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THE RECENT BOMBARDMENT of Gaza has resulted in hundreds being killed since fresh air strikes began early on Tuesday.
The breakdown of the ceasefire that took effect in January comes as the population is already dramatically weakened from 15 months of brutal war sparked by Hamas’s deadly 7 October attack on Israel in 2023.
“It’s worse this time,” senior deputy field director in Gaza for UNRWA, Sam Rose, warned yesterday.
“People are already exhausted, they’re already degraded, their immune systems, their mental health, (and) populations on the verge of famine.
“Children who had come back to school after 18 months out of school, now back in tents … hearing the bombardment around them constantly.
“It’s fear on top of fear, cruelty on top of cruelty, and tragedy on top of tragedy.”
Photojournalists have been risking their lives to capture the reality of life on the ground for Gaza’s population.
As of last night, the enclave’s civil defence agency said over 500 people had been killed since Tuesday, including more than 190 under the age of 18.
*****
Abdel Kareem Hana
Abdel Kareem Hana
Mourners gather around the bodies of Palestinians who were killed in an Israeli army airstrikes as they are brought to Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City, Tuesday, 18 March 2025.
Jehad Alshrafi
Jehad Alshrafi
A Palestinian man carries the body of his 11 years old daughter Aya Al-Samri who was killed by an Israeli army airstrike, during her funeral at the Baptist Hospital in Gaza city, Friday, 21 March 2025
Abed Rahim
Abed Rahim
Palestinians search for their belongings among the rubble of their destroyed homes, following the Israeli airstrikes on Khan Yunis on 18 March 2025.
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Jehad Alshrafi
Jehad Alshrafi
A woman reacts over the body of a person killed during overnight Israeli army airstrikes across the Gaza Strip, at the Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza City, Tuesday, 18 March 2025
Jehad Alshrafi
Jehad Alshrafi
Displaced Palestinians, carrying their belongings traveling from Beit Hanoun to Jabaliya, a day after Israel’s renewed offensive in the Gaza Strip, Wednesday, 19 March 2025.
Jehad Alshrafi
Jehad Alshrafi
An injured man is taken to the Al-Ahli hospital following overnight Israeli army airstrikes across the Gaza Strip, in Gaza City, Tuesday, 18 March 2025.
Habboub Ramez
Habboub Ramez
Relatives mourn beside the bodies of Palestinians, who lost their lives in Israeli attacks on northern Gaza, at the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahia, Gaza on 19 March 2025.
Abdel Kareem Hana
Abdel Kareem Hana
Displaced Palestinians, carrying their belongings and other items, move between southern and northern Gaza along a beach road away from the areas where the Israeli army is operating after Israel’s renewed offensive in the Gaza Strip, in the outskirts of Gaza City, Friday 21 March 2025.
Jehad Alshrafi
Jehad Alshrafi
A woman carries the body of a child to Al-Ahli hospital following overnight Israeli airstrikes across the Gaza Strip, in Gaza City, Tuesday, 18 March 2025.
Jehad Alshrafi
Jehad Alshrafi
A displaced Palestinian man, carries his belongings, moves away from the areas where the Israeli army is operating after Israel’s renewed offensive in the Gaza Strip, on the outskirts of Beit Lahia, Thursday, 20 March 2025
Jehad Alshrafi
Jehad Alshrafi
A woman mourns as she identifies a body in the Al-Ahli hospital following overnight Israeli airstrikes across the Gaza Strip, in Gaza City, Tuesday, 18 March 2025.
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Simply stop “rescuing” them a few metres off the Libyan coast and then providing a free ferry service to Europe and that will end this business pretty quickly.
@Mary Murphy: i hope millions of them get to europe, after all we terrorised and the plundered their once beautiful country and left it in shi*te so its only fair that they get a chance to repay the favour
@Fred Jensen: No, I will leave it up to you Fred as you seem perfectly capable of applying your usual intellectual opinion.
