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Dispatch From Gaza and the War That Never Ends
With the resumption of airstrikes and further degradation to what little infrastructure remains, the conditions of our existence are almost beyond description, though I will still try.
Mar 26, 2025
There is a fleeting moment, just before waking, when silence blankets the world. A moment where you are still held in sleep, shielded from the harshness of reality. But then, the silence is ripped away. The ground shakes beneath you. The sky erupts in light and fire. Walls tremble. Screams cut through the night. And suddenly, you are awake—not to the promise of a new day, but to devastation and fear.
This is Gaza’s reality—a war that never ends, a war that offers no respite, no mercy. On March 18, Israel resumed bombing Gaza, confirming that the so-called cease-fire, which began on January 19, was never more than a hollow promise. The bombings never really stopped. Gaza’s borders remained sealed. Humanitarian aid was blocked. Hunger deepened. Hospitals were pushed to the brink. Families were left to sleep in the ruins of their homes, or in overcrowded shelters without enough food or water. Even during Ramadan, the holiest month, Israel tightened its grip, ensuring that 2.1 million people were left without the essentials needed to survive.
This time, the war is taking an even darker turn. We had already been living without the basic necessities to survive… no housing, little food, fuel, or water. With the resumption of airstrikes and further degradation to what little infrastructure remains, the conditions of our existence are almost beyond description, though I will still try. Civilians are once again being killed indiscriminately. Journalists, children, and aid workers—those trying to document the truth and help the wounded, and those most vulnerable—are being targeted. At least 25 journalists have been killed since the latest round of attacks began. Some were killed while reporting from the ground, others targeted inside their homes. Khaled Abu Saif, a young journalist known for his fearless coverage of Gaza’s suffering, was killed when an Israeli airstrike hit the building where he lived. His camera was found next to his body, shattered by the same blast that killed him.
We were told the war had ended. We were told there was a cease-fire. But the bombs never stopped. The loss never ended. Now, we no longer ask when the war will end—we only ask how much more we can survive.
Children, as usual in Israel’s wars on us, have not been spared. On the first night of the resumed bombings, more than 130 children were killed. Some died in their sleep, buried beneath the rubble of their homes. Others were hit while playing outside. The youngest victims are too numerous to count. Families are digging through the ruins with their bare hands, trying to recover the bodies of their sons and daughters. They are not even given the dignity of a proper burial—the graveyards are full, and there is nowhere left to lay the dead to rest.
Aid workers are targets. Ambulances marked with the Red Crescent symbol are being bombed. Shelters clearly designated as humanitarian spaces are again targeted by Israeli missiles. Medical staff have been slaughtered while trying to reach the wounded. In one tragic case, three paramedics were killed when their ambulance was struck as they responded to an emergency call.
And now I must try to describe the horror that those of us still living must endure. There is no clean place left in Gaza. The streets are choked with the stench of rotting garbage and decaying bodies. Mountains of waste rise between collapsed buildings and broken roads. Flies swarm over the debris. Dogs sniff through the rubble and gnaw on human limbs and flesh. The air is thick with the sour smell of decay and smoke. Gaza, already suffocating under siege and war, is now drowning under its own waste.
Once again, tens of thousands of families have been forced to flee their homes in northern Gaza, seeking refuge in the already overcrowded central and southern areas. But there are no proper shelters left. Every school, mosque, and hospital that once offered refuge has been bombed or turned into a makeshift camp for the displaced. With nowhere else to go, many families have ended up on the edges of waste dumps—setting up tents or makeshift shelters among piles of garbage.
Children play barefoot in fields of trash. Families sleep next to rotting food, broken plastic, and the carcasses of dead animals. With the borders closed and humanitarian aid blocked, Gaza’s waste management system has collapsed. Garbage trucks no longer operate because there is no fuel. The sanitation system has completely broken down. Medical waste from overwhelmed hospitals and human waste from destroyed sewage systems now flow through the streets. Disease is spreading quickly—cases of cholera, dysentery, and skin infections are increasing daily.
“I wake up every day to the smell of rot,” says Abu Mohammed, a father of five who fled from Beit Hanoun to central Gaza. “We left our home because of the bombs, but now we are living among trash. My children are getting sick. There’s no clean water to wash them. We barely have food to eat. And the smell… it never goes away.”
