Affichage des articles dont le libellé est Gaza genocide. Afficher tous les articles
Affichage des articles dont le libellé est Gaza genocide. Afficher tous les articles

25/03/2026

‘Torture and Genocide’, a new report by Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese

On March 23, 2026 a new report by UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese to the Human Rights Council was published, with the title ‘Torture and Genocide. Here is a brief abstract. The report can be downloaded, by clicking on the image below.

Torture and Genocide in Palestine: A Systemic Policy

The report by the UN Special Rapporteur exposes a stark reality: the torture inflicted on Palestinians is neither incidental nor exceptional. It is a central pillar of a system of colonial domination and an ongoing genocidal process.

For decades, Israel has embedded coercive violence within its mechanisms of control. However, since October 2023, an unprecedented escalation marks a qualitative shift: torture has become massive, openly endorsed, and directed against the Palestinian people as a whole. It no longer targets individuals alone, but a population “as such.”

In prisons and detention camps, testimonies describe a regime of extreme brutality: beatings, sleep deprivation, deliberate starvation, sexual violence, and systematic humiliation. Children, doctors, journalists, and humanitarian workers are arrested, tortured, and in some cases killed. Bodies are broken, minds shattered, lives destroyed. This violence is not a deviation—it is coordinated, institutionalized, and publicly justified.

But torture is not confined to detention sites. The report demonstrates that the entire occupied Palestinian territory has been transformed into a “torturing environment.” In Gaza, siege, famine, mass bombardment, and the destruction of hospitals, schools, and homes create permanent collective suffering. The entire population is trapped in a space where death, fear, and deprivation are constant.

In the West Bank, pervasive surveillance, settler violence, forced displacement, and the destruction of livelihoods extend this logic. Daily life itself becomes a form of torture—an existence defined by insecurity, humiliation, and constant threat.

International law is clear: torture is absolutely prohibited. But the report goes further. It shows that the systematic use of torture against a group is a key indicator of genocidal intent. By inflicting widespread physical and psychological harm, destroying living conditions, and targeting social structures, Israel is implementing a strategy aimed at weakening, fragmenting, and ultimately erasing the Palestinian people.

This system is not sustained by the military alone. It is reinforced by legislation, validated by courts, legitimized by political discourse, amplified by media, and normalized within parts of society. Torture thus becomes a collective enterprise, socially produced and politically defended.

The report’s conclusion is unequivocal: the ongoing genocide also manifests as continuous, collective, and generational torture. These are not isolated acts, but a coherent architecture of destruction.

In the face of this, international inaction is no longer tenable. States have a legal obligation to prevent, investigate, and prosecute these crimes. Ending torture also requires ending the system that produces it: occupation, apartheid, and settler colonialism.



18/03/2026

Jürgen Habermas: In Lieu of an Obituary

In the first two or three quarters of his life, he had belonged to that Germany we loved—the Germany of “Dichter und Denker” (poets and thinkers)—only to end his long existence (96 years) on the side of the “Richter und Henker” (judges and executioners). Jürgen Habermas passed away on March 14. He no longer had the time or the strength to declare his support for Operation Epic Fury/Silent Holy City [sic & resic], unleashed by the well-known duo of executioners against the land that gave rise to Ibn Sina (Avicenna), Omar Khayyam, Rumi, Al-Ghazali, Suhrawardi, Al-Razi, Al-Farabi, Mulla Sadra, and… Ali Shariati. Having become a sacred cow of self-righteous but wrong-acting Germany, Habermas, shortly after October 7, 2023, committed an infamous text of unconditional support for the Zionist killers. This ultimate perversion of his own “communicative action” earned him a stinging response from an Iranian sociologist, a professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Asef Bayat, author of extremely creative works on social movements in the Mashreq and the Maghreb. We reproduce it below in lieu of an obituary, as it was first published in New Lines Magazine.-FG, Tlaxcala

Jürgen Habermas Contradicts His Own Ideas When It Comes to Gaza

One of the world’s most influential philosophers has weighed in on the war in Gaza. A Middle East scholar tells him why he’s wrong

