The current genocide in Gaza is said to be the most widely publicized genocide in history. Of course, this is all thanks to social media. Social media allows anyone with a phone and an internet connection to spread information around the world in seconds. And despite illusions of a ceasefire, the massacres continue to this day.
Official Palestinian estimates say around 70,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel in two years of genocide. However, some estimates suggest that the total amount is as much as 10 times higher. The brutality is astonishing.
Perhaps most surprising is the toll this has taken on children. At least 20,000 children have been killed by Israel, according to a September 5 report from Save the Children. Quoting from that report: “At least 1,009 of the children killed were under the age of one, and of those, almost half (450) infants were born during the war and died in action. At least 42,011 children were injured and, according to the Ministry of Health, The Human Rights Commission reports that at least 21,000 children are left with permanent disabilities, and thousands more are estimated to be missing or buried under rubble.” Anyone with even a modicum of moral sense would be appalled by these numbers.
But that’s not the end. The report continued: “Israeli forces have intensified shelling across the Gaza Strip, damaging 97% of schools and 94% of hospitals, killing children, who are seven times more likely to die from explosion injuries than adults. Their bodies are more vulnerable to trauma, often sustaining different types of injuries, and require specialized treatment tailored to their physiology and development.”
The damage is not just physical. For those who survived, the psychological damage is severe. An Al Jazeera report on October 31 this year stated: “Psychologists warn that more than 80 per cent of children in Gaza are now showing symptoms of severe trauma.” The report details the suffering of several children. One is a 15-year-old boy who currently suffers from high blood pressure, chronic diarrhea, and kidney failure, all caused by a traumatic experience he witnessed. Another is 8-year-old Lana, who survived an Israeli airstrike that collapsed the roof of her home. She developed vitiligo, a chronic skin disease that causes loss of skin, hair, and eye color as a result of exposure to missile smoke and chemicals. “Many doctors tried to treat her, but without success,” her father said. “Every time she hears an explosion, she panics.” The above man has suffered both physical and mental trauma.
A UNICEF report of October 26 this year summarized the situation as follows: “One million children bear the scars of fear, loss and grief as they endure the daily horrors of surviving in some of the world’s most dangerous places during their childhood.”
What is the world’s responsibility to these children, the 20,000 people who were killed, and the tens of thousands of others who have to live with physical and mental hardship for the rest of their lives? A Middle East Monitor report on November 10 said: “Despite the right to protection declared for every child in the world, international organizations remain silent in the face of the devastation in Gaza. The body is silent when it comes to Palestinian children. This silence threatens the future of children everywhere, not just in Gaza, because when rights are applied selectively, they are no longer ‘universal’ and have no credibility.”
“On November 20, 1989, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child, promising every child the universal rights to life, protection, education and health. On paper, all children are equal. But in Gaza, where dozens of children are killed and injured every day, claims of universality have become empty slogans.”
“When war broke out in Ukraine, the international community mobilized immediately. Funds were opened, schools were prepared for refugees, and the media kept the issue in the spotlight for weeks. But in Palestine, the same childhood, the same rights are being ignored. This silence proves that children’s rights work differently depending on geography.” Let me add that these rights also differ by race.
In Canada, where I live, the government initially offered to take in 1,000 Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, but later raised that cap to 5,000. To date, less than 1,000 Palestinians have arrived in Canada from the Gaza Strip, but the Canadian government has provided little support for their arrival. Most desperate refugees had to pay traffickers to take them from Gaza to Canada.
Compare this to Ukrainian refugees who were admitted to Canada. Thanks in part to the tireless efforts of the Canadian government, 298,128 Ukrainian refugees have been brought to Canada to date. Almost 1,000,000 applications were approved.
In a recent study conducted by me, Melai Sadek and Neela Hassan, Professor Sadek writes, “The more refugees resemble Canadian ideals (white, Western, liberal), the more likely they are to be seen, heard, and helped. The system is not designed to grant refuge that is not tied to a particular nation-state, making their suffering legally and politically invisible.”
