Skip to main content
Advertise Buy the paper Contact us Shop Subscribe Support us
The destruction of Gaza and a post-colonial parallel
Israeli tactics of obliterating the built and natural environments of Gaza remind JOHN GREEN of the methods he saw used by the reactionary forces of Renamo in Mozambique following its liberation from Portuguese colonial rule

ISRAEL’S genocidal action in Gaza has led to at least 30,000 dead (including 12,000 children). The past week has seen Israeli forces bombing Rafah — the last refugee haven in Gaza. But while the Israelis wage their ethnic cleansing campaign with bombs and bullets, they’ve also weaponised far more insidious means, including environmental destruction to make sure that no-one can return to a poisoned land.

Israeli armed forces are not just intentionally bombing residential areas in Gaza indiscriminately but are also using their sophisticated electronic surveillance technology to target the educated and skilled sections of Palestinian society, like academics, doctors, teachers, engineers. Only last week Israel killed Professor Nasser Abu al-Nour, a professor at the faculty of nursing at the IUG University in Gaza, along with seven members of his family in an attack on his home.

On top of this, and for the first time in the history of war, the Israelis are deliberately targeting journalists. In 2023 alone almost 100 journalists have been killed and 400 imprisoned, according to a report by the International Federation of Journalists. Israel does not want its war crimes documented.

Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
Features / 6 January 2025
6 January 2025
Driven on by novel forms of hard-right populism like Modi and Trump, European neofascists are skillfully rebranding themselves and taking power by copying the left's language — just as they did in the last century, writes JOHN GREEN
Books / 18 December 2024
18 December 2024
JOHN GREEN debates the potential of a book that explores fascism in US history and its contemporary impact to reach the audience it deserves
Books / 6 December 2024
6 December 2024
JOHN GREEN wades through the autobiography of Angela Merkel in search any trace of political vision or historical awareness
Books / 4 December 2024
4 December 2024
JOHN GREEN appreciates a stunning record of the pro-Palestinian demonstrations in London
Similar stories
Features / 25 May 2024
25 May 2024
With bombing unending in Gaza and settlers rampaging in the West Bank, the ICC’s moves charge Israeli officials, though an important milestone, show no sign of changing the occupation’s genocidal course, writes VIJAY PRASHAD
Features / 10 May 2024
10 May 2024
It is clear now beyond any doubt that Israel aims to destroy Gaza and annex the West Bank. As the Palestinian resistance has shown this is not possible, will the West start listening to the Palestinian people, asks RAMZY BAROUD
Features / 10 April 2024
10 April 2024
RAMZY BAROUD explains that Israel isn’t making mistakes, even due to callous carelessness — killing aid workers is part of a wider plan to make life in northern Gaza impossible, to facilitate ethnic cleansing
Opinion / 7 March 2024
7 March 2024
RALPH NADER warns that the situation in Gaza is so dire, and deteriorating so rapidly, that the 30,000 death toll must surely be a drastic underestimate