Asef Bayat, December 8, 2023


Philosopher Jürgen Habermas (left) and sociologist Asef Bayat (right). (Louisa Gouliamaki/AFP via Getty Images)

Editor’s note: Jürgen Habermas and Asef Bayat are towering global thinkers. Their books have been translated into multiple languages and are taught in universities throughout the world. Habermas is part of the pantheon of the legendary Frankfurt School of critical theory, along with the late Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer and Herbert Marcuse. Yet he is perhaps best known for his ideas about the “public sphere” — a realm where citizens come together to debate matters of general concern and “public opinion” is formed, which he traces back to coffeehouses and literary salons in 18th-century Europe — and as a defender of liberal democracy against its critics on both the left and the right. He is no stranger to the challenge that Bayat poses in this open letter; his very public debates and intellectual battles over many decades have made him a household name in Germany.

Bayat is a sociologist of the contemporary Middle East best known for his concept of “post-Islamism” and for his textured studies of street politics, everyday life and how ordinary people change the Middle East (the subtitle of his 2013 book, “Life as Politics”). Habermas has been widely criticized for his recent statements on the Gaza war, but what distinguishes this open letter is its immanent critique: Bayat sets out to show how Habermas fails to apply his own ideas to the case of Israel-Palestine. It is a critique from within the logic of Habermasian thought. This gives it a force that will — or should — resonate with Habermas and his defenders. It is more of an invitation than a polemic. It is an attempt to engage, and we publish it here in hopes that it will do just that.-New Lines

Dear professor Habermas,

You may not remember me, but we met in Egypt in March 1998. You came to the American University in Cairo as a distinguished visiting professor to engage with the faculty, students and the public. Everyone was enthusiastic to hear you. Your ideas on the public sphere, rational dialogue and democratic life were like a breath of fresh air in a time when Islamists and autocrats in the Middle East were stifling free expression under the guise of “protecting Islam.” I recall a pleasant conversation we had on Iran and religious politics over dinner at the house of a colleague. I tried to convey to you the emergence of a “post-Islamist” society in Iran, which you later seemed to experience on your trip to Tehran in 2002, before you spoke about a “post-secular” society in Europe. We in Cairo saw in your core concepts a great potential for fostering a transnational public sphere and cross-cultural dialogues. We took to heart the kernel of your communicative philosophy about how consensus-truth can be reached through free debate.

Now, some 25 years later, in Berlin, I read your co-authored “Principles of Solidarity” statement on the Gaza war with more than a little concern and alarm. The spirit of the statement broadly admonishes those in Germany who speak out, through statements or protests, against Israel’s relentless bombardment of Gaza in response to Hamas’ appalling attacks of Oct. 7. It implies that these criticisms of Israel are intolerable because support for the state of Israel is a fundamental part of German political culture, “for which Jewish life and Israel’s right to exist are central elements worthy of special protection.” The principle of “special protection” is rooted in Germany’s exceptional history, in the “mass crimes of the Nazi era.”

It is admirable that you and your country’s political-intellectual class are adamant about sustaining the memory of that historic horror so that similar horrors will not befall the Jews (and I assume, and hope, other peoples). But your formulation of, and fixation on, German exceptionalism leaves practically no room for conversation about Israel’s policies and Palestinian rights. When you confound criticisms of “Israel’s actions” with “antisemitic reactions,” you are encouraging silence and stifling debate.

As an academic, I am stunned to learn that in German universities — even within classrooms, which should be free spaces for discussion and inquiry — almost everyone remains silent when the subject of Palestine comes up. Newspapers, radio and television are almost entirely devoid of open and meaningful debate on the subject. Indeed, scores of people, including Jews who have called for a ceasefire, have been fired from positions, had their events and awards canceled and been accused of “antisemitism.” How are people supposed to deliberate about what is right and what is wrong if they are not allowed to speak freely? What happens to your celebrated idea of the “public sphere,” “rational dialogue” and “deliberative democracy”?

