Israel’s war on Gaza A reading list
Regions
Since the deadly attacks by militant group Hamas on 7 October, Israel has launched an indiscriminate bombing campaign of the besieged enclave of Gaza and imposed collective punishment on its 2.3 million residents cutting off water, food and vital fuel supplies – acts that constitute war crimes under international law. UN experts, Genocide and Holocaust scholars, legal practitioners and academics from around the world have urgently sounded the alarm on genocide and crimes against humanity. This war forms part of a decades long colonialist system of apartheid, violent occupation and oppression, imposed by Israel on the people of Palestine to dispossess them of their homeland.
The following content sheds light on the most recent developments from Gaza, while also providing context through articles, reports and videos from our archive.
Palestine Liberation series
-
Framing Palestine Israel, the Gulf states, and American power in the Middle East
Publication date: -
African attitudes to, and solidarity with, Palestine From the 1940s to Israel’s Genocide in Gaza
Publication date: -
Failing Palestine by failing the Sudanese Revolution Lessons from the intersections of Sudan and Palestine in politics, media and organising
Publication date: -
Sustainability fantasies/genocidal realities Palestine against an eco-apartheid world
Publication date: -
Vietnam, Algeria, Palestine Passing on the torch of the anti-colonial struggle
Publication date:
9 October 2024 - Video
More land, less Palestinians: Former DU professor Achin Vanaik on Israel’s ideology
The News Minute
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=PC_DgDlnUIU
9 October 2024 - Article
Arab monarchs have the weapon to stop war on Gaza: Prof Achin Vanaik
The Siasat Daily
https://www.siasat.com/arab-monarchs-have-the-weapon-to-stop-war-on-gaza-prof-achin-vanaik-3108965/
4 October 2024 - Video
Trump, Netanyahu & the Weaponizing of Fear One Year After October 7
Laura Flanders and Friends
https://lauraflanders.org/2024/10/trump-netanyahu-the-weaponizing-of-fear-one-year-after-october-7/
30 September 2024 - Video
Phyllis Bennis: Talk about ceasefire means nothing as long as we continue to send weapons and troops
IPS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDC9kSUKUqs
9 September - Longread
Pipeline to genocide
Energy Embargo for Palestine
https://www.tni.org/en/article/pipeline-to-genocide
5 September - Article
EU Complicity in Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza
As European institutions begin another five-year term in Brussels, it’s worth highlighting the extent to which the EU is complicit in genocide.
Niamh NÍ Bhriain
https://socialistvoice.ie/2024/09/eu-complicity-in-israels-genocidal-war-on-gaza/
Longread
The psychology of oppression and liberation
What would Fanon say about the ongoing genocide in Palestine?
Hamza Hamouchene
https://africasacountry.com/2024/06/the-psychology-of-oppression-and-liberation
13 June - Longread
Framing Palestine: Israel, the Gulf states, and American power in the Middle East
An alternative approach to understanding Palestine – one that is framed by the wider region and the Middle East’s central place in our fossil fuel-centred world.
Adam Hanieh
www.tni.org/en/article/framing-palestine
04 June - Publication
Partners in Crime - EU complicity in Israel’s genocide in Gaza
Since the attacks of 7 October, the EU has provided political cover and material support for Israel. This has continued through almost eight months of unrelenting bombardment with almost 40,000 people killed, the forced displacement of 2.3 million people, the fastest descent into starvation of an entire population ever recorded and the total destruction of Gaza’s civilian infrastructure including homes, hospitals, schools and universities, places of worship and bakeries.
Niamh Ní Bhriain, Mark Akkerman
https://www.tni.org/en/publication/partners-in-crime-EU-complicity-Israel-genocide-Gaza
31 May - Article
3D Roundup: An Indefinite Occupation?
Featuring Edward Said, Isabella Hammad, Ilan Pappé and Simone Zimmerman. With deep dives into settler extremism on the West Bank and Israel's dark plans for Gaza.
Jerome Roos
https://therift.blog/p/edward-said-isabella-hammad-israel-palestine
28 May - Article
What Does Left Internationalism Mean in the 21st Century?
Israel’s genocide in Gaza has put international concerns front and center for the US left today. Jacobin spoke with three leading internationalist organizers about how leftists should think about international solidarity in the 21st century.
