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human rights watch
'War-Crime Starvation Strategy': Israel Blocks All Humanitarian Aid into Gaza
“There will be famine and chaos”
Mar 02, 2025
Israel has reneged on the existing ceasefire agreement they had agreed to with Hamas. The first phase of the ceasefire expired Saturday and Israel announced on Sunday it is halting all humanitarian aid and fuel deliveries to Gaza and closing the border between Israel and Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that he made the decision "in full coordination with President Trump and his people."
In a statement Hamas called the suspension of aid a “war crime” and a violation of the ceasefire agreement. It said Netanyahu’s “decision to suspend humanitarian aid is cheap blackmail, a war crime and a blatant coup against the [ceasefire] agreement”.
Stephen Zunes, the director of Middle Eastern studies at the University of San Francisco, says the US’s apparent proposal favoring Israel follows a well-established pattern seen since the beginning of the war.
“This is typical,” he told Al Jazeera. “Hamas and Israel will agree to something. Then Israel will try to revise it in its favor. Then the US will put forward a new proposal that is in Israel’s favor and then the US will blame Hamas for not accepting that proposal.”
Israel’s decision to block all aid going into the Gaza Strip is a war crime under international law, a human rights expert says.
Kenneth Roth – former head of Human Rights Watch who is now a visiting professor at Princeton University – said Israel as an occupying power has an “absolute duty” to facilitate humanitarian aid under the Geneva Conventions.
“Israel’s latest threat to cut off all aid is a resumption of the war-crime starvation strategy” that led to the arrest warrant for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by the International Criminal Court, he said.
Doctors Without Borders said Israel's decision is “outrageous and will have devastating consequences”, said the group’s emergency coordinator Caroline Seguin.
“Humanitarian aid should never be used as a tool of war,” added the charity, known by its French acronym MSF, in a statement. “Regardless of negotiations between warring parties, people in Gaza still need an immediate and massive scale-up of humanitarian supplies.”
Jeremy Corbyn, who once led the UK Labour Party, said that Israel’s blocking of humanitarian aid was a “resumption of genocide”, before adding that the current British government – led by Labour – was “complicit."
AP reports:
Fayza Nassar, a woman living in the heavily destroyed urban Jabaliya refugee camp, said the closure would exacerbate already dire living conditions.
“There will be famine and chaos,” she said. “Closing the crossings is a heinous crime.”
Israel’s offensive has killed at least 48,388 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. It says more than half of those killed were women and children.
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Protests to Demand Netanyahu's Arrest as Fugitive Israeli PM Welcomed by Trump
"Benjamin Netanyahu should not be welcomed to the United States! He should be arrested for war crimes," said CodePink.
Feb 04, 2025
The women-led peace group CodePink is set to hold bicoastal demonstrations this week as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his backers in the U.S. government ignore an International Criminal Court
arrest warrant for the right-wing leader, who stands accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Netanyahu arrived Monday in the United States, which has not ratified the Rome Statute governing the ICC, after crossing the airspace of European nations that are signatories to the treaty. The Israeli leader and Republican U.S. President Donald Trump are scheduled to hold a joint news conference Tuesday afternoon after meeting in the White House.
Later in the week, Netanyahu is set meet with Trump administration officials and congressional leaders, who recently spearheaded bipartisan passage of House legislation to sanction ICC officials for seeking to hold Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his former defense minister, accountable for waging a war whose conduct is also the subject of an International Court of Justice genocide case.
"No matter who is in power, the imperialist leaders continue to fully support and fund the Zionist entity's escalating genocide of the Palestinian people," CodePink said in an online announcement of a Tuesday afternoon protest in Washington, D.C., and referring to Israel.
"While both Trump and Netanyahu continue to publicly advocate for total ethnic cleansing, we must ensure that they do not convene in our city without the people taking a stand," the group added. "We reject war criminals being welcomed into our city. Join us on Tuesday to reject this meeting, which will inevitably advance their genocidal plans."
Groups including CodePink, Council on American-Islamic Relations, Americans for Justice in Palestine Action, the U.S. Council of Muslim Organizations, and American Muslims for Palestine are also planning a Tuesday afternoon press conference to demand Netanyahu's arrest.
CodePink is also set to hold a demonstration outside Berkeley, California City Hall on Wednesday afternoon.
"War criminal Benjamin Netanyahu should not be welcomed to the United States! He should be arrested for war crimes," the Bay Area chapter of CodePink asserted. "We are speaking out against the meeting between Trump and Netanyahu and taking a stand against the U.S. funding of the Zionist genocide of the Palestinian people."
In addition to calling on the U.S. to "end all military aid to Israel," CodePink Bay Area condemned the Trump administration's plan to imprison tens of thousands of migrants in the notorious military prison at Guantánamo Bay. The White House confirmed Tuesday that U.S. officials have begun sending migrants from the United States to Guantánamo
Amnesty International said Tuesday on social media that "by welcoming Israeli PM Netanyahu, wanted by the ICC to face charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity, the United States is showing contempt for international justice."
"The Biden administration flouted any efforts at international justice for Palestine. Now, by not arresting Netanyahu or subjecting him to U.S. investigations, President Trump is doubling down, welcoming him as the first foreign leader to visit the White House since the inauguration," the group continued.
"The U.S. has a clear obligation under the Geneva Conventions to search for and try [to] extradite persons accused of having committed or ordered the commission of war crimes," Amnesty added. "There must be no 'safe haven' for individuals alleged to have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity."
