Israel/Gaza links for January 3

I'll include a few items here that were posted separately over the holiday period, but there also several new items.

A powerful interview with Israeli journalist Gideon Levy on the absence of any criticism of the Israeli war in Gaza (except calls for it to be even more brutal).  Lots of interesting content.   (Some annoying ads, however.)  (Thanks to S. Wallerstein for the pointer.)

Since Israel can't actually dismantle Hamas, what is the real goal?

The public health disaster in Gaza may become a public health disaster for Israel.

One quarter of Gaza's population may die within the year from bulletts, bombs, and disease: 

An estimated 85% of Gaza’s inhabitant are already displaced according to the UN Relief and Works Agency. Experts analysing previous refugee displacements estimate in the Lancet that crude mortality rates (that is deaths per 1,000 people) were more than 60 times higher than when each conflict began, on average. Extrapolating this to the current situation in Gaza, where the crude death rate before the conflict was 3.82 in 2021 (relatively low because of its young demographic), mortality rates could reach 229.2 in 2024 if the conflict and displacement continue at the current level of intensity, and Gazans continue to lack access to sanitation, medical facilities and permanent housing.  Ultimately, unless something changes, the world faces the prospect of almost a quarter of Gaza’s 2 million population - close to half- a million human beings - dying within a year. These would be largely deaths from preventable health causes and the collapse of the medical system. It’s a crude estimate, but one that is data-driven, using the terrifyingly real numbers of deaths in previous and comparable conflicts.

Sexual violence during the Hamas atrocities of October 7.  It's beyond creepy that some folks still insist on denying this (for example).  Sexual violence is a frequent tool of war, and given the barbarity of the October 7 attack, it's hardly surprising it included sexual violence against women as well.

The current atrocities in Gaza are too much even for Thomas Friedman.

A four-year-old girl in Gaza lost her leg in a bombing:  her story.

I probably won't do many more of these link roundups, the whole thing is just too ghastly at this point.  Israel totally blew the response to the October 7 atrocities, and has now exceeded them with its own crimes.