Phyllis Bennis, Bill Fletcher Jr, Van Gosse
jacobin.com/2024/05/left-internationalism-palestine-multipolar-geopolitics
23 May - Article
The Students Are Right: Universities have no business investing in the war machine
Over the past month, students have been rising up against Western support for the Gaza war and in solidarity with the Palestinian people from California to Kyoto. They’ve had enough: no longer will they allow their governments and universities to be complicit in war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Jerome Roos
therift.blog/p/student-protests-divest-israel-palestine-gaza
10 May - Article
Out-Organise the Enemy! Eqbal Ahmad and the liberation of Palestine
In 1969, at the Association of Arab-American University Graduates (AAUG) convention, Eqbal Ahmad delivered a stark message: the Palestinian liberation movement would fail if it relied solely on armed struggle. He argued for a broader strategy, combining military with political and ideological tactics. The aim was to bring about the moral isolation of Israel by exposing the violence and racism that Zionism, as a form of settler colonialism, had to rely upon. Today, that goal might finally be within reach.
Arun Kundnani
www.tni.org/en/article/out-organise-the-enemy
09 May - Video
Phyllis Bennis comments on US withholding arms package Israel
Phyllis Bennis
https://mediaview.aljazeera.com/video/1oTEcxSytT
1 May - Article
As College Campuses Erupt in Protest, Some See a Political Transformation
The pro-Palestine movement is growing and drawing on precedents from Vietnam to Black Lives Matter, suggesting that unequivocal US support for Israel may be on borrowed time
Arun Kundnani
26 March - Article
UN Security Council's Gaza Cease-Fire Resolution Is Not Enough—But It's a Start
Despite weaknesses and false U.S. claims that the resolution is nonbinding, it demands an end to the bombing and a massive influx of humanitarian aid. And that means the possibility of saving lives.
Phyllis Bennis
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/un-security-council-ceasefire-resolution-gaza
29 February - Article
Uncensored Black History Offers Lessons in Global Struggles for Liberation
Unearthing Black internationalism’s legacy can inform our fight for liberation in Palestine — and beyond.
Khury Petersen-Smith
https://ips-dc.org/uncensored-black-history-offers-lessons-in-global-struggles-for-liberation/
28 February - Article
The Biden Administration Joins Israel’s War on UNRWA
Following Washington’s lead, key US allies have cut funding for the United Nations Relief Works Agency for Palestine—making them all complicit in genocide.
Phyllis Bennis
https://www.thenation.com/article/world/us-israel-funding-unrwa-palestinians/
15 February - Article
War on Gaza: How Germany's left has failed Palestinians
Recent anti-racism protests seemed geared towards appeasing the Israel lobby, as politicians appear afraid to take a stand.
Josephine Valeske
https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/war-gaza-germany-left-wing-failed-palestinians-how
12 February - Longread
States must act now to stop Israel's genocidal war on Gaza
On 26 January, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled on the South Africa v. Israel case. Outside the Hague courthouse, hundreds watched, and millions online tuned in. Since the ruling, Israel plans a full-scale invasion of Rafah in Gaza, where 1.5 million seek shelter. Urgent action is needed to enforce the ruling. A Dutch court bans fighter jet component export, a crucial step. Other states must follow suit to halt the genocide.
Niamh Ní Bhriain
https://www.tni.org/en/article/states-must-act-now-to-stop-israels-genocidal-war-on-gaza.
18 January - Article
The US Attacks on Yemen Are a Dangerous Escalation
The United States’ strikes on Yemen are threatening to spark a wider regional conflict. To prevent further violence, the US must demand an end to Israel’s criminal assault on Gaza.
Phyllis Bennis
https://jacobin.com/2024/01/us-attacks-yemen-gaza-escalation
18 January - Article
No More Business as Usual
Our observations from the Hague as South Africa takes Israel to the International Court of Justice
Niamh Ní Bhriain, Brid Brennan
https://www.tni.org/en/article/no-more-business-as-usual
17 January - Article
The Only Solution to the Violence in Yemen and the Red Sea is a Cease-Fire in Gaza
U.S. strikes on Yemen are threatening a wider regional war. Diplomacy, not bombs, is the way to avoid a dangerous escalation.
Phyllis Bennis
https://inthesetimes.com/article/yemen-red-sea-houthis-gaza-palestine-israel
12 January - Article
South Africa’s Case of Genocide by Israel
South Africa presented a compelling, comprehensive detailed evidence based plaint on day one in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) hearing, to show that Israel is committing a gruesome genocide against the Palestinian people of Gaza, with the intent of wiping out Palestinian people of Gaza. South Africa made a strong appeal that provisional measures of the Genocide Convention be invoked with urgency and the ICJ pass a binding order that directs Israel to suspend all military campaigns in Gaza, since the people of Gaza are in mortal danger and no assistance can be provided to them without such suspension of military operations.
