The rise in international pressure over Gaza should be welcomed

On Tuesday, Australia joined with 27 countries including Canada, Denmark, France, Ireland, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK to condemn Israel for the deaths of hundreds of Palestinians seeking aid. The countries also demanded an end to restrictions on food and medical supplies. A ceasefire was needed now.

“The suffering of civilians in Gaza has reached new depths. The Israeli government’s aid delivery model is dangerous, fuels instability and deprives Gazans of human dignity,” the nations said.

Palestinians gather to collect aid from a distribution point in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza, on Sunday.Credit: Bloomberg

Australia’s Home Affairs Minister, Tony Burke, went further. Many of Israel’s actions were “indefensible”. Burke said on ABC radio: “We’re all hoping that there’ll be something that’ll break this. We’ve seen too many images of children being killed, of horrific slaughter, of churches being bombed.”

The statement also called for the release of Israeli hostages “cruelly held captive by Hamas since 7 October 2023 [who] continue to suffer terribly”. Hamas must release the hostages and Israel must heed the international message and pull back its military actions.

The statement followed the deaths of at least 79 people on Sunday near a UN food aid convoy at the Israel border. They were seeking flour. On Saturday, more than 30 died near two aid centres in southern Gaza.

It is in Gaza that mothers, fathers and children are starving to death, that tens of thousands are in various stages of malnutrition leading to starvation, that people are dying from gunshots and missile fire while trying to reach humanitarian aid. It is there that tens of thousands have died following the indiscriminate massacre of 1200 Israelis across the border.

A Palestinian man carries food collected from a humanitarian aid distribution point.Credit: Bloomberg

A ceasefire, of course, is not the end of a war. It is impossible to know what Israel’s endgame is. Will the war be over when Israel has built a “humanitarian city” – critics call it a “concentration camp”, including former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert – for Palestinians, initially 600,000 on the ruins of Rafah, then expanding to take in 2.2 million? The 28 nations hit out against the Israeli proposal. “Permanent forced displacement is a violation of international humanitarian law,” the joint statement said.

In the past few days, the military has pushed into the southern and eastern districts of the Gazan city of Deir al-Balah, which had been removed from the conflict. Thousands of Palestinians had sought refuge there.

It is also impossible to see peace rise from the ashes while Hamas has any semblance of power.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry has described Tuesday’s statement as “disconnected from reality”. It failed to put pressure on Hamas, the ministry said. “Hamas is the sole party responsible for the continuation of the war and the suffering on both sides.”

Australian federal opposition frontbencher Jonathon Duniam criticised the government’s involvement in the joint statement, saying it blamed Israel for Hamas’ disruption of aid. Zionist Federation of Australia president Jeremy Leibler said the Australian government and the international community should focus their efforts on pressuring Hamas to surrender. These are not unreasonable criticisms. In this hell, however, there are many realities.

International aid to Gaza was replaced several months ago from established NGOs to the US and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. Last week the UN Human Rights Council disclosed that almost 900 people had died while trying to get food, two-thirds of them near GHF sites. Malnutrition stalks the lives of Gazans. In May, more than 5000 children under the age of five were treated for acute malnutrition.

The Age supports the joint statement from Australia and the other nations. International pressure may not be the catalyst for a ceasefire, but it cannot help but be a factor. And it is the only lever many of these nations have to pull, short of the wide-ranging sanctions and embargoes the Greens and pro-Palestinian activists have called for.

“War is hell” is a phrase attributed to American Civil War general William Tecumseh Sherman almost 200 years ago.

In 2025, hell can be found on that thin strip of land called Gaza. A statement alone is not enough to change that, but it does send a clear message about the international community’s intolerance for continued destruction.

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