I am sure EU politicians are nodding their heads in agreement to your comment and saying ‘ why didn’t we think of that ‘!
@jon-boy55: We? I had n hand in what you accuse “us” of and I suspect Ireland was not involved either. Too many sympathisers ready to plunge our tax payers down deeper into the mire. With a social welfare creaking and not incapable of providing fair services for those who pay into the system; here comes the open border lefties wanting to put more strain on the system. You dodo millions have already got through and look what they have done to show their thanks.
@Charles Alexander: You’re following the tend of social justice warriors who bitch and moan about the way things are and don’t provide any suggestions or have the decency to substantiate their arguments. In which case you can all be duly ignored. Thanks for playing.
@Fred Jensen: I’m sure some have and yes, it would solve the issue but that doesn’t mean it’s necessary the correct solution.
I would hope that a more humanitarian solution can be found before we resort to such drastic measures.
Unfortunately, I don’t hold up much hope and feel that your widely held solution will be the one that will be applied.
Only history will be able to tell us as to whether it was the correct one!
@Virtual Architect: I certainly wouldn’t regard myself as a social justice warrior -just a person who doesn’t believe in taking the easy option to contentious issues.
Please point out any comment made on this issue where the individual has substantiated their argue – yourself included.
@Avina Laaf: We should only need to look at the reason we have borders in the first place . Controlled movement of people has always been accepted for trade , but not for losing the identity of the host country .
I just don’t understand the logic of someone like Charles Alexander .
@Ken Hayden: The simple solution is to send them back, refuse entry, close borders etc.
I’m just trying to look at it from a human perspective which on this platform doesn’t make me very popular.
The alternative poses considerable problems from both a security and economic perspective but fortunately, there are enough politicians in Europe who -as yet-are not prepared to take the easy option.
@Charles Alexander: The simple solution IS to send them back , France and Sweden have already had to cut their foreign aid budgets back , it costs up to 100 times more to feed and shelter a migrant in Sweden , than on the Syrian/Turkish border , god knows what the difference is in west Africa , so the funds will run out . We are not Communists , we don’t divide everything between everyone . We have a social heart , but that will only go so far .
And the cultural differences of these migrants might just destroy the decent heart we have .
@Charles Alexander: so do you have a share in a refugee centre? Why would you want this mass exodus of human suffering in Europe. The EU can’t take care of it’s owe citizens why do you want them to take care of ever one else.
@Fred Jensen: Correct and let’s not all forget that Merkel (Germany) is responsible for what is happening in Europe right now. I have no problem if Germany want all these migrants in their country as long as they are responsible for them and contain them within their borders. Who or what give her the right to invite into the EU all these migrants? None of the EU governments were consulted. No EU Citizens were consulted. To my mind she breached the understandings that are in the EU treaties and as such they the Germans should pay the financial and Social costs for their arbitrary decision.
@Warthog: What’s all this fuss about borders in relation to Brexit when Merkel blantely ignored and breached external EU border controls and allowed over a million non-EU citizens into Europe. Why shud we give a fk about borders after Brexit when the Germans don’t give a go about them. The EU & Democracy have nothing in common!
Like this is the answer to the whole migrant crisis??reminds me of the priest in Father Ted saying “we’ll say another mass” as the answer to everything
@Fake Avast: There are already in Europe who have paid a high price for that living standards they enjoy. Too many coming to Europe for a better life while Europeans are seeing a drastic drop in their life standards. Africa has always been poor and nothing has changed in 50 years. They cannot grasp the birth control will reduce starving in a major way.
@Fake Avast: Wrong! Australia stopped the influx across the Timor sea, and also put an end to the drownings, by making it clear that illegal immigrants trying to gain entry to Australia by that means would never ever set foot on Aussie soil – and sticking to their resolve.
Is it just me, but is there anyone in Brussels with a shred of common sense ? This should have happened a couple of years ago, wouldn’t surprise if Germany was exporting them.
