Ethnic cleansing is an effort to render an ethnically mixed country homogenous by expelling a particular group of people and turning them into refugees while demolishing the homes they were driven out of.”
― Ilan Pappé, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine
Palestinians in a fog of war face a serious threat of mass ethic cleansing. Israel advances its long-held plan of taking the Palestinian land. Ethic cleansing is a crime which is very clear in this event, though it is hard to accept, and the truth must be told. It is a war crime against humanity and even a mass genocide. It shows us Israel’s strategy for a “Greater Israel,” free of Palestine, and its presence by forcibly removing Palestinians and repressing them on a mass scale. They are destroying Palestinian homes and infrastructure so that they cannot return to their homeland. This should be considered a human rights violation.
In a war, casualties do happen, but not on this large scale. It is a humanitarian crisis, depriving people of shelter, proper medical aid, and food is scarce, so many dreams are dying under the rubble.
The Human Rights Council in 2023 held a general debate showing concerns about the human rights situation in Palestine. There were six million refugees from the state of Palestine, and thousands had been killed by the Zionists. The forceful occupation of the territories, including taking over natural resources, displacement, and repression, was being done to the Palestinians. Palestinian civilians, including children, were subjected to daily mass killings while the Israeli forces continued to attack villages, towns, and cities.
It was a serious concern about Israeli settlements that kept expanding their territorial boundaries by demolishing homes of the Palestinians and taking away their land, and replacing them with new Israeli settlers. The speakers wanted an immediate end to these atrocities and human rights violations, including Israeli policies that perpetuated the long illegal occupation.
Creation of Israel
We all know about the Balfour Declaration of 1917, which favoured the making of a Jewish national home in Palestine, essentially vowing to give away a country which wasn’t theirs in the first place. Britain also believed that it could gain control over Palestine, following this declaration. From 1919, the immigration of the Zionists increased drastically. Weizmann, who became Israel’s first president, had a dream of making Palestine a Jewish national state. From 1922 to 1935, the Jewish population increased from 9% to 27% of the total population, making thousands of Palestinians homeless as the Zionists bought those lands. The Arabs and the Palestinians were alerted to this huge number of immigrants.
As the Nazi power in Germany increased in 1933 to 1936 thousands of jews arrived in the palestinians shore to seek refuge. Seeing this large immigration, the Palestinian Arabs revolted against the British government. The British government crushed this revolt very violently and destroyed 2000 Palestinian homes, and at least 9000 Palestinians were in concentration camps where they were tortured them as well as interrogated.
The British government was scared of the violence and limited the immigration of the jews into Palestine, which led to Zionist revolts, such as the attack on the King David Hotel bombing in 1946, in which 91 people were killed. The British couldn’t handle the disaster they created and handed it over to the UN.
The UN adopted Resolution 181, recommending the partition of Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state. The UN partition was in such a way that the Arab was deprived of proper agricultural land and sea ports, so they rejected the proposal. Following the UN resolution, war broke out. The Zionists started large-scale attacks aimed at the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians, which culminated in the Nakba.
The Nakba
On May 15, Palestinians all around the world mark the Nakba or “catastrophe,” referring to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine and its destruction in 1948. On that day, the state of Israel came into being. It wasn’t a peaceful process rather a violent one, which forced Palestinians to leave their homeland to make Israel a Jewish national state.
Between 1947 to 1949, at least 750,000 became refugees beyond the borders of the state. The Zionists took more than 78% of the historic Palestine and ethnically cleansed, destroyed hundreds of villages, cities, and killed thousands of Palestinians in mass, including 70 massacres.
May 15 officially became the day to commemorate Nakba, zionists started taking away the land of Palestinians, but the displacement began much earlier. By May 15, half of the Palestinian refugees were already expelled from the country. This war did not start on October 7th; it is a war that had already begun when the Palestinians were sold off their land.
Humanitarian Crisis in Palestine
Palestine is in a Humanitarian crisis, and children in the Gaza Strip are facing a huge number of bombardments and are deprived of essential goods and services. People are dying because no proper life-saving care is provided. For 2 months, there was an aid blockade that caused starvation and illness. Every human being deserves to live; they aren’t destined to die. They are human beings just like everyone in these tough times; humanity is what we need.
The people dying in Palestine aren’t just numbers; those are the lives of the people who had dreams and a homeland they felt safe in, which is being taken away from them. Families who once lived a happy life are now struggling to live. They had land, farms, and bakeries that do not exist anymore. Since none of the raw materials are being provided, there are no bakeries running, the market is down, there is no food supply, and the only way they can survive is through humanitarian aid.
Malnutrition is on the rise. More than 9000 children are suffering from acute malnutrition, and hundreds or more children need aid to fight this, but due to insecurity and displacement, they cannot access it. It has been more than 18 months of war, and the aid is taking time to reach or is sometimes blocked by the parties in the war, which pushes the children to the brink, struggling to survive. Families are starving, with no proper aid reaching them, and the children are left on the bare minimum to survive. There is no justification for thousands of innocent people dying, bombing hospitals, and destroying living spaces where people once lived.
The Gaza Ministry of Health released a report which stated 52,400 Palestinians were killed, including 15,613 children, with 825 under 12 months. The UN humanitarian chief said 14000 babies in Gaza can die in 48 hours if the humanitarian aid is not delivered to them. Some children could not even experience or set foot on the ground, or go to school. Many children left school, colleges shut down, and so many dreams got lost in the rubble. The people in Palestine need protection, and what they need most is food and water from which they are being deprived of, which goes against all forms of humanity.
ALSO READ: Living with Trauma: The Palestinian Experience
Conclusion
This war has gone against humanity; thousands of children and families are dying every day. They have to live in fear each and every day and hope for their survival. Thousands of children died in the womb of their mothers, and some couldn’t even take their first step. Is this what you call a war, through innocent suffering on this huge scale? So many families do not exist anymore, and those who survive can never recover from this trauma and will always live with a heavy heart. The children do not have a normal childhood growing up listening to fairy tales; these children will grow up telling stories of war and how they lost everything.
The stopping of aid and bombing hospitals has taken away their little chance of survival. If they don’t die from bombing, they are going to die from starvation. Is this really a war or a crime against humanity? You do not need to be from any religion to stand up for what is happening in Gaza; you just need to be human.
Let us know your thoughts. If you have burning thoughts or opinions to express, please feel free to reach out to us at larra@globalindiannetwork.com.
