IDF statement on Aid Convoy Stampede

[Yellowducksandrakes]

What’s happened: Following the death of dozens of Palestinians after a stampede broke out around an aid convoy west of Gaza City, the US has blocked an Algerian-sponsored statement at the United Nations Security Council which sought to blame Israel.

• While reports conflict, it appears that:
• Before dawn yesterday morning, approximately 30 trucks containing aid entered the Gaza Strip to deliver food to the Rimal neighbourhood of Gaza City.
• At approximately 4.40 AM, thousands of Gazans swarmed the trucks. Drone footage of the event shows some of the trucks attempting to drive through the crowds, presumably in an effort to extract themselves and deliver the aid they were carrying.
• After a number of trucks were able to continue north, armed men opened fire on what remained of the convoy.
• While the IDF has admitted that its troops did open fire, it says that this was only “when they encountered danger, when the mob moved toward it in a manner that endangered the force”.
• The IDF also says that it “did not fire toward individuals seeking aid and we did not fire toward the humanitarian convoy from the ground nor from the air.”
• It is being reported that at least 112 Gazans were killed in this incident, with approximately 760 being injured. However, as these figures originate from within the Hamas-run Palestinian Ministry of Health, their veracity is questionable.
• The IDF’s initial inquiry into the incident has concluded its troops’ fire killed only 7 or 8 people and that the majority were killed in the chaos, not by shooting.
• “The tanks were there to provide security for the trucks. Our aircraft gave the troops on the ground a full picture from above,” the IDF said.
• “When the hundreds turned into thousands, the IDF complied with international law… Israel did not limit the quantity of humanitarian aid entering Gaza. We recognize the suffering of the Gaza residents.”
• In the aftermath of this event, much of the international community has reiterated calls for an immediate ceasefire and increased aid being allowed into the Gaza Strip.
• At the United Nations Security Council, Algeria sought to issue a statement which explicitly blamed Israel for this deadly incident. While supported by 14 out of 15 council members, it was blocked by the US.
• When asked why the US had not supported this statement, Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations Robert Wood said: “We don’t have all the facts on the ground – that’s the problem.”
• He also said that in the face of contradictory reports, the US was trying to establish facts, including regarding the “circumstances around how people died”.
• President Biden has also discussed this incident with Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. According to a White House statement, they agreed that it “underscored the urgency of bringing negotiations to a close as soon as possible”.
• The White House has also called for this event to be “thoroughly investigated”.

Context: Israel will conduct a thorough investigation into an incident which further highlights the complexity of distributing aid to the Gazan people and the urgent necessity of forming a civilian infrastructure to prevent further incidents of this kind.

Maybe they'll kill each other off. It would be better for the civilians if none of the factions/terrorist organisations were there.

apple.news/AfqegKv4BRySpmm8XrMXKfw

Not sure about the source (in that I am not sure about the publication) but it covers the factions and problems in Gaza.

Not really. The issue is that Israel is systematically blocking the distribution of food aid as well as bombing distribution centres and shooting at police escorts . It is basically promoting anarchy.

Analysts do not believe that the overthrow of Hamas would result in its replacement with a moderate regime.
It is felt more likely that an overthrow of Hamas would result in the emergence of gangs of rampaging warlords in an anarchic Somali type situation in which negotiated settlement would be near impossible. This would likely be followed by an oppressive Islamic regime such as Taliban /Isis all in parallel with a brain drain of educated moderate Palestinians, the potential leaders and drivers of economic activity.
Israel would be effectively be in a prison of its own making surrounded by ,such a regimen.The 500,000 highly educated and skilled individuals on which its economy depends to keep it in the developed world would migrate and, with them,the tax base in which the modern Israeli economy depends for defence and education . US support is rapidly drying up and will be gone. The demographics mean that semi-literate ultra religious Israeli extremists would dominate and the whole of the Holy Land will be an unstable cauldron of violent religious extremism and poverty that would make the current conflict just a prelude and the war in Afghanistan a picnic in the park.

That is an interesting article, thank
you. I was convinced by it, though perhaps it was selective in interviewing only those who are now turning against Hamas as I remember seeing reports in recent months saying that support for Hamas had increased a lot, not diminished, since the war started. There again, everything must be changing all the time.

