Will the Israel-Iran Ceasefire Bring Calm to Gaza?
News roundup from Israel/Palestine
With so much confusion and misinformation circulating, I wanted to offer a quick roundup of what liberal and progressive Israelis and Palestinians on the ground in Israel/Palestine are saying as this shaky Iran-Israel ceasefire takes hold.
Already many Israelis have been calling for the ceasefire between Israel and Iran to be extended to Gaza. The Hostages and Missing Families Forum wrote on X in Hebrew, “The ceasefire that took effect this morning must also include Gaza.”
This sentiment was echoed by Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid, who wrote on social media that, following the Israel-Iran de-escalation, “Now we need to bring back the hostages and end the war in Gaza.”
For context, we should remember that, as the missiles flew between Israel and Iran, the Israeli military continued its assault on Gaza unabated.
Throughout the past twelve days of hostilities, the Israeli human rights monitor B’Tselem posted simple, bold graphics to Instagram with the daily death toll in Gaza:
On June 17th, the Israeli military killed 111 people, 68 of whom were waiting in line for humanitarian aid.
On June 18th, 88 Palestinians killed, 31 of whom were waiting in line for aid.
On June 19th, 112 people, 22 in line for aid.
Even today, Israeli forces killed at least 40 Palestinians in Gaza according to local medics. "Enough!” Adel Farouk, a 62-year-old resident of Gaza City, told Reuters. “The whole universe has let us down. Hezbollah reached a deal without Gaza, and now Iran has done the same… We hope Gaza is next."
Outside of Gaza, Palestinian and Israeli civil society groups are sounding the alarm about Israeli settlers accelerating their land grabs under the cover of the Iran-Israel war.
In occupied East Jerusalem, the Israeli organization Peace Now warned today that six Palestinian families are about to lose their homes to settlers after the Israeli High Court rejected Palestinian appeals and ordered their eviction. Peace Now posted on X, “The settlers are trying to displace a whole community of some 700 Palestinians and replace them by settlers,” adding that, “This is done through discriminatory laws, that allow Jews to reclaim property lost in the 1948 war, while another law denies Palestinians the same right.”
Further south in the West Bank, in Masafer Yatta, Palestinian communities are anxious about the news from June 18 that Israel’s Higher Planning Council for the West Bank has issued a final decision, designating the entire area as a live-fire training zone for Israeli forces (so-called “Firing Zone 918”).
I have personally been receiving urgent pleas from my friends and colleagues in this region, where I spent three months as a human rights volunteer back in 2022. I received one message from a friend that read: “For the sake of the residents of Masafer Yatta who are clinging to their land with their fingernails, stop and think: to whom can I forward this appeal? Who can raise their voice, exert pressure, and stop the eviction? This is a struggle for life, for existence, for the future, for basic justice” (emphasis added).
Making the problem even worse, Palestinians across the West Bank have been living under lockdown by the Israeli army since the Israel-Iran war broke out. The Israeli-Palestinian +972 Magazine reported that “after striking Iran, the army reduced Palestinians’ movement to a near-total standstill — sealing off towns and cities with iron gates, closing checkpoints between the West Bank and Jerusalem, and shutting down the Allenby border crossing with Jordan.”
Calls to extend the ceasefire to Gaza. Ongoing atrocities in the starving coastal enclave, even against those lining up for food aid. Intensifying ethnic cleansing and colonization in the West Bank. Netanyahu’s government is clearly operating on all fronts simultaneously. It seems to me that the liberal-progressive opposition must do the same.