AI
Wednesday, October 11, 2023 6:41:03 PM
Agree. Has been for decades.
"Gaza is a concentration camp. Cue the outrage, but despite the connotations, Gaza fits the literal definition... "
Of course right-wingers say that is exaggerated -- Is Gaza Really like a Concentration Camp?
By Michael Rubin
Washington Examiner [OUCH!]
May 19, 2021
John Prusinski, a Massachusetts activist, minced no words as he spoke to reporters on the sidelines of a recent pro-Palestinian protest. “Right now, the people in Gaza are basically in an outdoor concentration camp,” he declared, despite never having been to Gaza.
Such polemics are nothing new. Academic Norman Finkelstein embraces the description, as do former presidential candidates Pat Buchanan and Ron Paul. Peter Beinart, a prolific pundit, and television anchor Mehdi Hasan appear to agree. Even former British Prime Minister David Cameron once likened the Palestinian territory to a “prison camp.”
Gaza’s situation is tragic, but not how so many progressives think.
In 2010, against the backdrop of the Turkey-sponsored Mavi Marmara flotilla, Washington Post columnist George Will noted that, in Gaza, even under Israeli blockade, “infant mortality rate is lower and life expectancy is higher than in Turkey.” When it comes to Gaza, such statistical surprises are more the rule than the exception. A decade ago, Gaza outperformed not only Turkey but also Brazil, Bulgaria, and Egypt in key health and welfare metrics.
Key indicators continue to show a disparity between political polemics about Gaza and reality. As of 2017, for example, life expectancy at birth in the Gaza Strip was 75.14 years, higher than Brazil, Peru, Egypt, Azerbaijan, Russia, or Ukraine. There are strains to living in Gaza, and so the territory has a high migration rate, but not quite as high as Lithuania or Latvia. Per capita income in both Gaza and the West Bank is $6,220 per year, far below Israel, but still above much of Central America, Pakistan, Ethiopia, and a number of Pacific islands. Gaza and the West Bank are dense in terms of urban population but far less than Singapore, Kuwait, and Belgium. Even if statisticians separated the West Bank and Gaza in their findings, there remains significant open space and farming in the strip. Unemployment is very high but not as high as in South Africa or Kenya.
Food, medicine, and construction supplies flood the Strip, even if Israel first scans and inspects trucks entering the zone. In 2017, the 19,000-square foot Capital Mall, an indoor shopping center that would not be out of place anywhere in the Middle East or Europe, opened its doors, and it continues to do booming business. Wealthier Gazans also visit beach resorts, the equestrian club, or posh coffee shops and restaurants.
This is not to downplay misery nor ignore residents yearning for a normal life, but simply to point out discussions of Gaza’s woes need nuance. Locals may complain about the difficulty of traveling to Israel, which withdrew from the territory more than 15 years ago, but the Egyptian border is more difficult for Gazans to get through, especially after President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi came to power and flooded many of the tunnels Gazans once used.
Then there is the issue of resources. Gaza, like Singapore, has little natural wealth. While Singapore’s rulers chose butter over guns, Hamas did the opposite. Every concrete and steel-reinforced tunnel represents material diverted from schools and hospitals. Every homemade explosive represents fertilizer diverted from farms. Propagandists can complain about restricted imports, but if Hamas can smuggle rockets and their components into the Strip, why do they find it so difficult to smuggle flour or penicillin?
All this hints at the real problem: governance. Hamas has repeatedly prioritized the bidding of Turkey and Tehran over the needs and desires of the Palestinians it claims to represent. U.N. and foreign aid to operate schools, run medical clinics, or build housing only allows Hamas to escape accountability for its own choices.
Every few years, conflict erupts after Hamas targets Israel with rockets, seeks to burn Israeli fields with incendiary balloons, or kidnap Israelis via new tunnels. The Israeli military “mows the grass,” Hamas seeks sympathy, and the cycle restarts.
It is racist for the international community not to acknowledge that Palestinians have agency. They and the international community should hold Palestinian leaders to account. If the international community truly wants to break the cycle of violence, let Hamas fail so that a new, better leadership might emerge. The tragedy Gaza faces is not its neighbors but international condescension and poor governance. In the meantime, Brazil, Egypt, and Lithuania need some serious help.
With links -- https://www.aei.org/op-eds/is-gaza-really-like-a-concentration-camp/
But that's to say every concentration camp is as bad as another. Gaza clearly fits the definition
"con·cen·tra·tion camp
/?käns?n'traSH(?)n ?kamp/
noun
noun: concentration camp; plural noun: concentration camps
a place where large numbers of people, especially political prisoners or members of persecuted minorities, are deliberately imprisoned in a relatively small area with inadequate facilities, sometimes to provide forced labor or to await mass execution. The term is most strongly associated with the several hundred camps established by the Nazis in Germany and occupied Europe in 1933–45, among the most infamous being Dachau, Belsen, and Auschwitz."
