Gaza City is “human animals”: Israeli actions after the Hamas attacks on civilians in the suffocating siege
Israel is intensifying air strikes on Gaza after the weekend’s surprise air, land and sea attack by Hamas, in which militants killed 1,300 Israelis and took some 150 as hostages.
Apartment complexes in Gaza City have been leveled, houses bombed and families annihilated. The upscale Rimal neighborhood in Gaza City has been badly damaged. At least 326 children in the Gaza Strip have been killed since Saturday, according to the Ministry of Health here. Women and children from my extended family were killed in an attack on Tuesday, and my cousin was killed on Wednesday. The entire strip is covered in the smell of explosives. Yoav Gallant, Israel’s Minister of Defense, called us “human animals” and said that the suffocating siege that Palestinians in Gaza have suffered for more than 15 years would be tightened even further.
The Biden administration is in talks with the UN to create a safe corridor for civilians.
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The death toll went up during the Israel-Gaza war. Israeli media said at least 1,200 Israelis have been killed from the Hamas attacks. And Palestinian officials say at least 950 Palestinians in Gaza were killed, along with 1,000 Hamas militants inside Israel.
The first shipment of U.S. weapons arrived in Israel, as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is traveling to Israel to deliver a message of solidarity and support, the State Department announced.
The President of the United States, Joe Biden, denounced the attack on Israel by Hamas and promised that he would make sure the country had what it needed.
Biden said that more than 20 Americans were missing and 14 had been killed in Israel. John Kirby said in an interview with NPR’s All Things Considered that there are some Americans among those held hostage by Hamas, but that they are a very small number.
“There’s also a larger number of Americans that are just unaccounted for. Some of them might be in the hostage pool. We don’t know. So, we’re, we’re trying to get as much information as we can,” Kirby said.
Israel was attacked on the 50th anniversary of the start of the War, while the bloodshed began on the Simchat Torah holiday.
The Palestinian militant group Hamas, which took control of Gaza in 2007, launched a massive surprise attack along Israel’s southern border on Saturday. Paragliders, motorcycles, and boats were used to sneak into Israel’s border.
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There is no power. Abuzayda says she can charge her phone for several hours at a time every few days if her family has left fuel. They can’t keep up with the outside world at any moment due to the sporadic access to communication.
About 2,300 Israelis and Palestinians have been killed so far. The killing of all civilians is very sad. I know that the pain of an Israeli parent is no different from the anguish of a mother or father in Gaza. I am not surprised we found ourselves at this point of no return.
Many of the fighters who breached those walls are probably just a few years older than Ali; many of them were born during the second intifada. Their entire experience has been Israeli military occupation, siege and devastating military assault upon assault in an enclave of 140 square miles, with unemployment and poverty rates of approximately 50 percent. This is the history, and these are the conditions that have shaped so many in Gaza, not a justification. Israel helped create these fighters by starving them of hope, dignity and a future.
The Biden administration is urging Israel — publicly and privately — to get humanitarian supplies into Gaza. It’s also trying to secure the release of the hostages kidnapped by Hamas, which include an unknown number of Americans.
He hadn’t been back to Gaza since moving to the U.S. seven years ago. Abuzayda and her husband, who is American, had gone back and forth about when exactly to visit.
“We changed our tickets like three to four times … and then we decided to come to Gaza at this time,” she said. “And our short vacation just turned into a nightmare.”
Abuzayda, her husband Abood and their one-and-a-half year old son Yousef traveled from Massachusetts for what was supposed to be a two-week trip. They don’t know when they’ll be able to go home — and not for lack of trying.
Abuzayda called the US embassy multiple times a day after Saturday’s attack. They told her that they did not have any new information. She tried to get to the embassy in Cairo, but couldn’t.
She said that they were not doing anything because they were running out of milk, diapers, and other things. They keep posting about U.S. citizens in Israel. Every five minutes they keep reminding the people in Israel to get out of Israel.”
Major US airlines have halted flights in and out of the country, which has made it difficult for others to leave. The New York congressman said his district alone has hundreds of people trying to get home from Israel.
The U.S. increased the travel advisory for Israel and the West Bank on Wednesday to level three, or “reconsider travel.” The advice to not travel in Gaza is still at a level four.
Abuzayda, who is staying at her parents’ house with other relatives, said her sister-in-law and her three kids had tried to cross the Rafah border, but they had to turn back after it came under an Israeli airstrike.
Mommy’s unsure when I’m going to tell Mommy, but he can’t tell me what’s going on
She said it’s not safe inside or outside. The markets are low on supplies. She is trying to make the most of the milk and diaper that she has left to keep Yousef safe and happy.
“The hardest feeling ever is to hide your fear and show the opposite, just to keep my son positive,” she said. “Because he doesn’t understand anything, he thinks this is a fireworks. And every time I tell him, while I’m crying, ‘okay mommy, clap clap this is a fireworks, it’s nothing.’ He will jump when he thinks I’ll be next to him.
Source: An overdue reunion became a nightmare for this American family now trapped in Gaza
Rejoinder to The Girl Who Saves Me and My Brother’s Baby’, Part II: The Voice of a Strongly-Interacting Twin
Her voice broke as she begged to save us. “Please. I got a one-and-a-half-year-old boy after six times of in-house fertilization. We have been trying to call the embassy since Saturday. Nobody’s helping us or getting back to us. Please save us.”