Worldwide Actions to Stop the Killing in Gaza

Palestinian Authority Ambassador Supports Oasis Plan. The Schiller Institute in Denmark conducted an hour-long video interview with the Palestinian Authority Ambassador to Denmark, H.E. Ambassador Prof. Dr. Manuel Hassassian, on March 13, in which the Ambassador expressed his anguish about the death and destruction in Gaza and in the West Bank, and the lack of support for ending the war among Western political leaders. He gave full support to LaRouche’s Oasis Plan and the concept of peace through development.

The interview covers the urgent need to stop the current genocide in Gaza, and the violence and oppression in the West Bank, as well as the necessary recognition, by the UN and the international community, of an independent Palestinian state, and what it will take within Israel to get there. The video of the interview can be seen here.

New Report on Irreparable Physical and Psychological Damage to Children of Gaza. The Save the Children charity has just published a devastating report documenting the terrible toll that Israel’s five months of warfare against the people of Gaza has taken on Palestinian children, 13,000 of whom have been killed and tens of thousands more wounded. Entitled, Trapped and Scarred, the Compounding Mental Harm Inflicted on Palestinian Children in Gaza, the report exposes how “five months of violence, displacement, starvation, and disease on top of nearly 17 years of a blockade have caused relentless mental harm to children in Gaza.”

Parents and caregivers who spoke with representatives of the NGO said that children’s capacity to even imagine a future without war has virtually disappeared. Mental health and child protection experts cited in the report warned that without urgent action, starting with an immediate, definitive ceasefire and “safe, unfettered humanitarian access, the war will inflict further lifelong detrimental mental harm, with rapidly shrinking opportunities to recover”. The hunger, destruction of healthcare infrastructure and rampant disease compound the disaster. The lack of medication caused by Israel’s siege has meant that “many little arms and legs have been sawed off without anesthesia,” Save the Children reports. “Screams and prayers fill the air of makeshift operating rooms, as Israel’s relentless onslaught has obliterated Gaza’s hospitals, clinics and healthcare infrastructure.”

A UNICEF report, issued March 15, indicates that 31%, or 1 in 3 children under 2 years of age in the northern Gaza Strip, suffers from malnutrition, which is a 15.6% increase from January. The report warns that malnutrition is spreading fast, and reaching “devastating and unprecedented levels,” due to the “wide-reaching impacts of the war and ongoing restrictions on aid delivery.”

Nicaragua Charges Germany with Complicity in Genocide. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has scheduled hearings for April 8-9 on the proceedings against Germany instituted March 1 by Nicaragua. The Application accuses the German government of aiding and abetting genocide in the Gaza Strip by supporting Israel politically, financially and militarily, when it knew that the military equipment would be used to commit “serious breaches of international law”. In addition, it points to the cut-off of assistance to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), although the government was “perfectly aware of the deadly impact” that would have.

Therefore, Nicaragua calls on the ICJ to oblige Germany to immediately suspend arms deliveries to Israel, insofar as they could be used to violate the Genocide Convention and other mandatory provisions of international law, and also to resume payments to the UNRWA. The initial hearings concern summary measures to be taken, with Nicaragua presenting its arguments on April 8 and Germany presenting its defense the following day.

The legal proceedings against Germany may well have contributed to Chancellor Scholz’s sudden trip to Israel March 17, where he at least called on Prime Minister Netanyahu to increase deliveries of humanitarian aid to Gaza, and in a whopper of an understatement, said the Palestinian death toll was “much too high”.