To The Daily Sun,
Marc Abear claims: "Before the Hamas War a de facto three-state solution was in place. Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza were all separate states with separate governments," and, "Israel was content to live next to autonomous Arab Gaza and the West Bank."
That's preposterous. Before October 7, Israel had killed over 30,000 Palestinians. Gaza has been blockaded to various degrees since the 1990s. Since 2007, it's been an open-air prison. The World Bank estimated that the 1996 blockade caused a 40% drop in Gaza's GNP. In January 2003, the UN Conference on Trade and Development found that the Israeli blockade had drained $2.4 billion from the Palestinian economy. The blockades limit the entry of products to a humanitarian minimum.
In 2010, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs stated that the blockade collapsed the Gazan economy. Beginning in 2012, Israeli officials started counting calories to determine how much food they would allow Gazans. Gazans have no seaport or airport because Israel blocks exit and entry into Gaza by sea or air.
Freedom of movement barely exists. Exports are heavily restricted. These economic warfare tactics deliberately stunt economic development. Since 1967, the West Bank has been a military-occupied apartheid state. Settlers and Palestinians have different rights, laws, courts, and punishments. Armed checkpoints, roadblocks, and barriers restrict Palestinian movement. It's a police state.
Mr. Abear supports Israeli war crimes because Hamas committed them, claiming "no nation can win a war without using disproportionate violence to hurt the enemy more than it is hurt."
Disproportional violence, indiscriminate attacks, targeting without distinction, and collective punishments are prohibited by the Geneva Conventions and are war crimes under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Israel is a rogue nation and doesn't care about international laws. Evidently, neither does Marc Abear.
James Veverka
Laconia
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