How Many Dead Palestinian Children Are Enough?

How many dead children is it going to take before Israel and its Zionist supporters are satisfied? What is the number that needs to be met before governments in the West intervene? When will the United States and other countries stop selling weapons and funding the genocide of children? This is a serious question.

Because after 19 months of genocide, Israel has reportedly killed 17,492 children. Many more are buried under rubble and presumed dead, but not included in this running total of children killed.

Clearly, 17,492 is not enough dead children, since Israel continues to kill one child in Gaza every 45 minutes, an average of 30 children killed every day.

As of March 2, Israel has cut off all aid to Gaza. Israel has blocked food, water, and medicine from reaching the 2.3 million people in Gaza. “A million children in Gaza depend on humanitarian aid. Their lives are hanging in the balance,” said Juliette Touma, director of communications for the UN Relief and Works Agency.

The United Nations’ emergency relief coordinator said the halting of humanitarian aid amounts to “cruel collective punishment.”

The human beings under siege in Gaza are not starving; they are being deliberately starved. There is a very clear distinction between the two.

But apparently, it’s still not enough dead children. Israel broke the latest ceasefire agreement on March 18. The Gaza Health Ministry says 2,326 people, including 732 children, have been killed since that day when Israel shattered the truce. The overall death toll since the war broke out is at 52,418.

Again, how many dead children are enough?

Zionists answer that they want their hostages back. And yet Israel continues to break ceasefires and fails to agree to further “prisoner”-for-hostage swaps. Does anyone honestly believe that Israel’s intentions are to bring home the hostages? Netanyahu recently admitted that it’s not about the hostages, it’s about eliminating Hamas.

This is ethnic cleansing, pure and simple. The goal is to eliminate Palestinians from both Gaza and the West Bank, as well as Jerusalem, the same goal Israel has had since 1948 during the Nakba, translated as the catastrophe, referring to the displacement of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. Before the Nakba, Palestine was a multi-ethnic and multicultural society. Between 1947 and 1949, at least 750,000 Palestinians from a 1.9 million population were made refugees beyond the borders of the state. To this day, a large portion of the Palestinian population remain refugees, living in camps.

As a Jew, I am well aware that Israel has been systematically killing children for 77 years. This is not new. What is new is the world is watching children blown to literal pieces, and having limbs torn off by United States missiles, while watching on their smartphones. They are watching schools and mosques being bombed. Hospitals. Bakeries. Journalists. NGOs providing food and aid.

Again, how many dead children is enough?

Gary Smith has contributed essays and columns to Newsweek, Jewish Journal, VegConomist, Moment Magazine, Tricycle Magazine, Jewish Chronicle, Jewish Independent, Mother Nature Network, Elephant Journal, and to several books. He lives in Los Angeles.