HUMANITARIAN TAKEAWAYS: GAZA |
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Dear friends of CHA,
This is the eighth issue of Humanitarian Takeaways with the focus on the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.
Our selected pieces aim to provide various perspectives (with a specific focus on the local ones) on the different aspects concerning the situation in the Gaza Strip. They explore the community priorities and perceptions of aid and support in Gaza; the defunding of UNRWA; the humanitarian situation in Rafah; the International Court of Justice ruling, including the responsibility of third states in this regard; as well as the risk of famine and the allegations of the crime of starvation in Gaza. Additionally, this issue features a visual investigation by The Guardian detailing the mass destruction of buildings and land in three neighbourhoods in Gaza.
In case you have missed our previous issues, here they are: Takeaways #1 on gender equality, #2 on locally led humanitarian action, #3 on anti-racism in aid organisations, #4 on the climate crisis, #5 on digital transformation, #6 on German foreign and humanitarian policy, and #7 on the triple nexus.
We hope that you find these Takeaways helpful in your work and remain open for your comments or suggestions.
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By GTS and AWRAD (01/2024)
Article length: 19 pages
(Sub)topics: Gaza; safety; basic needs; displacement; coping strategies; aid access; access to information.
In this recent paper, Ground Truth Solutions (GTS) and Arab World for Research and
Development (AWRAD) explore how communities in Gaza have been supporting each other; what aid access looks like to people on the ground; what people’s main priorities are and what they want the international community to know.
This report contains insights by 613 adult Gazans collected between late December 2023 and 2 January 2024. The research methods include a survey questionnaire, 20 in-depth interviews, and three case studies conducted to complement and enrich the analysis.
The research underlines that people in Gaza are living in constant fear: fear of the bombs, fear for their and their loved ones' safety, fear of further displacement, and fear of what happens if they run out of life-sustaining supplies. Only 9% of the people who participated in this research say they feel safe where they are right now, 24% feel safe “sometimes” and the remainder do not feel safe at all, at any time. Most (97%) say that they have nowhere to go or do not know where they could go in case they need to leave their current location. The main call on the international community is therefore to stop the violence. People’s critical survival needs, including access to food and water, are not being met. People worry about access to baby formula and the lacking support for children with allergies. Access to medication is very limited, and specific support is needed for people with disabilities and chronic illnesses, women, and older persons.
At the same time, people's coping abilities are way down because of critical food and water shortages, constant violence and inability to find safety, a lack of money, exhaustion, sadness, depression, and a lack of privacy. Constant pollution, both from the bombardment and from having to cook by burning firewood, poses additional challenges to coping. People’s primary source of support is family members. At the time of being surveyed 89% of people did not know how to access formal humanitarian assistance. Of those who have been able to access it, the majority say it was not enough. Additionally, more than 80% of the surveyed people believe the aid process to be unfair.
Both access to and trust in information is limited. The main source of information is word-of-mouth information from friends and family, closely followed by a radio transmission. This report finds that very few people see humanitarian organisations as a trusted information source.
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Blog, opinion, and interview articles |
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By Alexandra Blackman and Richard Clark, assistant professors at Cornell University (The New Humanitarian, 14/02/2024)
In this opinion article, Cornell University's assistant professors Alexandra Blackman and Richard Clark argue that "the United States, European countries, and other major donors must re-evaluate their concerns about the UN’s agency for Palestine refugees in light of the imperative to aid vulnerable populations and take immediate steps to renew funding for UNRWA’s vital humanitarian mission amidst the ongoing crisis in Gaza". The authors highlight that the UNRWA case represents the risk inherent in most international organisations, which must be balanced against the vital work of providing critical services to vulnerable populations in conflict zones.
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By Nasma, a Mercy Corps staff member based in Rafah (The New Humanitarian, 13/02/2024)
In this article, a Mercy Corps staff member describes life in the sliver of southern Gaza where 1.2 million people are sheltering in desperate conditions. She describes people "sleeping in the streets, in public buildings, and in any other available empty space", the damaged infrastructure, and "up to 700 people use[ing] a single toilet next to the tents, schools, or evacuation shelters where people who have been displaced now live, queueing for hours for their turn". Food, clean water, medicine, tents, and sanitary products are lacking, and digging equipment is needed to rescue people still lost under the rubble. Diseases and infections are at an all-time high.
This reflection was written before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the Israeli military to prepare plans for a ground invasion of Rafah and for the "evacuation" of the population from the area.