From the article you posted:

“In the void left behind by Hamas, some Gazans are attempting to organize at the grassroots level to provide services and a sense of order”.

“In Rafah, so-called Protection Committees – groups of local young men, dressed in matching black clothes and masks armed with batons – are providing basic security to markets and public areas”.

“Mr. Naim is one of several local Gaza business owners and community leaders who are who are attempting to form a council to facilitate the entry and distribution of aid and goods”.

I hope Hamas won’t kill them.

Incidently, and only as a conjecture, I wonder if the men visible on top of trucks on a BBC report a few days ago, who had thrown crates off among the people, were members of this Protection Committee? There was hypothesis at the time of the report that they were Hamas and the BBC was failing in not reporting it; but to my eye they looked similar to those in the photo on this article.

Apple News is a news aggregator- it fetches the news that you are likely to want to view.
Support for an armed struggle against Israel remains high.
Groups of masked young men armed with clubs do not really give much hope for the post conflict administration. Terrorist groups are like weeds- weakening of one is an opportunity for the others to scramble for its place.
Israel needs to back off undermining UNWRA, open crossings for aid convoys and allow an orderly distribution of food. Guys with clubs are not really likely to look after widows, orphans, elderly and other vulnerables- get real. They’ll just align to patriarchal clans of thugs.
No analyst expects the current Hamas leadership to form the basis of any post conflict administration in Gaza, so obviously opportunists of all kinds will be ready to step in rather than see a rehabilitated version of the failing PA take on the role.

From Haaretz newspaper there is this good news that some flour has got through to northern Gaza. There is also more mention of the sub groups, linked or not, to Hamas which were discussed previously. It seems difficult to untangle it all from the little we can pick up here.

“Trucks of flour reached areas of northern Gaza that have received no aid in four months, Palestinian media reported. The Hamas-linked Home Front media outlet reported that the aid wasdistributed by the "Popular Committees," a group that includes powerful clan leaders in Gaza, with security from Hamas personnel.”

https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/israel-government-continues-block-aid-response-despite-icj-genocide-court-ruling

Video of unicef spokesman with the aid in Egypt waiting for Israel to be approved to enter Gaza

https://twitter.com/1james_elder/status/1769832100079817098

Also statement from the UN humanitarian coordinator

The international community most definitely should hang their heads in shame and those in support of the Israeli action in Gaza need to ask themselves why they need to starve a population? How does that help to get the hostages back? How is that not a genocide?

@Dulra it is a genocide. I think the Israeli government stopped thinking about the hostages a long time ago.

For so many reasons, it is not a genocide. Using that term for what Israel is doing in Gaza cheapens it. What it might be, however, although it remains to be seen, is displacing a population.

The reality is that Israel lost it with Hamas, understandably, and wanted to destroy them, no matter what the cost and, I think, some, including Netanyahu, still see it that way.

However, I think the U.S is bringing huge pressure on Israel now and they are responding. I think you will see a lot more food and medical supplies going in in the next days and weeks. But Israel will go into Raffah, I think they want to finish the job. It is fair enough not to allow Hamas sanctuary.

The real test is now Israel behaves after it has finished the operation.

I hope they can be magnanimous in victory and work with the international community to make a proper 2 state solution. The stakes are higher than ever for both sides.

For so many reasons, it is not a genocide.

Could you maybe give 2 or 3 reasons why you are so certain that this is the case?

@Efacsen ,

‘The convention defines genocide as any act committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.’

There is no evidence that Israel intends to destroy the Palestinians. So intent isn’t there. If it were, they would be using massive dumb munitions and not relatively small smart ones.

The Palestinians are not just in Gaza, in fact there are about 50% more in the West Bank.

Out of a population of 5 mio Palestinians (in Israel), about 30,000 (probably fewer) have been killed. This is 0.6%. Compare that with the Holocaust (the false equivalence which Hamas wants you to buy into) where a full 35% of global Jewry were deliberately and cruelly exterminated.