Anuradha Chenoy
http://www.defenddemocracy.press/south-africas-case-of-genocide-by-israel/
11 January - Article
The Case of Genocide in Gaza by Israel and the International Court Of Justice (ICJ)
What everyone with open eyes and a cell phone witnessed 24 x7 for 3 months as Israel massacred Palestinians of Gaza is now being adjudicated in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague under the Genocide Convention brought into law by the United Nations in 1948. This case has been brought to this highest Court by South Africa, with a detailed application, where each point is substantiated with recorded and indisputable evidence.
Anuradha Chenoy
8 January - Article
A Crack in a 75-year-old Wall of Impunity: South Africa Challenges Israeli Genocide in Court
South Africa’s painstakingly compiled genocide case against the Israeli government isn’t just an important legal document — it’s a rallying cry for civil society.
Craig Mokhiber, Phyllis Bennis
2024
23 December - Article
The UN security council caves to US pressure to prevent a ceasefire
Phyllis Bennis
20 December - Article
The Christmas Truce of 1914 and the Demand for a Cease-Fire in Gaza
The World War I phenomenon should remind us of the urgency to end the mass killings—and to help us realize that a cease-fire to stop the violence is within reach.
Phyllis Bennis
https://inthesetimes.com/article/christmas-truce-1914-wwi-gaza-israel-palestine-ceasefire
19 December - Longread
“All Roads Lead to Jerusalem”
A Lucrative Border Industrial Complex
Petra Molnar
https://www.tni.org/en/article/all-roads-lead-to-jerusalem
18 December - Article
Israel, US campuses, and the fragility of the coloniser
Amid Israel's genocide in Gaza, silencing Palestinians is crucial to the colonial project that sees any indigenous resistance as a threat, writes Arun Kundnani.
Arun Kundnani
https://www.newarab.com/opinion/israel-us-campuses-and-fragility-coloniser
18 December - Article
Some facts for the unconvinced: Why we need a Gaza Ceasefire Now
Why we need a ceasefire to save lives, release the hostages, prosecute war crimes, and follow international law: a guide for those still uneasy, unconvinced, or uncertain.
Phyllis Bennis
https://fpif.org/why-we-need-a-gaza-ceasefire-now/
15 December - Video
VIDEO: How to Reverse Gaza’s Humanitarian Crisis — And Hold the Perpetrators Accountable
Watch this powerful briefing by IPS on the crisis in Gaza and international law.
Phyllis Bennis, Hani Almadhoun, Craig Mokhiber, Khury Petersen-Smith
8 December - Article
Yemen Has a Long Tradition of Solidarity With the Palestinian People
Yemen’s Huthi movement attracted global attention by seizing an Israeli-linked ship in the Red Sea and firing rockets toward Israel. They felt obliged to act because of the strong, historically rooted support for Palestinians among the Yemeni people.
Helen Lackner
https://jacobin.com/2023/12/yemen-israel-palestine-houthis-ships-red-sea-solidarity
22 November - Article
The ‘Humanitarian Pause’ in Gaza Proves Diplomacy Works. Now We Need a Real Ceasefire.
A quick FAQ on the agreement between Israel and Hamas to release hostages and pause the fighting.
Khury Petersen-Smith, Phyllis Bennis
21 November - Blog
World Fisheries Day and the crucial role of Gaza’s fishers
On 26 September 2023, the Gaza General Union of Fishworkers was admitted as a member of the World Forum of Fisher Peoples (WFFP). The fishworkers’ Union represents Gaza’s 4,000 fishers and an even larger number of women who repair fishing gear, clean fish and sell it at the markets. It was a day of celebration for the fishworkers’ union, established just a few months earlier in Gaza with the support of the Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC). It was also a moment for the global fisher movement, WFFP, to reconfirm its international solidarity with the fisherfolk in Gaza. In the new set of resolutions endorsed by its leadership, the WFFP states “we stand in solidarity with our fisherfolk in Gaza and demand an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine”.
Carsten Pedersen
https://www.tni.org/en/article/world-fisheries-day-and-the-crucial-role-of-gazas-fishers
21 November - Article
The false equivalence of the colonized and colonizer
Choosing to focus on denouncing Palestinian violence is akin to asking them to passively accept their fate—to die quietly and not resist.
Hamza Hamouchene
https://africasacountry.com/2023/11/the-false-equivalence-of-the-colonized-and-colonizer
21 November - Webinar recording
Webinar: Intransigent power & mass uprising for Palestine
Michael Arria, Isaac Kamola, Arun Kundnani, Mitri Raheb, and host Jenny Kelly.