In the few hospitals still functioning, doctors are warning of a major health crisis. Children are arriving with respiratory infections from breathing the polluted air. Cases of poisoning from contaminated food and water are on the rise. Infections from untreated wounds—often caused by the debris of collapsed buildings—are becoming more dangerous because antibiotics and medical supplies have run out.
“We are living like animals,” says Um Ayman, a mother of four sheltering near a waste dump in central Gaza. “I have to cover my children’s noses with pieces of cloth so they don’t breathe the poisoned air. We sleep surrounded by flies. My youngest child has a rash all over his body. There are no doctors left to treat him.”
If we were the “animals” that Israel says we are, would our suffering be any less? Even animals have their limits. We reached ours a long time ago, and still we keep going.
The humanitarian disaster is deepening, and the accumulation of waste is making an already desperate situation even worse. The people of Gaza cannot escape the bombs, but now they cannot even escape the rot beneath their feet. Clean water is running out. Food is scarce. Medical aid is blocked. And as the waste piles grow higher, so does the threat of disease and death.
There is no safety in Gaza. No one is spared. Journalists trying to tell the truth, children caught in the crossfire, and aid workers struggling to save lives—all are targets.
We were told the war had ended. We were told there was a cease-fire. But the bombs never stopped. The loss never ended. Now, we no longer ask when the war will end—we only ask how much more we can survive.
The world is watching Gaza slip further into devastation. The targeting of those who speak, those who heal, and those who are too young to understand why this is happening—this is not collateral damage. It is a deliberate effort to silence the truth and crush the human spirit. The world cannot remain silent any longer.
I say this: What is happening to us is beyond words and beyond the most wild and outrageous of imaginations. Those who support this genocide, those who look away, and those who remain silent for the sake of their comfortable lives will be judged and must be held accountable. Someday. I pray for that day, that day when the world finally sees us, that day when the world rises up to finally stop Israel and stop the mass murder of me and my people.
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As Trump Targets AP, Media Urged to Resist Moves Like 'Gulf of America' Renaming
"It's at times like these that journalists need to put down their pens and advocate for accountable leadership," asserted one campaigner.
Feb 14, 2025
First Amendment defenders are calling on media organizations and journalists to stand up to bullying and intimidation by U.S. President Donald Trump, whose administration on Friday confirmed the indefinite exclusion of one of the world's largest news agencies from White House press briefings and Air Force One flights over its refusal to adopt the Republican leader's new name for the Gulf of Mexico.
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Taylor Budowich said that because The Associated Press "continues to ignore the lawful geographic name change" of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, it will be indefinitely banned from White House news conferences and the president's official airplane.
"The level of pettiness displayed by the White House is so incredible that it almost hides the gravity of the situation."
The New York-based AP, which provides news content to roughly 15,000 media outlets in over 100 countries, has explained that, because the gulf is an international body of water, it will continue to call it the Gulf of Mexico because Mexico—whose president on Thursday threatened to sue Google for adopting Trump's name change—and other countries do not recognize the new name.
In contrast, the AP said it will call Denali, the highest peak in North America, Mt. McKinley following a name change by Trump because the Alaska mountain is located entirely inside the United States.
Budowich said the AP's decision on the Gulf of Mexico exposes the agency's "commitment to misinformation."
"While their right to irresponsible and dishonest reporting is protected by the First Amendment, it does not ensure their privilege of unfettered access to limited spaces," he argued.
But critics said the Trump administration's behavior is about a lot more than just a spat over a name change.
"Of course, this is just more petty behavior by a president seeking to punish any news organization that doesn't follow his dictates, regardless of how ridiculous they may be," Timothy Karr, the senior director of strategy and communications at Free Press, told Common Dreams on Friday.
"It's at times like these that journalists need to put down their pens and advocate for accountable leadership," Karr stressed. "They need to advocate for themselves, their colleagues, and for journalism writ large."
"The good news is that more than a dozen of the mass market news outlets have refused to adopt Trump's name change for the Gulf of Mexico," he added. "That's a start. They now need to speak out against his First Amendment threats, despite the consequences. There is much more at stake now than just having access to the White House."
"By defying Trump, the AP has created a rallying point for other organizations and individuals to find their spines and defy him as well."
Writing for Public Notice Friday, Noah Berlatsky commended the AP for "not changing their style to suit the whims of a would-be tin-pot dictator."