@Catherine Mc: what supplying more. Provide them at all ports across the med for when migrants arrive to allow them to go back. Im not heartless. They should be given a big push to help them on the way back.
@Paul O Mahony:
Sorry, I don’t agree with the high influx of asylum seekers coming to Europe, if they had been processed before arrival, yes it would have been the better option. Europe east and west may have accepted the situation, instead Angela Merkel’s free for all has caused nothing but trouble, also brexit might not have happened if EU heads used their brains.
There no comments here regarding George Soros’s role in all of this. It’s his leaflets telling potential migrants how to migrate and what they can expect when they get to Europe.. Like free houses and money for nothing etc. Those leaflets don’t mention dying in the Med when the boats falls to bits and sinks. That man should be put on trial for crimes against humanity. As for the headline thing about supplying boats to smugglers all that will do is create.. boat smugglers fed by boat thrives in ports on the Med coasts.
@Patrick J. O’Rourke: He also funds black lives matter, antifa and a whole host of other divisive groups. The man creates chaos wherever he goes. Thankfully, he’ll die soon.
Well, it’s something, but the real difficulty is getting countries of origin to take back failed asylum seekers. With some countries including Tunesia, the EU has been negotiating this for more than a decade. These countries simply don’t want ‘m back.
Some will say, well, just dump them back on the beach. But you can’t accuse countries of breaching international law when you don’t abide by it yourself, since dumping people on the beach is against international law. Which is incidentally related to why Italy wants to close its ports.
This stuff is going to get years to suss out. There’s millions in Africa waiting for their chance to escape poverty, and it’s only going to get worse. Heavy investments on that continent are inevitable, as Europe can’t be completely sealed off.
Ask the navy what happen the boats the refugees use? Libyan navy selling them back to people smugglers unless the navy sink them. Amazed this is only being reported now
Italy needs to own up to its very recent colonial past in Libya, you can’t just plunder a country of its riches and then act the coward when things get tough.
@Atheos Euripides: how far back should we go? If you go back a few more centuries you can just blame the Muslims for violently spreading Islam and conquering north Africa and m.e. of course this just goes against your leftist agenda
@Atheos Euripides: you do realise that very few are Libyans and the vast majority are sub Sahara Africans so blaming it for its colonial past is bizarre so yes lefty logic.
@Chilli: I think you need to go back only 6 years when a calculated campaign by the yanks, Brits and French completely destabilised the North African region in order to overthrow Gaddafi. Democracy by bombardment worked so well in Iraq and Afghanistan, the policy was continued in Libya.
Ghadaffi was a good guy when he was in power Libya was a successful economy with many workers from other African countries….US Britian and France backed a Sunni uprising against him that has turned Libya into a failed state full of warlords….Another regime change disaster for President Obama…..
@John003: That was a foreign policy disaster on a massive scale, but Ghadaffi ignored the dynamics of the so-called Arab spring so stubbornly that it led to a bloodshed that the West felt it could not ignore. This was more understandable at the time, and more easy to criticize with the hindsight of current knowledge.
But you’re right, Ghadaffi once had his tents and camels in Berlusconi’s backyard, and it absolutely seems as though diplomacy should’ve been able to do a lot more.
@Thinck: Indeed he wasn’t, but his rehabilitation after Lockerbie was at some point rather spectacular.
I personally think it was post-colonialist sensitivities that ultimately prevented Italy from reining him in before it was too late. So in a sense, given the Arab spring, this was a disaster waiting to happen.
@Thinck: In comparison to war monger Hilary Clinton and the CIA backed militia who bayonet raped him before killing him on camera, Ghadaffi was a saint.
The murderous US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said of Ghaddaffi: ‘ We came, we saw, HE DIED !’ This she followed by cackling maniacally like the crazed female that she is. Yet, she got more votes than Trump ! Americans are fundamentally insane, and killing is an integral part of their existence. Their criminal war record now numbers 45 invasions since the 1950′s. Just like irredeemable criminals they will continue to cause murder and mayhem throughout the world, until they are stopped.
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