The media’s betrayal – The siege of Gaza must end
Israel is acting in Gaza using methods it previously condemned in Biafra • The government and media denial campaign is reminiscent of that of the Corona era
By Eitay Mack • Translated by Sol Salbe
In a debate in the Knesset plenum held on 14 January 1970, Foreign Minister Abba Eban referred to the war in Biafra: “Worse and more terrible than the tribulation of the war was the disaster of the siege, whose victims were civilians, most of them children, who came into the light of day to live a short and tragic period of time, all of it torture. The horrifying verse in the Book of Lamentations has been fulfilled in the people of Biafra, “ They that are slain with the sword are better than they that are slain with hunger.”
Eban added that “the bloated Biafran child, with their thin limbs and large eyes demanding compassion, was the symbol of the ignominy of the generation.” In the eyes of many in the world, the way Israel has conducted the war in Gaza is the ignominy of the current generation.
In August 1968, the acting charge d’affaires of the Israeli embassy in Lagos, Emmanuel Ron, reported that the heads of the federal government who suppressed the rebellion in Biafra complained that criticism of them was unjustified because “starvation is an accepted weapon in wars and has been a legal means in the wars of advanced nations and there is no reason why Nigeria should behave differently.” Similarly, Netanyahu’s far-right government and its supporters claim that Israel is receiving unfair criticism from the world for its blockade of Gaza.
Instead of taking the global criticism seriously, which most western/democratic countries share, and also facing the indisputable facts — the Netanyahu government totally blocked the entry of humanitarian aid on March 2, decided on an aid program that initially promised only a “minimum of food,” and during its implementation, IDF forces killed hundreds of hungry people who came to receive food, while a “national sport” of refuting the photographs from Gaza has developed in Israel, in which officials, journalists, influencers, and others participate.
The research conducted by those who indulge in that refutation is not complicated, since in most cases the information about the underlying illnesses of the children and infants in the photographs has already been published in the international media or by their families and doctors in Gaza. It is no big surprise. It probably makes sense that the first victims would be people in high-risk groups, with underlying conditions and weak organ systems, who need specific food and medical care and are also more sensitive to the consequences of the deterioration in health among the entire population that Israel has concentrated in a huge density.
Therefore, the method of denial of the famine in Gaza is most reminiscent of the denial of the coronavirus pandemic in Israel. On that occasion too, there were those who conducted “research” to reveal to the public that the hospitalised and deceased suffered from underlying conditions. This is despite the fact that the Ministry of Health was open about the matter anyway and its representatives repeatedly asserted that the pandemic particularly endangers them and people from other high-risk groups.
The situation created by a series of reckless decisions made by the Netanyahu government even managed to transcend the White House’s walls. US Vice President JD Vance said: “I don’t know if you’ve all seen these images. You have got some really, really heartbreaking cases. You’ve got little kids who are clearly starving to death, […] “Israel’s got to do more to let that aid in,”.” President Trump said: “I want people to get food now […] Some of the children are really hungry, I see that, you can’t fake that.”
In response, the Netanyahu government, simultaneously and in a self-contradictory fashion, continues to argue that there is no famine, and that if there is famine, Hamas and the UN are solely to blame, but has agreed to airdrop humanitarian aid and also to allow additional ground paths for its entry into the Strip.
We must not allow this to become a temporary gimmick just to ride out the wave of criticism until the world’s attention shifts elsewhere. After 21 months of war, the health impact on the starving people in Gaza has been cumulative, and a small, short-term relief will not be able to undo the harm until Israel flicks the switch again in the opposite direction.
Consistently in polls, most Israelis support ending the war and ensuring that all the captives are freed. That is not enough. Until the long-awaited end of the war, those same Israelis must also make their voices heard about how the war it is being prosecuted and demand the removal of all barriers to the free entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza. An Israeli citizen cannot claim that the Netanyahu government does not represent them and at the same time remain silent in the face of one of its most immoral and cruel actions.
There was a time when the Knesset also thought so. On 22 July 1968, it passed a resolution regarding the war in Biafra, calling on the warring parties “to allow the transfer of aid of substantial magnitude to those in need, by land, sea and air. Until the conflict is resolved, it would be unacceptable to impede any aid necessary to save the lives of women and children and to ensure food and all help for the hungry and suffering of members of the Ibo and other tribes.”
This was true then for Biafra and is true today for Gaza.
