The Age | Waleed Aly | 31.05.2024
This was out and out planned murder – just like EVERY action taken by the Israeli Governments over 75 years – murder of people, dreams and hope – Mark
Whoops. Perhaps no sentiment in the mouths of Western leaders and their allies is so laden with blood. This week’s iteration comes from Benjamin Netanyahu after Israel’s catastrophic airstrike in Rafah, which set fire to a tent city, incinerating Palestinian civilians who had been specifically told this would be a safe zone.
As I write, the reported death toll is at 45 with some 60 more injured, but that doesn’t begin to tell the story. It’s the manner of it that suffocates.
“The tents are melting and the people’s bodies are also melting,” said one resident in hospital. “We pulled out children who were in pieces,” said one man who rushed to the scene. “We pulled out young and elderly people. The fire in the camp was unreal.” Whoops.
“Regret” said one Israeli major-general. Or in Netanyahu’s phrase, “something unfortunately went tragically wrong”. Elsewhere in the same speech he blamed a “technical failure”, presumably to be detailed once Israel finishes investigating the incident. But the overall message is clear:
“Unfortunately, in the past day there was a tragic event in which our forces unintentionally harmed non-combatants in the Gaza Strip. This happens in war. We are conducting a thorough inquiry … We will do everything to prevent a recurrence.”
Oh, sorry, that last quote was what Netanyahu said after an Israeli strike killed seven aid workers last month. Whoops.
“This happens in war.” That phrase reveals a little more than intended. Israel tends to offer this as a defence; as a way of categorising such events as sad, yet ultimately unavoidable. These things are not done, they just happen. And war does not happen without them.
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