Gaza clearly is a concentration camp. Other describe it slightly differently
Gaza: The world’s largest open-air prison
Palestinian protesters remove part of the Israeli barbed wire during clashes with Israeli security forces, at the Israel-Gaza border, in east of Gaza city on April 13, 2018. Photo: ZUMAPRESS.com / MEGA TheMegaAgency.com /NTB Scanpix
Roald Høvring | Published 26. Apr 2018
Palestine
More than 50 years of occupation and 10 years of blockade have made the lives of 1.9 million Palestinians living inside the Gaza Strip unbearable. That is why they now are protesting and risking their lives.
Please note that this article was published on 26 April 2018 and is therefore more than five years old.
Palestinian children and youth grow up in a society characterised by fear, lack of security, hopelessness and the lack of work, medical services, food, freedom of movement and other essentials. Today many refer to the Gaza Strip as the world’s largest open-air prison, where the prison guard is Israel.
Israel has imposed movement restrictions on the Gaza Strip since the early 1990’s. Restrictions intensified in June 2007, following the takeover of that part of the occupied Palestinian territory by Hamas. Israel imposed a land, sea and air blockade on Gaza, citing security concerns.
Despite the relaxation of some blockade-related restrictions in recent years, nearly two million Palestinians in Gaza remain ‘locked in’, denied free access to the remainder of the territory and the outside world. The blockade has undermined the living conditions in the coastal enclave and fragmented the occupied Palestinian territory and its economic and social fabric.
The isolation of Gaza has been exacerbated by restrictions imposed by the Egyptian authorities on Rafah, its single passengers crossing.
Source: OCHA .. https://www.ochaopt.org/theme/gaza-blockade
Unliveable by 2020
Gaza is one of the world's most densely populated areas, with more than 5,000 inhabitants per square kilometre. The Gaza Strip is smaller than the city of Oslo but is home to three times as many people. The population is expected to rise to 2.1 million by 2020.
A 2012 UN report predicted the Palestinian enclave would be “unliveable” by 2020 if nothing was done to ease the blockade, but in June 2017 a UN report on living conditions in Gaza stated that all the indicators are going in the wrong direction and that deadline is actually approaching even faster than earlier predicted.
On 30 March 2018, a six-week campaign composed of a series of protests was launched in the Gaza Strip, near the border with Israel. Named by Palestinian organisers as the "Great March of Return", the protesters demanded that Palestinian refugees and their descendants be allowed to return to what is now Israel.
It was supposed to last between 30 March and 15 May. Five tented camps were set up 500 to 700 metres from the fence with Israel and were to remain there throughout the campaign. On 25 April Hamas stated that the protests will continue past 15 May.
Forty Palestinians have been killed and 5,511 were wounded in the mass protests along the border fence since 30 March, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported on 26 April. The protests have been held every Friday since 30 March.
Why are Palestinians in Gaza protesting?
1.9 million people are confined
Gaza is described by many Palestinians and humanitarian actors as the world’s largest open-air prison. 1.94 million Palestinians live behind a blockade and are refused access to the other occupied Palestinian areas and the rest of the world.
7 out of 10 are refugees
7 out of 10 Palestinians in Gaza are registered as refugees, and many of these come from families who were forced to leave their villages in 1948. Many have also been forced to leave their homes due to war and violence.
Four years after the Israeli attack on Gaza in 2014, 23,500 Palestinians in Gaza are still unable to return to their homes.
700 children have been killed
The oldest children in Gaza have lived through three wars that have killed more than 3,800 Palestinians. More than 700 of these were children. Many children have seen family members, relatives, friends or others be killed or seriously injured.
50 per cent are traumatised by war
Half of all children have been psychologically traumatised by war, occupation and blockade. Close to 300,000 children need psychosocial help.
70 per cent of all schools run double shifts
Close to 70 per cent of all schools run double or triple shifts due to a lack of schools. In addition, a lack of electricity reduces the students' chance to learn or do homework. The blockage also stops young people from studying on the West Bank or abroad.
According to the UN's organisation for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), the large cuts in donations from the US may lead to the organisation being unable to deliver diesel to 275 schools. These schools may be forced to close down if other countries do not contribute.
