[Salon] Fwd: Just before Seder night, we remember the commandment “And you shall tell your children”

Begin forwarded message:

Because of the hunger, my wife can barely nurse our nine-month-old son Yamen. Baby formula is nowhere to be found. We live off what we manage to get – a little rice, a little corn we ground, and also barley, which is meant for feeding farm animals. Now even the barley ran out and people have started grinding bird and rabbit food. But there’s not much of that, either.
Ibrahim a-Ghandur, 38, from Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza
Dear Todd,
Hundreds of thousands of people like Ibrahim and his family have been surviving for months without the barest necessities. On the eve of Passover, as we gather to feast together, B’Tselem is releasing a harrowing update on the hunger now rampant in Gaza. The figures are hard to believe and the personal accounts shocking. Worse yet, Israel is guilty of a war crime no one believed possible in the 21st century: intentional starvation.

Reducing masses to begging for food and using starvation as a method warfare requires utter dehumanization. Sadly, the dehumanization of Palestinians in Israeli society has accelerated in recent months.
Read our new position paper:
On October 7, we awoke to the horrendous and criminal assault by Hamas on partygoers and southern communities in Israel, in which 1,200 people were killed and 253 abducted, 133 of whom are still in Gaza. Since that day, we have been sliding further into the abyss. B’Tselem warned that living under a regime of occupation and apartheid would inevitably lead to more violence, but we could not have imagined the scale of brutal human rights violations now under way.

Every day, we learn again how cheap Palestinian life have become. In Gaza, a day in which tens of people are killed and not hundreds is considered “light”. In the West Bank, killings have skyrocketed: since October 7, we have documented 444 Palestinians killed by settlers or Israeli forces there, and 14 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons.
Info on fatalities

Since October 7, Israel has drastically tightened its restrictions on Palestinians’ movement in the West Bank, erecting dozens of new checkpoints, blocking dozens of communities from accessing main roads and revoking all entry permits into Israel – for work or any other purpose. All these disrupt daily life and make it hard for Palestinians to go about their affairs.
New movement restrictions in the West Bank

Meanwhile, Palestinian communities are being driven out of their homes on a daily basis. A few weeks ago, we reported that Israel ramped up its pressure on dozens of shepherding communities in the northern Jordan Valley. Close cooperation between the military, the police, the regional settlement council and area settlers is forcing these residents out of their homes and land.
Full paper and video
Just before Seder night, we remember the commandment “And you shall tell your children” – and try to fulfill it. We fight denial, concealment and indifference by telling the truth. This truth now surpasses the bounds of imagination: millions of people displaced from their homes, starved and denied access to basic medical care in Gaza, while close cooperation between armed settlers and the military instills fear in tens of thousands of Palestinians in Area C.

The common thread is clear: the logic of the Israeli apartheid regime is growing stronger. More violence, more oppression, more robbing of lives. The government is abandoning its obligations not only to Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, but to its own citizens being held captive. It does not care about individuals and is lying to us, Israelis, that the war is serving security interests and is worth the price. The truth is that for six months, we have been stuck in a war of revenge with no purpose or future, that can only increase the suffering, pain and hatred.

B'Tselem needs your support to continue exposing this reality, fighting attempts to hide and distort it, and taking an uncompromising moral stand against it.

Donate to B'Tselem

We call again for an immediate ceasefire and for a deal to release all the hostages.
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[Salon] Fwd: Just before Seder night, we remember the commandment “And you shall tell your children” – and try to fulfill it