The fact is that most of the critics and protests you admonish never question the principle of protecting Jewish life — and please do not confuse these rational critics of the Israeli government with the disgraceful far-right neo-Nazis or other antisemites who must be vigorously condemned and confronted. Indeed, almost every statement I have read condemns both Hamas’ atrocities against civilians in Israel and antisemitism. These critics are not disputing the protection of Jewish life or Israel’s right to exist. They are disputing the denial of Palestinian lives and Palestine’s right to exist. And this is something about which your statement is tragically silent.

There is not a single reference in the statement to Israel as an occupying power or to Gaza as an open-air prison. There is nothing about this perverse disparity. This is not to speak of the everyday erasure of Palestinian life in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem. “Israel’s actions,” which you deem “justified in principle,” have entailed dropping 6,000 bombs in six days on a defenseless population; well over 15,000 dead (70% of them women and children); 35,000 injured; 7,000 missing; and 1.7 million displaced — not to mention the cruelty of denying the population food, water, housing, security and any modicum of dignity. Key infrastructures of life have vanished.

14/03/2026

Normalized Trauma, Traumatized Normalcy – The Palestine Exhibition “Kalanlar Filistin” in Istanbul

On March 30, 2026, the solidarity exhibition "Kalanlar Filistin" [What remains of Palestine] closes its doors after three months in Istanbul Harbiye. Milena Rampoldi of ProMosaik visited this exhibition for us and reports on her impressions. 

Milena Rampoldi, March 14, 2026

At first glance, this exhibition organized by the Turkish cultural association Kalyon Kültür would be seen as the narrative of the Zionist destruction of Palestinian life (family, school, childhood, culture) and thus as a material presentation of the Zionist genocide. However, what really counts here, if you are in the middle of the exhibition and experience it, is not the brutal destruction that you perceive on the surface, but what is “left” and lives on after the destruction.


It is about everything that Zionism cannot hit, namely the soul, resistance and humanity. In fact, the title of this innovative exhibition, which somehow turns classical museum pedagogy and its dialectical paradigms completely upside down, could be translated as “What remains of Palestine”.

What remains and stays after the bombings and airstrikes of the Israeli military, the symbol and essence of new colonialism in the Middle East, are human dignity, the spirit of resistance and the Palestinian humanity of an oppressed people, but who are by no means the victims of this destruction. 

The visitor enters into an empathic dialogue with the war reality of Palestine, which is “recreated” in the exhibition premises. The visitor loses all distance, his empathy is the result of the abolition of any dialectic between his safe and stable existence in Istanbul-Harbiye and the genocide in Gaza. However, the visitor is not there to perceive Palestine as an object in the sense of Edward Said and to pity it as a do-gooder, but to appear as a witness for Palestine and to leave the exhibition as a witness.

Like the testimony in the Qur'an, the testimony of a historical event is not a right, but an obligation. And this commitment leads to ethical responsibility. The visitor interacts with the destruction and does not get out of his responsibility number. Since the obligation to stand up for Palestine is not a choice of a sunny day in Harbiye, but the ethical obligation of a life as an ethical thinking, witnessing and acting person. As it says so beautifully on the website of the exhibition: “This exhibition is not a visit; it is an attitude.”

What remains after the Zionist destruction is the ontological “remnant,” the remnant that opposes any ontological brutality.

“Destruction is not a moment here, but a structure that has gained continuity; trauma is the new form of everyday life.”

Trauma gets normalized in Palestine. Palestinian life in Gaza is the remnant of this traumatized normality. However, the trauma is now also an everyday aspect of the visitor, who has turned into a responsible confidant/witness for life.

“The visitors are not invited to emotional relief, but to an ethical debate. Here, not compassion, but testimony is expected. Because testimony results in responsibility.”

It is not about the catharsis of the visitor, as it is the case in a Greek tragedy, but about the inconvenient knowledge of the Zionist genocide in Gaza.

What remains are silent people and silent objects that stay immovably in their place as witnesses of destruction. This can be seen in particular in the rooms where the kitchen, the school class and the Palestinian home are shown after the Israeli bombings. The material remains, a piece of wall, an empty pot, a school desk, a blackboard..., and these objects are silent. 