42 per cent are unemployed
The people in Gaza face the world's largest unemployment rate. 42 per cent of the capable, adult population live without compensated work. For those aged between 15 and 29 years old, the unemployment rate has risen to 62 per cent.
Today, the people in Gaza are 25 per cent poorer than they were when the first part of the Oslo agreement was signed in 1993.
84 per cent are in need of humanitarian aid
1.6 million people, or 84 per cent of the population in Gaza, need humanitarian aid. The number is increasing, and the UN calculates that more than two million people will need humanitarian aid by 2020.
41 per cent have too little food
4 out of 10 families struggle to acquire enough food. In Gaza, more than 830,000 Palestinians need assistance in the form of food or nutritional supplements.
According to UNRWA, the large cuts in funding from the US will cause the UN to have to reduce food support. Most of those who will be affected are already living below the poverty line.
98 per cent of ground water is undrinkable
98 per cent of the water in Gaza is contaminated and undrinkable. Gaza has beautiful beaches, but every day, 90 million litres of unfiltered sewage is pumped out along the shoreline.
2-4 hours of electricity
The Gazan population cannot count on more than 2-4 hours of continuous electrical power a day. Every day, Gaza experiences up to 22 hours of power outage.
35 per cent of arable land is unavailable
35 per cent of the land eligible for farming is unavailable and fishermen are blocked from 85 per cent of the waters on the coast of Gaza due to Israeli security zones.
7 per cent of children suffer from stunted growth
Poverty and a lack of food has led to 7 per cent of children suffering from stunted growth due to long-term malnutrition. Sixty per cent of the children are anaemic.
45 per cent are refused medical treatment outside Gaza
Those in need of specialised medical treatment must apply for permission from the Israeli government to leave Gaza. Many applications are declined, or at best delayed, and many risk dying while they wait.
In October 2017, the World Health Organization reported that only 55 per cent of the applications to leave Gaza for medical treatment were granted.
Sources:
* OCHA, Humanitarian needs overview 2018
* OCHA, Humanitarian needs overview 2017
* AIDA
* Physicians for Human Rights – Israel (PHRI): http://www.phr.org.il/en/gaza-cancer-patients-denied-medical-treatment/
* Al Jazeera: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/04/israel-forces-continue-shoot-kill-gaza-protesters-180414083235983.html
https://www.nrc.no/news/2018/april/gaza-the-worlds-largest-open-air-prison/
"Gaza is a concentration camp. Cue the outrage, but despite the connotations, Gaza fits the literal definition... "
Of course right-wingers say that is exaggerated -- Is Gaza Really like a Concentration Camp?
By Michael Rubin
Washington Examiner [OUCH!]
May 19, 2021
John Prusinski, a Massachusetts activist, minced no words as he spoke to reporters on the sidelines of a recent pro-Palestinian protest. “Right now, the people in Gaza are basically in an outdoor concentration camp,” he declared, despite never having been to Gaza.
Such polemics are nothing new. Academic Norman Finkelstein embraces the description, as do former presidential candidates Pat Buchanan and Ron Paul. Peter Beinart, a prolific pundit, and television anchor Mehdi Hasan appear to agree. Even former British Prime Minister David Cameron once likened the Palestinian territory to a “prison camp.”
Gaza’s situation is tragic, but not how so many progressives think.
In 2010, against the backdrop of the Turkey-sponsored Mavi Marmara flotilla, Washington Post columnist George Will noted that, in Gaza, even under Israeli blockade, “infant mortality rate is lower and life expectancy is higher than in Turkey.” When it comes to Gaza, such statistical surprises are more the rule than the exception. A decade ago, Gaza outperformed not only Turkey but also Brazil, Bulgaria, and Egypt in key health and welfare metrics.
Key indicators continue to show a disparity between political polemics about Gaza and reality. As of 2017, for example, life expectancy at birth in the Gaza Strip was 75.14 years, higher than Brazil, Peru, Egypt, Azerbaijan, Russia, or Ukraine. There are strains to living in Gaza, and so the territory has a high migration rate, but not quite as high as Lithuania or Latvia. Per capita income in both Gaza and the West Bank is $6,220 per year, far below Israel, but still above much of Central America, Pakistan, Ethiopia, and a number of Pacific islands. Gaza and the West Bank are dense in terms of urban population but far less than Singapore, Kuwait, and Belgium. Even if statisticians separated the West Bank and Gaza in their findings, there remains significant open space and farming in the strip. Unemployment is very high but not as high as in South Africa or Kenya.
Food, medicine, and construction supplies flood the Strip, even if Israel first scans and inspects trucks entering the zone. In 2017, the 19,000-square foot Capital Mall, an indoor shopping center that would not be out of place anywhere in the Middle East or Europe, opened its doors, and it continues to do booming business. Wealthier Gazans also visit beach resorts, the equestrian club, or posh coffee shops and restaurants.