Human Rights Watch chief advocacy officer Bruno Stagno said in a statement Tuesday that "if President Trump wants to break with the Biden administration's complicity in the Israeli government's atrocities in Gaza, he should immediately suspend arms transfers to Israel."
"Trump said the hostilities in Gaza were 'not our war' but 'their war,' but unless the U.S. ends its military support, Gaza will also be Trump's war," Stagno added.
The National Iranian American Council (NIAC), meanwhile, expressed alarm at reporting that the Trump administration is preparing to ramp up his "maximum pressure" policy against Iran in an effort to stop the country from developing nuclear weapons and cripple its oil exports.
"Benjamin Netanyahu has played every single modern U.S. president to act against American interests and likes to boast, 'I know America, America is a thing that can be moved easily,'" NIAC president Jamal Abdi said Tuesday. "Only time will tell whether Trump will succeed in his efforts to end and prevent wars and be a dealmaker in the Middle East, or if [Netanyahu] will move Trump into a war with Iran that will torpedo his presidency and ensure another generation of American military adventures."
"Today, Trump has a rare and historic opportunity for peace—if he stands up to Bibi," Abdi asserted, using Netanyahu's nickname. "He has a chance to stabilize the Middle East and do what his predecessors tried and failed to accomplish: ending the forever wars that have bogged down the U.S. and American troops in the region for a generation."
"Or, he could bow to Bibi and allow the U.S. to be dragged into a catastrophic regional war that would torpedo his presidency and America's interests," Abdi added. "Netanyahu and fellow hawks will surely welcome the 'return' of the so-called 'maximum pressure' approach on Iran—even though it never went away—and work to ensure that it is implemented as harshly as possible to drive Iran away from the negotiating table and push the U.S. and Iran toward a disastrous war."
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Cease-Fire 'Only the First Step' for Gaza Plunged Into 'Horrifying Abyss' by Israel
Human Rights Watch warned that "continued weapons sales to Israel by its partners despite vast evidence of its unchecked atrocity crimes are putting those countries and officials at risk of direct complicity."
Jan 17, 2025
While people around the world welcomed Wednesday's announcement of an agreement to pause Israel's assault on the Gaza Strip and free the remaining hostages held by Hamas, human rights defenders stressed that the only way to truly end the suffering of Palestinians is to address the root causes of their oppression and for countries to stop arming Israel.
"The news that a cease-fire deal has been reached will bring some glimmer of relief to Palestinian victims of Israel's genocide. But it is bitterly overdue," Amnesty International secretary-general Agnès Callamard said Thursday. "For Palestinians—who have endured more than 15 months of devastating and relentless bombardment, have been displaced from their homes repeatedly, and are struggling to survive in makeshift tents without food, water, and basic supplies—the nightmare will not be over even if the bombs cease."
"Israel's continuous and deliberate denial and obstruction of humanitarian aid to Gaza has left civilians facing unprecedented levels of hunger and children have starved to death," Callamard continued. "The international community, which has thus far shamefully failed to persuade Israel to comply with its legal obligations, must ensure Israel immediately allows lifesaving supplies to urgently reach all parts of the occupied Gaza Strip to ensure the survival of the Palestinian population."
"Unless Israel's illegal blockade of Gaza is promptly lifted, this suffering will only continue," she added. "Israel must dismantle the brutal system of apartheid it imposes to dominate and oppress Palestinians and end its unlawful occupation... once and for all."
Human Rights Watch (HRW)—which highlighted Israel's alleged "unchecked crimes against humanity and war crimes" in its annual World Reportpublished Thursday— asserted that "all countries which provide weapons to Israel, including the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany, should suspend weapons transfers due to the Israeli military's repeated, unlawful attacks on civilians."
HRW added that nations should defend the International Criminal Court—which last year issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his former defense chief—as well as the International Court of Justice, which is weighing a genocide case against Israel and has ordered its forces to prevent genocidal acts and allow the unimpeded flow of humanitarian aid into besieged Gaza. Critics have accused Israel of ignoring the ICJ orders.
"Israel's decadeslong systematic repression of Palestinians worsened dramatically and plunged civilians in Gaza into a horrifying abyss, but possibilities for international justice are emerging," HRW Middle East and North Africa director Lama Fakih said on Thursday. "Continued weapons sales to Israel by its partners despite vast evidence of its unchecked atrocity crimes are putting those countries and officials at risk of direct complicity."
The Israeli human rights group B'Tselem welcomed the cease-fire—which was approved by Israel's Security Cabinet on Friday and, if agreed upon by the country's full Cabinet as expected, is set to take effect Sunday—but stressed that "the catastrophe persists" in Gaza.
"Millions of people in Gaza remain destitute, starving, and homeless," the group said in a statement. "A cease-fire is only the first step, and one that should have happened long ago. There is a real concern that Israel will resume fighting after the first phase of the deal is complete."
As Common Dreamsreported Thursday, Israeli forces killed scores of Palestinians in Gaza following Wednesday's cease-fire announcement.
"The international community must do everything in its power to demand Israel stop the war completely and permanently," B'Tselem said. "Beyond a lasting cease-fire that includes enough humanitarian aid for the entire Gaza Strip, its residents must be allowed to return to all parts of Gaza."
"Israeli decision-makers responsible for serious violations of the laws of war and for crimes against humanity must be held accountable, and all Israeli violence against the Palestinian people in the entire area between the Jordan [River] and the Mediterranean must cease," the group stated.
"The only way to break the cycle of bloodshed is to end the occupation, oppression, and apartheid regime and ensure the human rights of everyone living in this space," B'Tselem added.
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