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The Gaza genocide

Laila El-Haddad 2 March 2008


We celebrated Yousuf’s fourth birthday today. We ate cake. And we counted the bodies. We sang happy birthday. And my mother sobbed. We watched the fighter jets roar voraciously on our television screen, pounding street after street, then heard a train screech outside, and shuddered. Yousuf tore open his presents, and asked my mother to make a paper zanana, a drone, for him with origami; we were torn open from the inside, engulfed by a feeling of impotence and helplessness, fear and anger and grief, despondence and confusion. Laila El-Haddad writes on the “long-term” Gaza genocide. 

The time for worldwide boycott is now

Omar Barghouti 1 March 2008


On Friday, 29 February 2008, Israel’s deputy defense minister Matan Vilnai threatened Palestinians in Gaza with a “holocaust.” This date will go down in history as the beginning of a new phase in the colonial conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, whereby a senior Israeli leader, a “leftist” for that matter, has publicly revealed the genocidal plans Israel is considering to implement against Palestinians under its military occupation, if they do not cease to resist its dictates. Omar Barghouti comments for EI. 

Israel kills some more children

Mohammed Omer 1 March 2008


GAZA CITY, 1 March (IPS) - Tamer was nine, and no child soldier. He did not live in the area from where homemade rockets are launched into Israeli territory. The day he was killed, he was at least two kilometers from the place Israeli troops had entered Gaza, and met with return fire by Palestinian resistance. His tragedy was that the family home was near Deir al-Balah in the middle of the Gaza Strip, close to the area the Israelis have set up as their Kussfim base. 

Israel kills at least 31 Gazans today, including 8 children

1 March 2008


Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) escalated the attacks and ground incursions against Gaza today. Many attacks hit civilian homes and other objects, killing 31 Palestinians, including eight children. Among the civilian casualties are 13 civilians who were killed inside their homes. Since Wednesday 27 February 2008, IOF killed 61 persons and injured approximately 120. 

Israeli minister threatens "holocaust" as public demand ceasefire talks

Ali Abunimah 29 February 2008


Israeli officials began damage limitation efforts after the country’s deputy defense minister Matan Vilnai threatened Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip with a “holocaust.” The comments came a day after Israeli occupation forces killed 31 Palestinians, nine of them children, one a six-month-old baby, in a series of air raids across the Gaza Strip. EI co-founder Ali Abunimah comments. 

Israeli siege creates drinking water crisis in Gaza

29 February 2008


Gaza’s drinking water crisis was aggravated over the past three days. In addition to the shortage of water supplies to households, the municipal authorities in the Gaza Strip ran out of materials essential for the treatment of water. The Palestinian Water Authority is now instructing Gaza’s people to boil the water at their homes before using it for cooking or drinking. 

Patients suffer privatized, politicized healthcare

1 March 2008


BEIRUT, 28 February (IRIN) - When Hamza Shahrour had a heart attack in June last year, the 24-year-old Shia might have hoped to survive it, given that he was just a few blocks away from the Rafiq Hariri hospital, named after the former five-time Sunni prime minister. But because Hamza’s family had no health insurance and could not afford to pay the thousands of dollars deposit demanded, the doctors refused to treat him. 

Gaza-Egypt border in political limbo

Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani 29 February 2008


CAIRO, 27 February (IPS) - One month after throngs of Palestinians flooded into Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula from the Gaza Strip, the flashpoint Rafah border crossing remains tightly shut. But according to some opposition figures, the breach — viewed by many as a victory for Palestinian resistance faction Hamas — signaled the need for new border protocols consistent with shifting political realities. 

Egypt begins pumping gas to Israel despite Gaza siege

Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani 29 February 2008


CAIRO, 29 February (IPS) - On Monday, Egypt began pumping natural gas to Israel in accordance with an energy accord between Cairo and Tel Aviv. While the Egyptian government defends the move as being in the country’s best interest, opposition figures decry the notion of economic cooperation with Israel, especially in light of the latter’s ongoing siege of the Gaza Strip.