This is not to downplay misery nor ignore residents yearning for a normal life, but simply to point out discussions of Gaza’s woes need nuance. Locals may complain about the difficulty of traveling to Israel, which withdrew from the territory more than 15 years ago, but the Egyptian border is more difficult for Gazans to get through, especially after President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi came to power and flooded many of the tunnels Gazans once used.
Then there is the issue of resources. Gaza, like Singapore, has little natural wealth. While Singapore’s rulers chose butter over guns, Hamas did the opposite. Every concrete and steel-reinforced tunnel represents material diverted from schools and hospitals. Every homemade explosive represents fertilizer diverted from farms. Propagandists can complain about restricted imports, but if Hamas can smuggle rockets and their components into the Strip, why do they find it so difficult to smuggle flour or penicillin?
All this hints at the real problem: governance. Hamas has repeatedly prioritized the bidding of Turkey and Tehran over the needs and desires of the Palestinians it claims to represent. U.N. and foreign aid to operate schools, run medical clinics, or build housing only allows Hamas to escape accountability for its own choices.
Every few years, conflict erupts after Hamas targets Israel with rockets, seeks to burn Israeli fields with incendiary balloons, or kidnap Israelis via new tunnels. The Israeli military “mows the grass,” Hamas seeks sympathy, and the cycle restarts.
It is racist for the international community not to acknowledge that Palestinians have agency. They and the international community should hold Palestinian leaders to account. If the international community truly wants to break the cycle of violence, let Hamas fail so that a new, better leadership might emerge. The tragedy Gaza faces is not its neighbors but international condescension and poor governance. In the meantime, Brazil, Egypt, and Lithuania need some serious help.
With links -- https://www.aei.org/op-eds/is-gaza-really-like-a-concentration-camp/
But that's to say every concentration camp is as bad as another. Gaza clearly fits the definition
"con·cen·tra·tion camp
/?käns?n'traSH(?)n ?kamp/
noun
noun: concentration camp; plural noun: concentration camps
a place where large numbers of people, especially political prisoners or members of persecuted minorities, are deliberately imprisoned in a relatively small area with inadequate facilities, sometimes to provide forced labor or to await mass execution. The term is most strongly associated with the several hundred camps established by the Nazis in Germany and occupied Europe in 1933–45, among the most infamous being Dachau, Belsen, and Auschwitz."
Gaza clearly is a concentration camp. Other describe it slightly differently
Gaza: The world’s largest open-air prison
Palestinian protesters remove part of the Israeli barbed wire during clashes with Israeli security forces, at the Israel-Gaza border, in east of Gaza city on April 13, 2018. Photo: ZUMAPRESS.com / MEGA TheMegaAgency.com /NTB Scanpix
Roald Høvring | Published 26. Apr 2018
Palestine
More than 50 years of occupation and 10 years of blockade have made the lives of 1.9 million Palestinians living inside the Gaza Strip unbearable. That is why they now are protesting and risking their lives.
Please note that this article was published on 26 April 2018 and is therefore more than five years old.
Palestinian children and youth grow up in a society characterised by fear, lack of security, hopelessness and the lack of work, medical services, food, freedom of movement and other essentials. Today many refer to the Gaza Strip as the world’s largest open-air prison, where the prison guard is Israel.
Israel has imposed movement restrictions on the Gaza Strip since the early 1990’s. Restrictions intensified in June 2007, following the takeover of that part of the occupied Palestinian territory by Hamas. Israel imposed a land, sea and air blockade on Gaza, citing security concerns.
Despite the relaxation of some blockade-related restrictions in recent years, nearly two million Palestinians in Gaza remain ‘locked in’, denied free access to the remainder of the territory and the outside world. The blockade has undermined the living conditions in the coastal enclave and fragmented the occupied Palestinian territory and its economic and social fabric.
The isolation of Gaza has been exacerbated by restrictions imposed by the Egyptian authorities on Rafah, its single passengers crossing.
Source: OCHA .. https://www.ochaopt.org/theme/gaza-blockade
Unliveable by 2020
Gaza is one of the world's most densely populated areas, with more than 5,000 inhabitants per square kilometre. The Gaza Strip is smaller than the city of Oslo but is home to three times as many people. The population is expected to rise to 2.1 million by 2020.
A 2012 UN report predicted the Palestinian enclave would be “unliveable” by 2020 if nothing was done to ease the blockade, but in June 2017 a UN report on living conditions in Gaza stated that all the indicators are going in the wrong direction and that deadline is actually approaching even faster than earlier predicted.
