White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre holds the daily press briefing at the White House on Oct. 16, 2024, addressing a letter the Biden administration sent warning the Israeli government that it may withhold arms, setting a 30-day deadline for Israel to improve Palestinians’ access to food, medicine and other necessities. Photo by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images

Columnist Dan Perry October 16, 2024

The Biden Administration is pressing Israel to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza, threatening to withhold munitions essential for its multi-front war unless aid flows increase, to levels agreed on earlier in the year, within 30 days. This has reignited global outcries accusing Israel of “starving” Gazan, but the deeper truth is that the friction attaches to wider frustrations with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s conduct of the war.

It is undeniable that the plight of Gaza civilians is dire, with Israel not challenging claims that tens of thousands of civilians have been killed and many hundreds of thousands displaced. The Biden administration’s humanitarian concerns are reasonable, but there has in fact been relatively little evidence of starvation — which, if purposeful, would be illegal.

International humanitarian law, particularly the Geneva Conventions, explicitly prohibits the starvation of civilians as a method of warfare. Article 54 of Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions forbids the destruction or removal of objects indispensable for civilian survival, such as food and water. If Israel were doing this, pressure would be well-founded.

But there is little confirmed evidence of mass starvation in Gaza. While Israel did temporarily withhold supplies at the start of the conflict, brief blockades alone do not lead to starvation, especially when stockpiles and resources already exist. Water, for instance, is vital, but humans can survive without it for two or three days — indicating that infrastructure and resources were sufficient during the short-term blockades.

Israel has since allowed the passage of humanitarian aid, albeit in limited quantities, through monitored channels. Supplies such as food, water, and medical aid have reached Gaza, but much of it is intercepted by Hamas, which resells it and hoards it for its fighters. 

If the humanitarian position is not exactly clear, Netanyahu’s war strategy is even more obtuse.  There is widespread stupefaction, from Washington to the security establishment in Tel Aviv, that Israel’s war strategy has so dramatically clashed with the country’s traditional doctrine of short and effective campaigns.  Brief, intense wars take into accounthe country’s small population, delicate diplomatic situation and economic vulnerability to global isolation.

For much of the past year, the Biden Administration has taken heat for supporting Israel, for without the US  munitions supply and diplomatic umbrella on the world stage the war could not have possibly gone on. Throughout, the prime minister has refused Biden’s pleas — echoed by most reasonable players in Israel itself — for a concrete plan for the day after Hamas, involving an alternative Palestine government that would need to start preparing. 

This has fueled far-from-unfounded theories that Netanyahu is deliberately prolonging the war to delay political accountability for the Oct. 7 massacre, when 1,200 Israelis were killed in a surprise Hamas attack after the Gaza border was left unguarded under Netanyahu’s  administration’s extraordinarily incompetent oversight.

For all of Israel’s successes against the Hezbollah militia in the second front in the north, the original incompetence has continued to plague the military in Gaza. 

Many argue that, despite the challenges of dismantling a terrorist organization like Hamas, Israel could have pursued a shorter and more effective campaign. A plausible approach might have been to start operations in the south, clearing the population and sealing off the border with Egypt to prevent smuggling. From there, Israeli forces could have moved to the north, forcing the population into central Gaza, isolating Hamas fighters, and strategically cutting off their ability to maneuver. Civilians could have been allowed to return to the north and south while Hamas was cornered in the middle of the strip.

Instead, Israel chose to begin in the north and has been playing a game of cat and mouse, leaving pockets of Hamas fighters across Gaza. A year later, Hamas, though degraded, remains capable of commandeering aid shipments and operating throughout the territory. 

There is no endgame in sight, and Netanyahu appears even to have lost interest in negotiating the return of 101 hostages — some of them believed dead —whom Hamas still holds captive. Having lasted this long, the fiasco threatens to even affect the Nov. 5 election in the United States, as it has become a wedge issue complicating the Democrats’ campaign. Many Israelis are convinced that is Netanyahu’s plan: Dragging things out in hopes that Donald Trump is elected, thus presumably removing all guardrails for Israel.

Ironically, some of the humanitarian concerns about Israel’s intentions attach to the so-called “Generals’ Plan,” which Netanyahu is leaning toward as his  current strategy. This plan, widely attributed to retired Israeli Major-General Giora Eiland and backed by many of his fellow retired colleagues, advocates for the evacuation of approximately 400,000 people still residing in northern Gaza to the south, creating a closed military zone in the north. 

The plan, in fact, is an effort to instill a more strategic approach to the war —and aims to conduct operations without risking civilian lives and reduce the pressure of collateral damage. Those who evacuate would receive basic humanitarian provisions, such as food and water. 

But human rights organizations warn that this strategy could trigger a humanitarian disaster if safe corridors are not properly established or if civilians are trapped in crossfire. There have already been reports that Hamas is actively preventing civilians from fleeing dangerous areas, complicating the situation further.

The plan has sparked concerns internationally, as forced displacement of this scale could be interpreted as ethnic cleansing under international law. Sadly, that concern is amplified by the emergence within Israel of hardline voices, including Eiland himself,  suggesting that no civilians in Gaza are truly “innocent.” This is not just harsh — it borders on criminal. 

Moreover, there are calls on the Israeli right to annex parts of Gaza as punishment. Just this week, Likud Knesset member May Golan — who once described herself as “proud to be a racist” — proposed a tour around Gaza with a focus on rebuilding Jewish settlements, a deeply provocative idea that could inflame tensions further.

While this is certainly not government policy — and would be opposed by the large majority of Israelis — it does align with the lack of any “day-after” strategy for Gaza. Netanyahu has refused to discuss any form of governance for Gaza following the defeat of Hamas, leaving a dangerous vacuum in the planning process. This has left the door open for extremists.

This entire edifice of incompetence and chaos is the background to the current US pressure on Israel.  But despite the many frustrations surrounding the conduct of the war, it is essential to root discussions in facts. If civilians are being deprived of humanitarian aid, Israel must act swiftly to rectify that. However, the claims of mass starvation and collective punishment should be critically examined, as there is limited reliable evidence to support these accusations.

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