The loss of innocent life in Gaza

My friend and colleague Tahani Abu Daqqa lost 14 close relatives this week from a bomb dropped on their building. I have known Tahani for 9 years. We work together to build environmental and humanitarian cooperation between Israelis and Palestinians. Since the 7^th of October, my organization, the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, and Tahani’s organization, Damour for Community Development, have worked together to try to relieve the suffering of non-combatants in Gaza by providing them with basic food items, clothing, tents, water, sanitation and energy equipment.

Tahani spent the first seven months of the war moving from house to house in Gaza to avoid bombs and keep her 90-year-old ailing parents as safe as possible. Her family house was destroyed early in the war. Eventually, she was able to get her parents and herself out of Gaza to some level of safety. She is now living in Cairo among the more than one hundred thousand Palestinian refugees who were able to escape the war to Egypt.

Last week, Israel renewed the fighting in Gaza. Many of the family members of the Israeli hostages are terrified that the end of the ceasefire and the renewal of fighting is a death sentence for their loved ones in Gaza. Others agree with government claims that the only way to get the hostages out is to put military pressure on Hamas. Time will tell who is right. What is certain is that with the restart of the ground war, Israeli soldiers’ lives are once again at risk. What is also certain is that many innocent non-combatant Palestinian civilians’ lives have been and will be lost.

The Israeli press has been diligent in reporting the names of the specific Hamas leaders who were targeted and have been killed in this latest military campaign. The Israeli press has been less diligent about reporting the names of innocent Palestinians who were killed because they were close to those targets or for other completely unknown reasons. Some media have reported on hundreds of Palestinians killed during the attack on Ismail Barhoum at the Nasser Hospital. They are quick to add that this is according to the “Hamas-run Ministry of Health” creating some doubt as to the accuracy or reality of these numbers.

I spoke to Tahani this week about her family’s tragic loss of life. She told me about her four cousins, four brothers who all lived in one building together with their families. They had all fled their village, Abasan Al Kabira, which sits on the Gaza border opposite Kibbutz Nirim, during the early stages of the war. Since the cease fire, they, like many other Palestinians, had moved back to their home, which fortunately had not been destroyed. They were told it was now safe. When the bombing resumed after the collapse of the ceasefire, the Abu Daqqa cousins’ family’s house was hit. Fourteen members of the four families were killed, including Omar Asamat, 5 years old, Muhamad Ahmad, 12 years old, Halaa Ahmad, 9 years old, Sama Ahmad, 6 years old, and Qasaa Eadil, 7 years old. Another family of Tahani’s relatives in Abasan had just fled their home and were driving away to safety when their car was hit, and the father, mother, and four children were killed.

These Palestinians were not killed because they were a threat to the State of Israel or its citizens. I cannot explain to Tahani why it was necessary for the security of my country that her family members die. I do not understand how their deaths contribute to the military pressure on Hamas, which will lead to the release of the hostages. This war, which began as a justified response to the atrocities committed by the Hamas terrorist organization on October 7th, has lost its legitimacy in my eyes. The war must end now, the hostages must be returned to their families, and the Palestinians in Gaza must be allowed to live without fear of being killed by Israeli bombs and weapons. The Israeli government can and must end this war now.