to ground invasion. Gives Hamas deadline for cease fire.
oxfam warns a ground invasion could be catastrophic for those in the city.
experts believe it may pave the way for eventually ethnic cleansing by Israel.
Make no mistake, a shit load of worrying information here. No where in this article does it say "here is the plan for ethnic cleansing" like stated in the title.
You're right. It's still to early to call if israel is planning to kill all Palestinians and commit Ethnic Cleansing. Who knows, can you even call Genocide a Genocide? Let's ask the israeli government about this
“No half jobs. Rafah, Deir al-Balah, Nuseirat, total and utter destruction,” Smotrich said, referring to the two cities in Gaza and the Nuseirat refugee camp.
This description given by CommonDreams is by far the most accurate one.
To call this unbalanced is to pretend that israel is not committing Genocide or Ethnic cleansing.
When every shitty propaganda outlet shills for israel killing "dying" people we're supposed to look the other way. But when a NEWSpaper goes "israel is doing Genocide" everyone loses their jimmies. The hypocrisy is astounding.
Reporting should not include commentary. I don’t disagree that this is genocide and ethnic cleansing. But editorializing belongs in editorials and opinion pieces. I want facts. The headline here suggests that Israel is calling it ethnic cleansing themselves, which is not the case.
This is why I’m often critical of CommonDreams as a publication. Their headlines are misleading and they mix opinion with reporting.
To be clear, this is not a problem unique to CommonDreams. I’ve lost a lot of respect for the NYT and CNN over Israel and Palestine coverage. The NYT has also put out some polls with terrible methodology lately, and it's been independent, left wing publications pointing that out. And I've liked their coverage, it was just focused on the facts.
All editorializing in reporting is wrong. CommonDreams is just more blatant about it.
Please don't call Israel "the Jews." I am a Jew and I do not stand with Israel. Israel wants you to think all Jews are Israelis and all Israelis are Jews.
The fun thing with the people downvoting my above comment is that it's hard to know if they're pissed off because I don't support Israel or don't like that I'm a Jew.
Me too. I'm seriously considering buying a kippah to visually make this point.
For the sake of completeness, Israel does happen to be Jewish, just like Hamas happens to be Muslim. And yeah, in light of recent history that's ironic. Hopefully nobody here has forgotten we don't all agree with our (distant, in my case) relatives.
Don't worry, I usually don't (and I didn't say "the Jews", just "Jews" - big difference, since a "the" in front of it would imply that it's all while without "the" it's just a part of them).
It just was needed in this context for the sake of my comment (the irony would be harder to understand otherwise).