On 30 March 2018, a six-week campaign composed of a series of protests was launched in the Gaza Strip, near the border with Israel. Named by Palestinian organisers as the "Great March of Return", the protesters demanded that Palestinian refugees and their descendants be allowed to return to what is now Israel.
It was supposed to last between 30 March and 15 May. Five tented camps were set up 500 to 700 metres from the fence with Israel and were to remain there throughout the campaign. On 25 April Hamas stated that the protests will continue past 15 May.
Forty Palestinians have been killed and 5,511 were wounded in the mass protests along the border fence since 30 March, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported on 26 April. The protests have been held every Friday since 30 March.
Why are Palestinians in Gaza protesting?
1.9 million people are confined
Gaza is described by many Palestinians and humanitarian actors as the world’s largest open-air prison. 1.94 million Palestinians live behind a blockade and are refused access to the other occupied Palestinian areas and the rest of the world.
7 out of 10 are refugees
7 out of 10 Palestinians in Gaza are registered as refugees, and many of these come from families who were forced to leave their villages in 1948. Many have also been forced to leave their homes due to war and violence.
Four years after the Israeli attack on Gaza in 2014, 23,500 Palestinians in Gaza are still unable to return to their homes.
700 children have been killed
The oldest children in Gaza have lived through three wars that have killed more than 3,800 Palestinians. More than 700 of these were children. Many children have seen family members, relatives, friends or others be killed or seriously injured.
50 per cent are traumatised by war
Half of all children have been psychologically traumatised by war, occupation and blockade. Close to 300,000 children need psychosocial help.
70 per cent of all schools run double shifts
Close to 70 per cent of all schools run double or triple shifts due to a lack of schools. In addition, a lack of electricity reduces the students' chance to learn or do homework. The blockage also stops young people from studying on the West Bank or abroad.
According to the UN's organisation for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), the large cuts in donations from the US may lead to the organisation being unable to deliver diesel to 275 schools. These schools may be forced to close down if other countries do not contribute.
42 per cent are unemployed
The people in Gaza face the world's largest unemployment rate. 42 per cent of the capable, adult population live without compensated work. For those aged between 15 and 29 years old, the unemployment rate has risen to 62 per cent.
Today, the people in Gaza are 25 per cent poorer than they were when the first part of the Oslo agreement was signed in 1993.
84 per cent are in need of humanitarian aid
1.6 million people, or 84 per cent of the population in Gaza, need humanitarian aid. The number is increasing, and the UN calculates that more than two million people will need humanitarian aid by 2020.
41 per cent have too little food
4 out of 10 families struggle to acquire enough food. In Gaza, more than 830,000 Palestinians need assistance in the form of food or nutritional supplements.
According to UNRWA, the large cuts in funding from the US will cause the UN to have to reduce food support. Most of those who will be affected are already living below the poverty line.
98 per cent of ground water is undrinkable
98 per cent of the water in Gaza is contaminated and undrinkable. Gaza has beautiful beaches, but every day, 90 million litres of unfiltered sewage is pumped out along the shoreline.
2-4 hours of electricity
The Gazan population cannot count on more than 2-4 hours of continuous electrical power a day. Every day, Gaza experiences up to 22 hours of power outage.
35 per cent of arable land is unavailable
35 per cent of the land eligible for farming is unavailable and fishermen are blocked from 85 per cent of the waters on the coast of Gaza due to Israeli security zones.
7 per cent of children suffer from stunted growth
Poverty and a lack of food has led to 7 per cent of children suffering from stunted growth due to long-term malnutrition. Sixty per cent of the children are anaemic.
45 per cent are refused medical treatment outside Gaza
Those in need of specialised medical treatment must apply for permission from the Israeli government to leave Gaza. Many applications are declined, or at best delayed, and many risk dying while they wait.
In October 2017, the World Health Organization reported that only 55 per cent of the applications to leave Gaza for medical treatment were granted.
Sources:
* OCHA, Humanitarian needs overview 2018
* OCHA, Humanitarian needs overview 2017
* AIDA
* Physicians for Human Rights – Israel (PHRI): http://www.phr.org.il/en/gaza-cancer-patients-denied-medical-treatment/
* Al Jazeera: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/04/israel-forces-continue-shoot-kill-gaza-protesters-180414083235983.html
https://www.nrc.no/news/2018/april/gaza-the-worlds-largest-open-air-prison/
It was Plato who said, “He, O men, is the wisest, who like Socrates, knows that his wisdom is in truth worth nothing”
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