commentary editorials

Reports About the Current Crisis

Oct 10, 2023

Palestinians in Gaza destroy the fence separating the strip from the rest of Palestine, October 7, 2023. editorials

Today, October 10, marks the fourth day of the Palestinian uprising from Gaza. At the time that I am writing to you, the Palestinian Ministry of Health is reporting that Israeli forces have killed 788 Palestinians in Gaza and injured at least 4,100. But while resistance forces continue to maintain territorial control outside of Gaza, including Israeli military bases which have been taken over, Israeli forces annihilate captive Palestinian families in their homes in Gaza, often without warning. Airstrikes from the sky have been compounded by reports by Euro-Med Monitor and others of the use of white phosphorus yet again, a chemical weapon that causes serious injury and death when it comes in contact with the skin or is inhaled or swallowed. Israeli airstrikes have also already made 187,500 Palestinians in Gaza homeless, internally displaced by the destruction of their homes. For many Gazans, this is a second, or third displacement, as the majority of Gaza residents are refugees from across Palestine. Most recently, the Israeli Defense Minister referred to Palestinians in Gaza as “human animals” and declared that in addition to cutting off any electricity, Israel would block access to food, water, or fuel to the more than 2 million Palestinians living there, more than half of which are children. Last night Israeli forces cut access to water going into Gaza, ensuring that this declaration was carried out. This is nothing less than a genocidal decision.

These facts apprise us of the crux of the matter: Palestinians live and die at the whim of the Israeli state, which has worked toward our elimination as early as 1947. The threat that Gazans, entrapped in a tiny enclave ¼ the size of London, will die en masse as a result of the Israeli decision to disrupt access to basic human needs, illustrates exactly the massive power difference between the Palestinian resistance fighters and the state.

Outside of Gaza, in the West Bank and Jerusalem we are facing increased military presence, road closures, no access to checkpoints, and stifled movement between communities. Despite this, Palestinians have risen up against the colonial state and in solidarity with the Gaza uprising, marching in Nablus, Jenin, Bethlehem, Ramallah, and Jerusalem. Over the last three days, in suppressing Palestinian calls for decolonization, the Israeli state has killed numerous Palestinians in Nablus, Qalandiya, and Hebron. At the same time, settlers across Jerusalem and the West Bank used the opportunity to continue attacks on vulnerable Palestinian communities, and local reports indicate that state forces have armed settlers with additional weapons, rather than discourage more settler violence. Meanwhile, Israeli police have arrested Palestinian citizens in Yafa (Jaffa) and elsewhere arbitrarily.

GSC will continue to send updates in the coming days, as things develop on the ground. In the meantime, we urge our friends to remember that we cannot analyze events as if they are happening outside of history. The uprising that began on October 7 is a response to decades of colonial violence, ethnic cleansing, genocide, and erasure. For many resistance fighters, it is likely the first time they have stepped foot outside of Gaza, for one reason only: they have been trapped in an open air prison by the Israeli state and its military. The destruction of the apartheid wall, reclaiming tools of violence weaponized against all Palestinians for decades, and the bravery to step outside of the genocidal siege — after many, many years of both nonviolent and violent attempts at resistance that have garnered no tangible victories — are all inevitable emblems of dignity.

Until liberation and return,
Lara Kilani

Cindy Lee Sheehan is an American anti-war activist, whose son, U.S. Army Specialist Casey Sheehan, was killed by enemy action during the Iraq War. She attracted national and international media attention in August 2005 for her extended antiwar protest at a makeshift camp outside President George W. Bush’s Texas ranch—a stand that drew both passionate support and criticism. Sheehan ran unsuccessfully for Congress in 2008. She was a vocal critic of President Barack Obama’s foreign policy. Her memoir, Peace Mom: A Mother’s Journey Through Heartache to Activism, was published in 2006. In an interview with The Daily Beast in 2017, Sheehan continued to hold her critical views towards George W. Bush, while also criticizing the militarism of Donald Trump.

Ms.Sheehan was the 2012 vice-presidential nominee of the Peace and Freedom Party, and received 1.2% of the statewide vote in the 2014 California gubernatorial election.

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