[Salon] Israel has destroyed more than 1, 500 buildings in Gaza since ceasefire

[Chas Freeman <cwfresidence@gmail.com>]

FM: John Whitbeck

The BBC report at the link transmitted below makes clear that, while Israel's slaughter of Palestinian individuals in Gaza has slowed since the "ceasefire" was proclaimed a month ago, Israel's destruction of Palestinian buildings in Gaza, intended to render the Strip uninhabitable, has not.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0mxylxw48yo

It should also be clear that Israel has no more incentive to proceed to "Phase 2" of the current "ceasefire" after the release of its remaining hostages than it did to proceed to "Phase 2" of the prior "ceasefire" after the release of the agreed number of its hostages.

Indeed, the optimal scenario from the perspective of the Israeli government is the effective perpetuation of the status quo, with the Israeli military in control of a majority of the territory of the Gaza Strip encompassing almost all of the Strip's agricultural land (transformed into a wasteland devoid of Palestinians and with its former buildings razed to the ground), with a still-armed and still-demonized Hamas in control of the shrunken remainder of the Strip and with Israel in full control of all land, sea and air access to this shrunken Strip, enabling Israel to control all goods and people entering or leaving it and to keep the surviving Palestinians on a permanently strict "diet".

In this scenario, Israel could cite the continuing "terrorist threat" to justify leaving the surviving Palestinians in Gaza to rot, with no hope for a better future, in their shrunken Strip, thereby strongly encouraging the "voluntary emigration" sought by Israel ever since it launched its genocidal assault against the people of Gaza in October 2023.

Since this is the optimal scenario from the perspective of the Israeli government, it is highly likely to prove to be the fate of Gaza in the absence of a barely imaginable moral and ethical epiphany and declaration of independence from subservience to the Israeli-American Empire on the part of Western, Arab and Muslim governments which, so far, profess to wish to see the success of the Israeli-American surrender/recolonization ultimatum.