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By Jinan Bastaki, associate professor of Legal Studies at New York University, Abu Dhabi (OpinioJuris, 05/02/2024)
In this blog article, associate professor Jinan Bastaki analyses the implications of the ICJ's recognition of the plausibility of genocide for third-states, particularly state parties to the Genocide Convention. Bastaki draws on the Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro (“Bosnia v Serbia”) judgement in 2007, which explained state responsibility regarding the prevention of and complicity in the commission of genocide. Bastaki notes that "a state can be held responsible when it omits to act with the available lawful means when it could have. There is heightened responsibility for states that have the capacity to influence the state committing genocide due to, inter alia, the strength of their political ties. [...] The responsibility, moreover, is to act to prevent genocide, regardless of whether these actions are likely to succeed or not."
Additionally, "states must not be complicit in the commission of the genocide itself." Here, complicity includes a positive action, and the state in question has to be aware of the intent to commit genocide. Bastaki therefore argues that "the mere issuance of provisional measures by the Court, detailing the destruction (South Africa v Israel, paras. 46-49) and dehumanizing language (paras. 50-53) that make the risk of genocide plausible, triggers at the very least the duty to prevent since all states are now aware of the serious risk of genocide and the urgency of the case".
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By Eric Reidy, editor and reporter (The New Humanitarian, 18/01/2024)
In this interview, Executive Director of the World Peace Foundation Alex de Waal explains that "a famine* declaration requires thresholds to be met in terms of food availability and livelihoods, malnutrition, and excess mortality. Only if those three are met for a specific location is a famine declared. If one is met and there is a fear that the others will in due course be met, then it's called catastrophe, and the famine warning may be issued. And that's what's happened in the case of Gaza." De Waal adds that there is "prima facie evidence that Israel is committing the war crime of starvation; that it is destroying objects indispensable for the survival of the civilian population on a very large scale and in a reckless manner that is leading to enormous humanitarian suffering". According to de Waal, the speed and the comprehensiveness of this destruction in Gaza is exceptional, and no amount of aid provided will remove the risk of famine if the destruction of objects indispensable to survival continues.
* Famine is the worst phase (no 5) of food insecurity according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification System (IPC). Here you can find more information on the situation in the Gaza Strip.
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By Sorcha O'Callaghan, Ayesha Khan, Kathryn Nwajiaku-Dahou, Theo Tindall, Leen Fouad, Cecilia Milesi (ODI, 08/11/2023)
In this article, the ODI researchers and senior staff maintain that "international humanitarian law has been consigned to a footnote, an afterthought" in the Israeli–Hamas conflict, and that "the double standards are evident" in terms of acknowledging the suffering inflicted by Israeli bombing on Palestinian civilians. The latter also relates to the continuous marginalisation of Palestinian voices by Western governments and media. The authors state that "calls for a ‘humanitarian pause’ are a distraction and a derogation of humanitarian responsibilities" and that "only a ceasefire can stop the bloodshed".
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A podcast episode by ODI (08/02/2024)
In this podcast episode hosted by ODI's Chief Executive Sara Pantuliano, Kate Mackintosh (Executive Director, UCLA Law Promise Institute Europe), Raz Segal (Associate Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Stockton University), Ronak Gopaldas (Director, Signal Risk), and Sorcha O’Callaghan (Director of Programme, Humanitarian Policy Group) discuss what the last month's ICJ interim ruling means for Israel, Gaza, and wider geopolitical relations.
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Visual investigation by Niels de Hoog, Antonio Voce, Elena Morresi, Manisha Ganguly, and Ashley Kirk (The Guardian, 30/01/2024)
This Guardian investigation published on 30/01/2024 details the mass destruction of buildings and land in three neighbourhoods in Gaza: Beit Hanoun, al-Zahra, and Khan Younis. The investigation used satellite imagery and open-source evidence, and found damage to more than 250 residential buildings, 17 schools and universities, 16 mosques, three hospitals, three cemeteries, and 150 agricultural greenhouses. The scale of destruction in Gaza has led some experts to describe it as “domicide”, understood as the widespread, deliberate destruction of the home to make it uninhabitable, preventing the return of displaced people.
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A collection of insights by multiple authors (HPN, 26/10/2023)
This is a collection of insights by humanitarian practitioners on the humanitarian situation in Gaza and Israel, submitted between October 2023 and February 2024.
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