Therefore, “…compassion in Canada’s refugee system is conditional. It is applied most readily to those who fit Canadian norms in terms of race, religion, language, or lifestyle. Those who do not fit are often seen as burdens, threats, or ungrateful.”
Let’s look at other examples of how children in conflict zones have been supported by world governments and compare them to how those governments treat Palestinian children.
A report in the Times Colonist on September 2 this year stated: “One year after the devastating rocket attack on Ukraine’s largest children’s hospital, which killed four people and injured 12 others, the century-old facility is preparing to reopen with support from the Canadian Red Cross.” A United Nations Development Program (UNDP) report from April this year said: “The United Nations Development Program (UNDP), with financial support from the Government of Latvia, has completed the renovation of Early Childhood Education Facility No. 19 and the kitchen building of the Chernihiv Regional Children’s Hospital. These facilities are among the war-damaged sites restored under the project “Latvia for Chernihiv: Rehabilitation of Social Infrastructure”.”
The United States has been complicit in the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza from day one, and in August revoked all visitor visas for people coming from Gaza. According to a BBC report, “The Palestine Children’s Relief Fund said in a statement that the decision ‘will have a devastating and irreversible impact on the ability to bring injured and seriously ill children from Gaza to the United States for life-saving treatment.'” According to an Aug. 17 report in German news site DW, the cancellation came “after the US-based charity Heal Palestine announced last week that it had brought 11 seriously injured Gazan children, along with their caregivers and siblings, to the US for treatment.” The humanitarian trip attracted the attention of far-right influencer Laura Loomer, who claimed without evidence that some of these medical visas were issued to “pro-Hamas” people. Based on this, the US canceled all visas.
The so-called ceasefire was supposed to provide only a slight relief from Israel’s brutal bombing and allow food and medicine to flow into Gaza. Nothing like this has happened. Oxfam said on October 29 this year: “With the fragile ceasefire agreement in jeopardy, Oxfam and other aid organizations are ready to scale up to deliver more food, clean water and medicine to millions of Palestinians in need. Despite overwhelming need, the Israeli government continues to allow only a small portion of needed humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip.”
Let’s take a look at the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Section 1 of Article 25 reads in part: “Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and his family, including food, clothing, shelter, health care and necessary social services.” Section 2 includes the phrase “Mothers and children have the right to special care and support.”
The arrival of food, water and medicine should not have been included in the ceasefire agreement. The world should have demanded an end to Israel’s blockade, which deprived the people of Gaza of basic necessities on the very day the blockade began. History will not look kindly on the countries and their leaders who stood by and tolerated this atrocity against men, women, and children. Schools will teach about this period in the same way they teach about the Holocaust. In other words, the brutal and racist leaders of one country massacred hundreds of thousands of defenseless citizens of another country. Add to that the fact that many developed countries not only condoned it, but were complicit in these war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Who can look at photos of dead children, including babies, burned, mutilated, and almost unrecognizable and not blame those responsible? Who wouldn’t want to stop this atrocity when they see children so emaciated that their bones are exposed due to lack of food? We must ask, where are the so-called leaders of “civilized” societies? We cannot expect any humanity from US President Donald Trump. He has shown contempt for those suffering at home and abroad. But what about Canada’s Mark Carney? British Keir Starmer? French Emmanuel Macron? These countries have recently “officially” recognized Palestine, largely in accordance with the continued demands of their populations. According to the Harvard Law Review, “State recognition is the formal recognition by another state that an entity qualifies as a state,” such as a defined territory, a permanent population, governmental control, or the ability to engage in international relations. Canada, the United Kingdom, France, and the 157 of the 193 United Nations member states that recognize Palestine must insist, through all diplomatic means, including the toughest sanctions, that Israel end its starvation and bombing of Palestinian children and adults.
The world has failed the Palestinian people for over 75 years, but that failure has been evident to the entire world since October 2023. We must continually strive for justice for Palestinians and hold accountable all those responsible for their suffering.
Robert Fantina (American writer and human rights activist)
This article was presented at a conference on “Children: Victims of Violence in War and Terrorist Incidents” organized by the Habilian Association (Families of Victims of Terrorism in Iran) and held on the occasion of World Children’s Day.