The first victims are always the children. For the Zionist genocide is above all a child genocide. Therefore, the figure of Handala is also central in this exhibition.

Handala is the famous cartoon character of the Palestinian artist Naji al-Ali from 1969, which has very strong autobiographical traits. The murdered children of Gaza and the children who, like the cartoonist himself, became surviving refugees are the symbol of testimony that remains and defies brutal destruction.

“What can be seen here is not a loss, but irretrievable time.”

“The barbed wire at the centre of the installation transforms the border from a geographical line into a permanent experience imprinted in body and memory. This installation is not conceived as an aesthetic composition; it wants the visitor to immediately feel the interruption between today and yesterday and its ethical significance. The work calls for observation, not pity.”

The trauma is, as mentioned, the normality. War is continuity and the labyrinth of the exhibition is a constant reality. The visitor walks into the labyrinth. He remains there voluntarily and experiences the darkness of imprisonment acoustically as a permanent experience. The children teach the visitor what is war - acoustically and visually. The cries of the children are imprinted in the mind and soul of the witness spectator. At the same time, the guided tour of the exhibition illuminates the various movements on the grey walls of the labyrinth. Violence and brutality become part of everyday life and are no exceptions. You do not escape from this labyrinth, you stay, listen and painfully learn the resistance, which then remains as an echo once you left the exhibition. 

When the bombs are asleep, we too can sleep

Is there chocolate in paradise?

Allah is with us

“What is happening here is not a deviation, but order itself.”

The visitor can't get out of the situation. This is not an escape room, this is his testimony of Palestine, the Zionist colony of the Middle East of children like Handala.



The other room, where the names of the martyrs are read, performs the same function. Here, too, the witness does not flee, but remains. The dialectic between testimony and witness is abolished. We are in the post-dialectical space of the Palestinians' response to the Zionist State and its outdated dialectics.

23/02/2026

They Served in Gaza, Then Died by Suicide – but Are Not Recognized as Fallen IDF Soldiers
Taking part in genocide can indeed be stressful


The IDF's policy is clear: while soldiers are in uniform, they're the military's responsibility. The day after? Not anymore. Soldiers who take their own lives after discharge because of their service are not recognized as fallen and do not receive a military funeral. Six bereaved families tell Haaretz how it feels to be left outside the gate

Tom Levinson, Haaretz, 19/2/2026

It happened late at night, after another tense, even turbulent, day. Roi Wasserstein, a reservist who served as a combat medic, was speaking to his company commander, whom he had known since they were both conscripts. Perhaps they discussed some of the scenes they had witnessed; perhaps they shared fears of what was to come. Details of the conversation remain elusive, like a black box no one will ever find.

Around 2 A.M., Wasserstein retired to his creaky bed. It was the night of October 10, 2023. He was in a staging area near the Gaza Border.

He slept for about three hours. At dawn, comrades woke him. Come quickly, the commander needs medical attention, they said. "He's been shot." In truth, he had shot himself. The commander, a doctor at Schneider Medical Center, was pronounced dead at the scene.

Wasserstein told his family nothing, kept it to himself. They only heard about it later. "Everything is fine," he answered laconically when confronted. One year and nine months later, in July 2025, his father found him in his room, dead by gunshot. Roi Wasserstein was 24.

Only during the Shiva did his family learn of other secrets he had carried from the war. "His friends told us he was one of the first to arrive at the Givati Brigade armored personnel carrier incident" – in which 11 soldiers were killed – "and that he personally pulled out the bodies, or what was left of them, from the vehicle," his brother Tom says. Soldiers who were present at the scene told Haaretz of images they will never forget ("ashes, body parts, charred flesh, a smell that won't let go").

