The war on Gaza continues and hostilities in the West Bank have been escalated by the recent launch of an operation to control counter-terrorism. Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz has said that operations in the West Bank would continue “with the same determination used against terror infrastructures in Gaza” and urged the temporary evacuation of Palestinians from the West Bank.
According to the Washington Post, Israeli troops raided several parts of the West Bank on the 28th of August, Wednesday. Areas of Jenin, Tulkarm, Tubas and al-Fara’a refugee camp have been surrounded by the troops. Masoud Ammar, a lawyer in Jenin, has spoken out that, “the sky is full of drones” and that there’s “a huge number of armored personnel carriers.”
Nida Ibrahim, from Al Jazeera, has said “In the past few weeks, we’ve seen an intensification in the use of aerial strikes against Palestine fighters … the Israeli military claiming they are combatting the use of IEDs [improvised explosive devices].”
The latest report has declared 21 Palestinians dead. And more people have been detained every day. The offensive has entered its ninth day as of the 5th of September and Palestinians are being forcibly evacuated from their homes. As the Middle East Eye reports, the Israeli troops withdrew from Tulkarm and Tubas on Friday but the operations have continued in Jenin.
At Least 676 people have been killed in the occupied West Bank including 152 children since October 7th, when Hamas fighters from Gaza attacked Israel. More than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed since then amongst which were 16,500 children. Scores of people have been severely injured by multiple raids, airstrikes, starvation and deprivation of any basic means of survival.
As of September 1, according to Al Jazeera, in Gaza, 60% of residential buildings, 80% of commercial facilities, 85% of schools and multiple hospitals have been damaged and destroyed. With this new escalation in Jenin, many residents are trapped in their homes without proper water, power, or food as Israeli forces have taken over the city. Residents have reported the heavy presence of armored vehicles, bulldozers and snipers.
A reporter from Al Jazeera has said, “Palestinians say the main goal of this military operation, the largest in more than two decades, is destruction.” The people most affected by this operation are the people in the camp in Jenin. As per the latest update, families have started to move from the camp which has been entirely sealed. The Israeli military has blocked all entry and exit points in order to prevent the escape of the Palestinian fighters who are said to be the main targets of the raids.
This operation has been claimed by the IDF to be crucial to the curbing of Palestinian violence against Israeli troops. The Palestinian Authority (PA) administration and President Mahmoud Abbas have been unable to counter any advances by Israel. Palestinians have not been able to communicate about this recent escalation majorly due to the cutting off of the internet and communication channels.
What started as a small-scale operation in Jenin, quickly escalated into a larger incursion involving Israeli troops and local armed groups. There has been a spike in attacks by Palestinian fighters, especially from the West Bank regions in recent months. The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) reported several high-ranking Palestinian militants were killed during the operation, including members of the Islamic Jihad and Hamas. BBC has reported that the man who headed Hamas in Jenin, Wissam Khazem, has been killed in the fight.
Access to hospitals has been blocked since they have been taken over by Israeli troops. As Al Jazeera writes, The Director of Jenin Government Hospital, Wassim Bakr, gave an instance where a man called Ayman Rajeh, a 58-year-old, was arrested at dawn and his body was brought to the hospital handcuffed and bearing signs of torture. There were many such instances. People have been denied access to hospitals that are blocked using dirt barriers.
The international community has been quick to respond to this and reinvoke calls for a ceasefire. Protests in solidarity with Palestinians have been continuing in various parts of the world amidst vigorous suppression by governments.
From the Archives
The Columbia University protests have been among the most impactful student protests which saw student encampments on a large scale. Some of their demands included divestment from companies that are aiding the Israel government in the war on Gaza, there was also a demand for greater transparency in the spending of the university’s finances and there was a call for amnesty for students and faculty who were subject to attacks due to their expression of solidarity to the Palestinian cause.
Academics and Intellectuals have been writing, protesting, and voicing their support for Palestinians. They have voiced out the ideas of settler-colonialism, racism, supremacy, and genocide. Joseph Massad, calls the war on Gaza a Western war on the Palestinian people. He writes this to shed light on the support shown by the Western governments to Israel and how they have been complicit in the killing of Palestinians.
In his article titled, ‘Why Israel's genocide in Gaza is a western war on the Palestinian people’, Massad argues that the war on Gaza is not solely the doing of Israel but a part of an ongoing Western Imperialist agenda that has been promoted by major western powers like the US, UK, France, and Germany. They have carried this on in order to maintain their control over the exploitation of resources in the Middle East. This support has been given in the form of financial, military, political and media powerhouses.
The new escalations which were unprecedented and have no rational reason behind them only serve to deepen the injustice that is being carried out against the Palestinian people. Each new development fuels people from all over the world to react to what is happening. The world rages against the injustice as the Palestinians face uncertain lives and cruel deaths day by day, and yet there is no sign of a ceasefire in the near future.
Edited by Veda Rodewald
Asvika (she/her) is a student of Political Science at OP Jindal Global University, and a Copyeditor at Political Pandora. Her research interests lie in anthropology, culture, grassroots politics and the intersection between literature and politics.
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