The Israeli public must look at what its army is doing in its name in the northern Gaza Strip straight in the face. In early October, the Israel Defense Forces announced a military operation, and for more than a month now, the area around the towns of Jabalya, Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahia have been under a tight siege. "A siege within a siege within a siege," one UN official called it. This means the IDF isn't letting anyone enter the area, not even international aid organizations.
Residents of northern Gaza were told to move south, in the spirit of the so-called "Generals' Plan" proposed by Maj. Gen. (res.) Giora Eiland, although officially, Israel denies that it is implementing it. The basic concept of the plan is to evacuate the residents, declare the area a closed military zone and then assert that anyone remaining there will be considered a terrorist who can be killed.
Many residents fear they won't be able to return, while others have been unable to leave the area. A few days ago, the United Nations and other aid organizations warned that the situation is "apocalyptic" and "the entire Palestinian population in north Gaza is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine and violence."
The army is forbidding humanitarian aid trucks to enter; only ambulances have been given permission to transport seriously ill people to the hospital in Gaza City. And this is happening at a time when the IDF asked all the civilian rescue services to leave the area.
On top of the mass expulsion, there is starvation, damage to hospitals, and humanitarian disaster causing disproportionate harm to civilians. The Israeli public is almost never informed about such incidents, and in any case, it has demonstrated utter indifference. Two weeks ago, for instance, the IDF attacked a building in Beit Lahia – killing 94 people, according to the Hamas-run Gazan Health Ministry – because a Hamas lookout post located on the building's roof had helped set off a bomb that killed four soldiers two days earlier. In Israel, there is almost no discussion of whether such a massive death toll was justified in proportion to the military target.
In practice, the war is being run in disregard of international law. It's as if there were no civilians in Gaza, no children and no consequences for our actions. The desire to take revenge for Hamas' attack on October 7, 2023 has turned into brutal, unbridled warfare that constitutes a gross violation of the laws of war and, even worse, will be remembered as a moral stain on the country.
Moreover, the massive destruction of homes and buildings in the northern Gaza Strip and the army's preparations to hold on to territory by paving roads and establishing infrastructure indicate an intention to prepare for de facto annexation and the establishment of settlements based on the West Bank model.
Israel must abandon the Generals' Plan and end the humanitarian disaster. The time has come to make a sincere attempt to sign a hostage deal and end the war.
The above article is Haaretz's lead editorial, as published in the Hebrew and English newspapers in Israel.