I don’t like the way Israel has prosecuted this war but their clear intent is to destroy Hamas. They have been negligent of civilian life, but it is miles away from a genocide.

For using relative small ones … they’ve destroyed quite a lot of Gazas buildings

Probably fewer … can you specify this, how do you know when official organisations around the world are accepting that more than 30k have been killed, 100k injured and many are missing and the survivors are going through one of the worse famines , where do you get the probably less than 30k have been killed from?

holocaust killed 35% in how long ? 4 years ?

30k x 12 months / 5 months of this genocide = 72k people if the war lasted a year

288k if it lasted 4 years that only in Gaza. Many are being killed in West Bank nowadays as well. So probably that 0.6% would be much higher if this lasted 4 years as the holocaust did.

Btw we keep being told that comparing this was against holocaust is antisemitism and we shouldn’t do it.

There is no evidence that Israel intends to destroy the Palestinians. So intent isn’t there. If it were, they would be using massive dumb munitions and not relatively small smart ones.

Did you see the evidence of intent presented to the ICJ hearing in January? Mainly in the form of speeches by senior Israeli government figures containing genocidal threats - the defence of which was 'it's only rhetoric' so it doesn't count

US Intelligence says that less than 50% of the bombs/missiles used have been 'smart' the rest have been dumb and amongst those have been 100s of massive battlefield weapons not intended for urban use

So neither of your assertions stand much scrutiny

@EasterIssland ,

As a Jew, I do find it odious to make the comparison for all the reasons I stated above. I am a believer in free speech, though, so I don’t think we should ban people comparing them, but I do think anyone who does is either hard of thinking or antisemitic.

This won’t go on 4 years. It is probably at least 80% done. The IDF said in early Feb that it had destroyed 17/24 Hamas battalions and I think they are much further advanced now.

The real question will be how Israel behaves after eliminating Hamas, which they had every right to do.

As a Jew, I do find it odious to make the comparison for all the reasons I stated above. I am a believer in free speech, though, so I don’t think we should ban people comparing them, but I do think anyone who does is either hard of thinking or antisemitic.

No-one on this whole thread except you has mentioned the holocaust - likely because it's not been relevant to the discussion

So why bring it up at all in this context

Here you are at 12.37 bringing the holocaust up a propos of trying to justify why this definitely isn't genocide- no-one else mentioned it before except you

Out of a population of 5 mio Palestinians (in Israel), about 30,000 (probably fewer) have been killed. This is 0.6%. Compare that with the Holocaust (the false equivalence which Hamas wants you to buy into) where a full 35% of global Jewry were deliberately and cruelly exterminated.

.

As a Jew, I do find it odious to make the comparison for all the reasons I stated above. I am a believer in free speech, though, so I don’t think we should ban people comparing them, but I do think anyone who does is either hard of thinking or antisemitic.

can you explain why have you been the one comparing Gaza to the holocaust?

@Efacsen ,

Because it is the clear hidden subtext in a lot (not all) of the anti Israel sentiment: Jews are committing genocide. It is exactly what Hamas were aiming for in their disgusting cowardly attack.

Israel has rightly been criticised for some of its actions and rhetoric, but they had to fight back and it was never going to be pretty, mainly as Hamas hide behind civilians.

I think the U.S have it right, support Israel but put pressure on them behind the scenes to spare civilians and put in a decent post-conflict plan. And I think it is slowly working.

Think you have the answer about how will Israel behave once they get rid of Hamas based in how are they behaving in West Bank: killing people , banning people from praying during ramadan in mosques and detaining and torturing people …

This won’t go on 4 years.

its been going for years… since 2005 Gaza has gone through 6-7 wars. So how do you know this one won’t last 4 years

@EasterIssland ,

It is undoubtedly a difficult time for Israel and they have not been behaving well (although still 1,000x better than the Hamas butchers),.

But Israel depends in the U.S a lot and the support of global Jewry.

I think, once Netanyahu goes, which he will, things will get better.

ive read several comments saying that if food has reached the north of Gaza it’s been because of local authorities have been supporting and helping on this. I might be paranoid but targeting and killing one of these people … sounds like Israel is not happy for the aid to be distributed in the north