16/02/2026

To Honor the Memory of Those Massacred on October 7, Israelis Must Recognize Their Actions in Gaza


Gideon Levy, Haaretz, 15/2/2026


Smoke rises following an explosion, within the "yellow line" zone, which is controlled by Israel, in Khan Younis in the southern earlier this week. Credit: HASEEB ALWAZEE/Reuters

The recent outrage over an Israeli minister’s rejection of the word ‘massacre’ in reference to October 7 revealed that in Israel, the word is reserved for one side. Those fighting for its preservation must apply it to what happened in Gaza

In the first months following October 7, I constantly used the term massacre to describe what had happened. What I saw with my own eyes as I wandered through the southern border area with photographer Alex Levac could only be defined as one.

In Sderot, Ofakim, in the Re’im parking lot, on death-strewn Highway 232, in Be’eri and Nir Oz, we saw endless silent testimony to a massacre. The trails of congealed blood in the rooms of kibbutz members, the lives cut short in an instant, the weekend copies of Haaretz, with readers massacred as they were perusing them, the bodies of their dogs lying in their yards, the crushed and shattered cars with their silent remnants of the Nova music festival, ID cards and personal effects in the ruins of the police station in Sderot, and of course, the surviving witnesses – all told a story of a horrific massacre. A massacre – what else could you call it?

The temporary memorial for victims set at the Re’im parking lot in the initial months after the Nova party, in January 2024. Credit: Hadas Parush

A year later, I could no longer use that term. This was after the word massacre came to be used in Israel’s discourse only for describing what was done to us. The only massacre was the massacre of Israelis in the south, and no other. Hardly anyone used the word massacre to describe what was happening across the border, in Gaza, at our hands.

When an Israeli said "massacre," he meant the massacre of Israelis, as if he were stating that there was no other. The word massacre became a fraught one, a tendentious one serving propaganda and thus disqualified for use, as far as I was concerned, due to its one-sided meaning.

Meanwhile, the second massacre proceeded at full force, and no one called it by its name. It did not cancel out the first massacre, but its scope, in numbers and devastation, far exceeded it. The fact that it was perpetrated mainly by air did not diminish its nature by one whit.

Destroyed buildings in Gaza, as seen from the Israeli side of the Israel-Gaza border earlier this week. Credit: Amir Cohen/Reuters

The furious argument that has erupted in the last few days over the government’s foolish attempt to erase from people’s minds the massacre we suffered can only evoke a bitter smile.

Nothing could be more ironic: After more than two years in which the public discourse refrained from using the word "massacre" or its synonyms for describing what the IDF was doing to Gazans; after more than two years in which Israel tried to tell itself, and the world, that the only massacre that took place was that of Israelis; over two years of playing the victim, in which Israel put on display, for itself and the world, only its own war wounds; over two years in which it forbade any expression of compassion, humaneness and solidarity with the victims of the other massacre; after over two years in which the Israeli media concealed, ignored or blurred the other massacre, along comes the government trying to erase from Israeli minds the first massacre as well, as if it never happened.


Culture and Sports Minister Miki Zohar speaking at the first government-funded film award ceremony in Jerusalem last month. Credit: Naama Grynbaum

Culture Minister Miki Zohar actually objected to adopting a stance of victimhood, in which Israel had wallowed, as long as this served its purposes.

Nevertheless, there was a massacre in Israel, as well as a genocide in Gaza. One should recognize this. The power of words is great. The fact that so few Israelis are bothered by what their country has done in the Gaza Strip proves the immense power of words. The fact that every time the word "massacre" was or is still used in Israel, people mean only the killing of 1,200 Israelis, never the killing of 70,000 Gazans, proves how easy it is to brainwash people and shape their mindset.

Therefore, the current battle over this term is important. People who are justifiably fighting to keep this term intact regarding the events of October 7 should at least also adopt it for describing what Israel did in its reckless retaliation in Gaza. One cannot say "the October 7 massacre" and not say a word about the punitive and vengeful massacre that followed it.

The blood of Israelis massacred along the Gaza border cries out, but no less so than the blood of the thousand babies that were massacred in the Gaza Strip. Both groups were victims of barbaric and criminal behavior. Both groups deserve the correct definition, not mendacious propaganda. There was a massacre in Israel. In Gaza, there was a genocide.