"And by defying Trump, the AP has created a rallying point for other organizations and individuals to find their spines and defy him as well," Berlatsky added.
Those include the heads of the White House Correspondents' Association (WHCA) and Reporters Without Borders (RSF), as well as groups like the Committee to Protect Journalists, National Press Club, PEN America, and Society of Professional Journalists.
"The White House cannot dictate how news organizations report the news, nor should it penalize working journalists because it is unhappy with their editors' decisions," WHCA president Eugene Daniels said earlier this week.
RSF USA executive director Clayton Weimers said in a statement that "the level of pettiness displayed by the White House is so incredible that it almost hides the gravity of the situation."
"A sitting president is punishing a major news outlet for its constitutionally protected choice of words," Weimers added. "Donald Trump has been trampling over press freedom since his first day in office."
President Trump banning the Associated Press from an event over their usage of "Gulf of Mexico" instead of "Gulf of America" may seem more absurd than alarming, but Trump's attacks on the free press are no joke.
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— ACLU (@aclu.org) February 11, 2025 at 5:35 PM
Numerous experts highlighted what they called the unconstitutionality of banning a media outlet from press briefings for political reasons.
"The AP—a major news agency that produces and distributes reports to thousands of newspapers, radio stations, and TV broadcasters around the world—has had long-standing access to the White House," Aaron Terr, director of public advocacy at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, wrote on Friday.
"It is now losing that access because its exercise of editorial discretion doesn't align with the administration’s preferred messaging," Terr added. "That's viewpoint discrimination, and it's unconstitutional."
Berlatsky wrote: "As ABC, Meta, the LA Times, The Washington Post, and Google demonstrate, you lose 100% of the fights you preemptively and despicably surrender. The AP has already won an important victory by refusing to change the Gulf of Mexico to some random other name at the whim of a power-mad orange gasbag."
"If any portion of Trump's agenda is to be stopped, we need people and organizations who are willing to defy him and speak truths he doesn't want to hear," he added. "Despite Trump, the
AP still calls the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of Mexico. In doing so, it's reminding us what freedom looks like. It's also demonstrating us that if you don't want to lose your freedoms, you have to use them."
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'How Does It Feel to Have Your Legacy Be Genocide?' Asks Journalist Thrown Out of Blinken's Briefing
"Physically dragging out a reporter from the State Department briefing room while preaching press freedom to the rest of the world is the perfect example of the Biden administration's love affair with double standards and duplicity," said one foreign policy observer.
Jan 16, 2025
Two journalists were removed from Secretary of State Antony Blinken's final news conference on Thursday after interrupting Blinken's remarks to heckle him about the United States' policy toward Gaza, a day after a cease-fire deal between Hamas and Israel was announced. One of the reporters, independent journalist Sam Husseini, was physically carried out of the briefing room by security.
Less than two minutes into Blinken's remarks, as he was thanking the reporters in the attendance for "asking tough questions," Max Blumenthal, the editor in chief of The Grayzone—an independent news—addressed Blinken, saying loudly in reference to the cease-fire deal:"300 reporters in Gaza were on the receiving end of your bombs. Why did you keep the bombs flowing when we had a deal in May?" On Wednesday, President Biden announced the breakthrough, saying that “this is the ceasefire agreement I introduced last spring."
"Why did you sacrifice the rules-based order on the mantle of your commitment to Zionism," Blumenthal continued, before being led to the door. "How does it feel to have your legacy be genocide?" he yelled.
Blumenthal also called out State Department Spokesman Matt Miller, who is briefly visible in a video filmed by the journalist, who charged that Miller "smirked through a genocide."
Not long after, Husseini also interrupted Blinken.
"I am asking questions after being told by Matt Miller that he will not answer my questions," said Husseini, who also referenced the findings of Amnesty International, which concluded in December that Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. "You pontificate about a free press... Criminal! Why aren't you in the Hague." The Hague is where the International Criminal Court is located.
Blinken can be heard saying "respect the process" in response to Husseini's outburst.
Trita Parsi, the executive vice president of the non-interventionist "action tank" the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, remarked that "physically dragging out a reporter from the State Department briefing room while preaching press freedom to the rest of the world is the perfect example of the Biden administration's love affair with double standards and duplicity..."
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