Gaza People Are Not Numbers
Every day the death toll rises. The Gaza Health Ministry says at least 5,000 people have died in the Israeli airstrikes. The next day it updates the toll to 5,700, then to 6,500, then to 7,300 and it keeps growing.
These are people, not numbers. These are human beings. They are flesh and blood. They are dreams and desires. They are fathers and mothers who long to see their children grow up and succeed in life. They are children who long for a peaceful life where they can go to school and play with their friends without fear. They are young people with thousands of wishes for their future.
They are not statistics or collateral damage. They are not disposable or replaceable. They are precious and irreplaceable. They deserve dignity and respect. They deserve justice and peace. They deserve life and happiness.
But to many people in the world, these Gaza residents who are being killed in large numbers as a result of relentless Israeli bombings are individuals living faraway, and whether they are dead or alive doesn’t make much difference. Nor does it matter how they are being murdered.
And to Israel, they are not even numbers. It is as if they did not exist at all. Like all war criminals and blood-thirsty evils in history, what matters to the Tel Aviv regime is achieving its evil objective at any cost and no matter what. They don’t care if it means the loss of thousands of lives, thousands of innocent lives.
No one ever expects the occupation regime, which has committed every possible crime for decades, care the least for human lives, let alone the lives of the Palestinian people. But what about the rest of the world?
As for governments, they are either supporting and abetting Israel in committing the atrocities against the people of Palestine or paying lip service to the idea of peace and preventing the destruction and massacre in Gaza.
The United Nations Security Council, whose very structure screams injustice but whose main duty is to ensuring peace in the world, has failed to pass a resolution that would bring an end to the Israeli bombing of Gaza. And that is because Western countries do not care if Palestinian lives are being lost needlessly.
Well, the United Nations General Assembly on Friday adopted a resolution calling for an “immediate, durable and sustained humanitarian truce”, demanding “continuous, sufficient and unhindered” provision of lifesaving supplies and services for civilians trapped inside the enclave.
But, unfortunately, UNGA resolutions are symbolic and considered to be mere recommendations. They are not legally binding.
And, by the way, Israel doesn’t give a care even to “binding” UNSC resolutions, including those that “(condemn) Israel’s measures to change the status of Jerusalem al-Quds as invalid” and “condemn Israeli violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the occupied territories”.
The West, the United States in particular, has been whitewashing every atrocity Israel has been committing under the pretext of “self-defense”.
Since the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation was launched by the Hamas resistance movement, Western leaders, including US President Joe Biden and UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, have visited the occupied territories to give assurances to the Zionist regime’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, that he has their backing in acting against Palestinians as he sees fit.
Biden’s visit coincided with one of the gravest atrocities the Zionists have committed: Killing nearly 500 patients, medical staff and other civilians in a bombing of a hospital, the al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City.
The bombardment of the hospital triggered a wave of anger and protests across the Middle East and beyond.
But even such a barbarism was not enough for Biden to have a pang of conscience. Instead of outright condemnation of such a savagery, he tried to place the blame on Hamas.
No matter how many Palestinians are slaughtered, Israel can do whatever it considers necessary because it has a right to “self-defense”, Western leaders believe.
If you wonder about international laws, human rights and humanitarian principles, don’t be so naïve. They cease to exist when it comes to Israel’s “rights”, including the “right to self-defense”.
And what about Palestinians? What are they allowed to do in self-defense? Nothing. Anything they do in defense of their rights, their land, their sanctities, their homes, their families, and their lives is “terrorism”.
Do they have any rights whatsoever? Yes, of course. They have the right to remain silent and watch as their homes are demolished by Israeli bulldozers, their sons and daughters are detained by Zionist forces and held in “administrative detention” for months and even years without any charges, their youths are killed in Israeli attacks and in raids on refugee camps, and more and more of their land is usurped for building illegal Israeli settlements.
So there is no point in expecting governments to act and prevent more Israeli barbarism in Gaza. But people must. The people of the world must condemn the Zionist regime’s crimes and pressure their governments to do something. There have been protests against Israel in different countries. The international community continues to show support for the Palestinians. But more needs to be done.
The world should not remain indifferent to the Palestinian people’s suffering and loss. The world should not turn a blind eye to their plight and pain. The world should not ignore their voices and cries. The world should act to protect them from the indiscriminate Israeli airstrikes, from the inhumane Israeli attacks that spare no one.
The people of Gaza are not numbers. Every single life matters. As the Holy Quran puts it: “… whosoever kills a human being …, it shall be as if he had killed all mankind, and whoever saves the life of one person, it shall be as if he had saved the life of all mankind.” (Verse 32 of Surah Al-Ma’idah)
By Seyed Hossein Beheshti Shakib
