Censored! Press TV discussion today of UNRWA’s report that 50,000 children across the Gaza strip are suffering from acute malnutrition
This morning’s 10 minute live on-air chat with the Press TV anchor in Teheran and with a scholar based in Morocco was dedicated to the latest report of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees describing the humanitarian situation in Gaza as catastrophic.
Regrettably Belgium appears to have banned dissemination of the Press TV website (again) and I am unable to view the video. Perhaps readers in different jurisdictions will have better luck.
See https://www.urmedium.net/c/presstv/129847
In any case, I use this platform to repeat my points in the video, which I directed in particular at Russian officials who monitor closely what is being said in Iran. My point was that lamentations and expressions of outrage over the genocide Israel is perpetrating in Gaza are presently a woefully insufficient response.
The time for action has arrived and I advanced one possible course of action, namely for countries with the determination to put an end to the suffering and death of innocent children come together and take a page from the American foreign and military policy playbook, forming a Coalition of the Willing to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza by force.
I find it understandable that Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and other neighboring states do not by themselves take military action against Israel even in the very limited sense of ensuring that humanitarian aid reaches the Gazans in amounts to stave off famine. Each country individually would expose itself to devastating Israeli revenge attacks that would cost the lives of their citizens and cause great material damage. However, if there is a collective force, say, to open Haifa port to ships with aid or to open the land border crossings, that would be an entirely different matter. And for this I can think of no country better placed to play a leading role than Russia, which happens to have its own naval base and air base in Syria as well as other military assets in the region.
There are, of course, many open issues raised by this proposal, some of which were mentioned by my fellow panelist. However, he also noted that if European and NATO countries like Norway and Spain that have formally recognized the Palestinian state were to join the coalition, it would have still greater likelihood of success in the face of not only Israeli but also American opposition.
The other topic raised by Press TV today was why Europe looks on with indifference at the Israeli war crimes and general inhumanity displayed by the Netanyahu government. My simple answer is the “Never Again” slogan, the reference to the slaughter of 6 million Jews in Europe during the Holocaust, for which European leaders, and Germans above all, feel collective guilt to this day. Regrettably this has deprived them of reason amidst the Israeli atrocities in Gaza. And what the Israeli government is doing is a tragedy not only for their victims but for themselves. They are desecrating the memory of the Holocaust dead and it will take more than one generation to live down these crimes against humanity.
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2024