20 November - Article
From Osama to Gaza: The Unravelling of the US Position in the Middle East
The wreckage of the American position in the Middle East traces back not only to recent events but to a chain of occurrences in which one man, Osama bin Laden, played a central role.
Walden Bello
17 November 2023 - Opinion
In supporting Israel's genocide, Germany has learnt nothing from history
It is becoming increasingly clear that as the German government targets migrants and cracks down on pro-Palestine protests, some lives are more valuable than others
Josephine Valeske
14 November 2023 - Opinion (in Spanish)
De Argelia a Palestina: la falsa equivalencia entre colonizado y colonizador
Denunciar y señalar la violencia de los oprimidos y colonizados no solo es inmoral, sino también racista. La población colonizada tiene derecho a resistir por cualquier medio necesario, especialmente cuando todas las vías políticas y pacíficas se han estancado u obstruido.
Hamza Hamouchene
https://www.elsaltodiario.com/opinion/argelia-palestina-falsa-equivalencia-colonizado-colonizador
11 November 2023 - Article
Some questions for the 234 representatives who voted to censure Rashida Tlaib
You say you object to the slogan, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” Where in the lands between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea do you think Palestinians should not be free?
Arun Kundnani
10 November 2023 - Opinion
European complicity in war crimes in Gaza
Even amid the horror in Gaza, some EU member states have been busy doing business with Israel approving lucrative arms deliveries, in the full knowledge that they will be used against a civilian population under siege.
Niamh Ní Bhriain
https://euobserver.com/opinion/157676
9 November 2023 - Article (in French)
De l’Algérie à la Palestine, la fausse équivalence entre le colonisé et le colonisateur
La guerre n’a pas commencé en Palestine le 7 octobre dernier, elle s’enracine dans une histoire coloniale de plus d’un siècle et dans une vaste entreprise de nettoyage ethnique qui a débuté en 1948 avec l’expulsion de plusieurs centaines de milliers de Palestinien-nes de leurs terres, de leurs villes, de leurs villages, de leurs maisons. De même, la question de la violence en situation coloniale est posée depuis longtemps, et le parallèle avec la guerre de libération nationale en Algérie – victorieuse face au colonialisme français – peut nous éclairer, comme le défend dans cet article Hamza Hamouchene.
Hamza Hamouchene
https://www.contretemps.eu/algerie-palestine-colonisation-violence-oppression/
3 November 2023 - Article
We Need an Immediate Ceasefire in Gaza
"Millions of innocent Gazans are in danger. Half are children who’ve lived through five wars already."
Phyllis Bennis
https://www.juancole.com/2023/11/need-immediate-ceasefire.html
1 November 2023 - Article
Islamophobia in the US is rooted in its unconditional support for Israel
Tracing the rise of Islamophobia, from the 1973 oil embargo to Trump's election to Hamas's attack, Arun Kundnani argues that support for Israel is central. But Americans are finally starting to see through the smokescreen of anti-Muslim propaganda.
Arun Kundnani
https://www.newarab.com/opinion/islamophobia-us-rooted-total-support-israel
24 October 2023 - Opinion
Imagine you’re a Palestinian youth
What would you do to rectify the historical injustice visited on your people?
Walden Bello
https://fpif.org/imagine-youre-a-palestinian-youth/
24 October 2023 - Opinion
The EU's funding and support for Israeli arms companies
Following the deadly 7 October attacks by militant group Hamas, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and European Parliament president Roberta Metsola reassured Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu that "Israel can count on the EU".
As they met in Tel Aviv, Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) indiscriminately bombed the besieged enclave of Gaza and imposed collective punishment on its 2.3 million residents cutting off food, water and fuel — acts that constitute war crimes under international law.
In the same way that the clock on Israel's occupation of Palestine didn't start on 7 October, neither did the EU's friendship with Israel.
Niamh Ní Bhriain
https://euobserver.com/opinion/157594
21 October 2023 - Article
No, Israel Is Not Making the Desert Bloom
For decades, Israel has boasted of “making the desert bloom,” as if Palestinians never even existed. As Israel today pushes Gazans toward mass dehydration, we should remember its longstanding efforts to colonize land through its control of the water supply.
Manal Shqair
https://jacobin.com/2023/10/israel-settler-colonialism-greenwashing-eco-normalization-water-energy
Related to http://www.plutobooks.com/9780745349213/dismantling-green-colonialism/
19 October 2023 - Article
Israel’s War on Palestinians: Language in the Service of the Unspeakable
It is extraordinary that Israel, the occupier, calls for a ‘war’ against the occupied.
Let us start with acceptance of a fundamental moral-political reality. The relationship between the Palestinians in the occupied territories and Israel is that of the oppressed vis-à-vis the oppressor.
