✦. A Deadly “Aid” System: Militarised and Lethal
Since late May, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF)—a private aid distribution network set up by Israel and backed by the U.S.—has positioned food sites under heavy military control. Originally funded with a $30 million U.S. grant, GHF restricts access through Israeli and American contractors alongside IDF security details.
But aid seekers face a deadly choice: starve or risk being shot. More than 500 Palestinians have been killed trying to reach these sites, and thousands wounded.
✦. Soldiers Testify to Direct Orders
Haaretz reports that multiple IDF personnel confirm orders to shoot unarmed civilians near GHF distribution points. One describes it as “a killing field”—with 1–5 deaths daily, using heavy firepower like machine guns and grenades.
These testimonies triggered a war‑crimes investigation by Israel’s Military Advocate General, though Netanyahu and defense officials deny any deliberate targeting & call the allegations malicious.
✦. Weaponisation of Hunger = War Crime
The UN’s human rights office determined that weaponising food, restricting access, and militarising distributions constitute a war crime, and potentially other international offences.
UN Secretary-General Guterres condemned the system as “inherently unsafe” and “killing people”, while MSF labeled it “slaughter masquerading as humanitarian aid”.
✦. Engineered Genocide: Starvation as a Strategy
Since October 2023, Israeli forces have systematically:
Destroyed Gaza’s food systems — bakeries, farms, and food warehouses.
Cut off water infrastructure and bombed desalination plants, leading to deaths due to water scarcity.
Restricted electricity and fuel to hospitals and bakeries, causing healthcare collapse and malnutrition deaths.
Carried out forcible displacement of 1.7 million people—often bombing so-called “safe zones” after ordering evacuations.
Attacked maternity wards, IVF clinics, and used sexual violence — actions formally described by the UN as “genocidal acts” .
Human Rights Watch has stated that the deprivation of water—leading to thousands of indirect deaths—constitutes the war crime of extermination and may amount to genocide.
✦. Genocide by Legal Definition
Israel’s actions meet multiple legal criteria under the 1948 Genocide Convention:
Killing members of the group: Over 56,000 Palestinians killed since October 2023.
Inflicting destructive conditions: Starvation, displacement, and infrastructure collapse.
Targeting reproductive health: Strikes on maternity healthcare and use of sexual violence.
Forcible transfers: Widespread evacuations followed by bombings.
UN bodies—including the OHCHR and Special Rapporteurs—assert Israel’s methods are “consistent with genocide” through starvation and collective punishment.
✦. Global Apathy & Complicity
Despite the overwhelming evidence and global legal frameworks warning of genocide, Western governments continue diplomatic and military support for Israel. The European Union labeled Israeli methods likely in breach of human rights, but has stopped short of sanctions.
Meanwhile, U.S. funding continues to support aid sites that function as military chokeholds over Gaza’s survival.
✦. Amplifying the Victims’ Voices
The Gaza Health Ministry reported at least 549 killed, 4,000 injured in Rafah since May 27 .
Aid workers—paramedics and UN staff—were also targeted: e.g., 15 medics killed in Rafah on March 23 .
Most vulnerable groups—women, children, the elderly—are dying in alarming numbers from hunger and lack of medical care.
✦. What Must Be Done
UN & ICC: We need swift legal classification of genocide and binding investigations.
International Governments: Must enforce arms embargoes, halt military aid, and sanction those enabling mass starvation.
Media & Public: Sustained reporting that centers Palestinian voices and holds leaders accountable.
✦. Final Analysis
Israel’s campaign in Gaza extends far beyond military operations—it has become a systematic genocide enabled by military blockades, hunger, displacement, and direct killings. The militarised aid system is not a humanitarian stopgap—it’s an instrument of policy, deepening suffering and death. The deaths at aid sites are a symptom of the broader machinery of destruction that threatens the annihilation of a people.
Humanity must respond before the silence becomes complicity.
✦ Eelaththu Nilavan ✦
28/06/2025
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Amizhthu’s editorial stance.
