In his column in the New York Times, Nicholas Kristof started from the story of a 10-year-old girl in Gaza. Her father was an X-ray technician. She was smart and spoke English well. She had been accepted into an international exchange program, and had to travel to Japan to meet a bright future that awaits her, but now she lies in a hospital bed with a severe wound to her thigh and part of her femur bone missing as a result of a bomb explosion.

Dr. Samer Al-Attar, the orthopedic surgeon who cared for the girl and told me about it, says Nicholas Kristof, says the girl needs to have her hip amputated to save her life, and her father is struggling to come to terms with how his life and the life of his daughter have collapsed.

Nicholas Kristof mentions that he covered many bloody wars, and wrote scathingly about how governments in Russia, Sudan, and Syria recklessly bombed civilians, but the matter is different this time, because “my government stands by what President Joe Biden referred to as indiscriminate bombing, and because I am this time helping pay for the bombs as a taxpayer."

While the writer understands Israel's reaction, the military response is not just one of two options without a third. Israel chose to respond with bombs weighing about two thousand pounds, destroying entire neighborhoods, and allowing a small amount of aid to enter the region, which is now teetering on the brink of famine. The result is This does not appear to be a war against the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), but rather against the entire population of Gaza.

Responsibility for collusion

Nicholas Kristof wondered how Americans, with their conflicting views due to the war, could confront their friends from Gaza, pointing out that they might remain silent, or look away, instead of entering into a bitter and polarizing debate that might cost friendships, but “indifference is the most insidious danger.” Not at all,” says writer Elie Wiesel, who also said that “human suffering anywhere concerns men and women everywhere.”

The writer warned that the suffering of children - and half of Gaza's population is children - "should raise our particular concern," noting that estimates by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) indicate that there are at least 17,000 children in Gaza who are unaccompanied or separated from their families. In the midst of the chaos of war and displacement.

Some will blame all of this on Hamas, but - for Nicholas Kristof - this seems to be an evasion of moral responsibility, because Israel and America have the ability to act, and “the atrocities suffered by Israeli civilians” do not justify leveling Palestinian neighborhoods to the ground.

The writer wondered how Biden criticizes Russia for bombing civilians and undermining the rules-based international order, while he himself supplies Israel with bombs that wipe out neighborhoods in Gaza, and how he gives diplomatic cover to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at a time when the residents of Gaza are facing famine, especially since he suspended funding for His country to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Refugees (UNRWA), which is responsible for providing assistance to them.

The writer concluded that decisions related to waging war are painful, because innocent civilians always suffer, stressing that a smart 10-year-old girl in Gaza is as valuable as the life of any American or Israeli child, “and therefore we Americans must bear responsibility.” “We are complicit in her tragedy and the tragedy of Gaza as a whole.”

Source: New York Times + Aljazeera