Achin Vanaik
https://thewire.in/world/israels-war-on-palestinians-language-in-the-service-of-the-unspeakable
7 October 2023 - Video
Phyllis Bennis on Al Jazeera: We Need an Immediate Ceasefire in Gaza
We can maintain our “grief and outrage” over the killing of Israeli civilians while still fighting to prevent a “potential genocide” in Gaza.
https://ips-dc.org/phyllis-bennis-on-al-jazeera-we-need-an-immediate-ceasefire-in-gaza/
16 October 2023 - Article
Revisiting an Interview with a Leader of Hamas
Nearly two decades ago, the "most wanted man" in Lebanon discussed Israel, intra-Palestinian relations, and the prospects for liberation.
The momentous events in Gaza and Israel the past week brought back to my attention an interview my former colleague Marylou Malig and I did with a Beirut-based leader of Hamas nearly two decades ago that was published in the Indian periodical Frontline.
https://fpif.org/revisiting-an-interview-with-a-leader-of-hamas/
16 October 2023 - Article
Both Israelis and Palestinians Are Victims of Israel’s Apartheid System
The answer to Hamas’s horrifying crimes isn’t to kill innocent Gazans — it’s to change the conditions from which this brutality sprang.
Phyllis Bennis
https://ips-dc.org/both-israelis-and-palestinians-are-victims-of-israels-apartheid-system/
14 February 2023 - Longread
Seeing the World Like a Palestinian – Intersectional Struggles against Big Tech and Israeli Apartheid
With collaboration of Big Tech, Israeli state has rolled out ever more digital tools to spy, surveil and repress Palestinians in order to entrench its apartheid rule. Palestine is at the sharp end of digital colonialism and therefore a critical place for global resistance to begin.
Apoorva PG
https://www.tni.org/en/article/seeing-the-world-like-a-palestinian
May 2021 - Longread
Israel: the model coercive state and why boycotting it is key to emancipation everywhere
Israel’s arms and security industry has become an intrinsic part of the apartheid regime. It is not only present in the brutal violence of the bombing of Gaza and the constant harassment and dispossession of Palestinians, it is also shaping the coercive dimensions of states everywhere, bringing the politics and methodology of occupation to other countries and regimes.
Alys Samson Estapé
https://longreads.tni.org/stateofpower/israel-the-model-coercive-state
May 2021 -Infographics
Israeli – A Militarised State
State of Power 2021 Coercive World
https://longreads.tni.org/state-of-power-2021/israel-infographics
10 February 2020 - Article
Trump's Middle East 'Peace Plan' Is a Step Towards Institutionalising Apartheid
The ‘deal of the century’ demands that Palestinians officially accept that Israel has no responsibility for its inaugural act of ethnic cleansing and all brutalities on Palestinians since.
Achin Vanaik
13 November 2018 - Report
Shrinking Space and the BDS Movement
A widening pattern of repression of social movements has taken shape around the world. Everywhere, space for dissent is shrinking rapidly. Governments and corporations alike are working to suppress and silence movements, organisations and individuals who organise against repression. This shrinking of public space threatens virtually all social movements. Around the world, the legality, physical safety, and public access of dissident movements and civil society more broadly are being threatened. This report examines the legal and political pressure exerted on the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) Movement, a global campaign aimed at pressuring Israel to end human rights violations, launched in 2005 by a group of Palestinian activists.
Bina Ahmad, Ben White Phyllis Bennis
https://www.tni.org/en/publication/shrinking-space-and-the-bds-movement
12 November 2018 - Article
Will Europe use Israeli drones against refugees?
'Combat proven' drones that were employed during Israel’s three major attacks on Gaza over the past decade may soon be used to monitor Europe's borders.
Mark Akkerman
https://www.tni.org/en/article/will-europe-use-israeli-drones-against-refugees
18 May 2018 - Article
It remains our obligation to respond
Over the last six weeks the Israeli-Palestinian conflict reached its lowest point since the 2014 Gaza war. The Palestinian protests on the Gaza border that started on March 30 under the name 'Great March of Return', turned into massacre on May 14.
Phyllis Bennis
https://www.tni.org/en/article/it-remains-our-obligation-to-respond
5 January 2015 - Video
Defying US and Israel – Will ICC Membership bring justice to stateless and occupied Palestinians?
Phyllis Bennis and Ali Abunimah about the move opposed by the United States and Israel, Palestinian leaders have submitted a request to join the International Criminal Court and sign over a dozen other international treaties.
Phyllis Bennis, Ali Abunimah