Israel has turned Gaza into a 21st century concentration camp

The basic definition of “concentration camp” is simple: a large place where a large group of people, usually civilians, are imprisoned without due process. There are various reasons as to why they are kept in confinement, including their ethnicity, religion or because they oppose the authorities ordering their imprisonment.

Encyclopaedia Britannica goes further, describing the targeted group as belonging to the “Other” more than for just being individuals, simply because of their belonging and identification with a certain way of life. It also explains that a concentration camp must not be described as a “prison” because that implies that the people held there have broken the law, and that due legal process was followed. And why might people be kept in such place? “For security reasons [and] exploitation or [collective] punishment,” says the encyclopaedia.

Inside concentration camps there is no differentiation between individuals based on age or health, meaning that those so detained can include children, women, the elderly and the chronically ill. Even worse, while they are confined they are generally denied access to health care, decent living spaces, and access to basics such as water, food and electricity. They are usually given the bare minimum of such necessities.

From this we can determine that there is a prime example of such a camp in the Gaza Strip.

The enclave fits such a description perfectly, except for being described as an open-air prison; more on this later. The group of people who are kept in the Gaza concentration camp are Palestinians, Arab and predominantly Muslims and civilians. Nobody in the mainstream media, particularly in the West, has to my knowledge pointed out that in October 2023 Israel started to transform the enclave into a 21st century concentration camp.

Between 2007 and 2023, when the current genocide started, Israel was already controlling all of the crossing points into Gaza, determining who could enter and leave, and limiting the amount of food, medicine, fuel and everything else, including machinery and general items. This policy suffocated the Palestinian economy in the enclave, pushing unemployment up to almost 85 per cent from a pre-war figure of around 46 per cent. Almost 90 per cent of the population, some two million people, have been displaced at least twice as they try to survive the indiscriminate bombardment of the Israeli army.

OPINION: The graveyard of dignity: 57 Muslim states and the silence over Gaza

Moreover, it is Israel’s standard policy to make sure that the majority of Palestinians are pacified against resisting the occupation of their land, which is their legitimate right. This strategy was formulated in a metaphor that says that it is necessary to “mow the grass” every now and then, a sick euphemism for bombing Gaza to deter resistance. In a paper entitled “Mowing the Grass: Israel’s Strategy for Protracted Intractable Conflict”, written by two Israeli academics, they analyse the strategy as simply non-stop war, with no end in sight.

Since October 2023, that has become “destroying the lawns”. Israeli’s former defence minister used a more specific term when, last year, he was commenting on Israeli efforts to end resistance in the occupied West Bank. Yoav Gallant, indicted by the International Criminal Court as a war criminal, said that, “We are mowing the grass, [but] the moment will also come when we will pull out the roots.”

In many news reports Gaza is being described as an open-air prison, but in light of the ongoing genocide such a description is an understatement and potentially misleading since it implies that the people kept inside have been through due legal process, been charged and found guilty or are awaiting sentencing by a legitimate court.

This is not the case, though.

The entire population is being punished, indiscriminately, without any due process. Furthermore, they are being forced into this situation by an occupying power that has no legal justification for its continued occupation of Palestinian land.

No matter who you are in Gaza, you aren’t getting enough — if any — food, water, medicine and fuel. Babies, children, women and the elderly are no exception. All are suffering from what Gallant ordered in 2023: a “complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel; everything is closed.”

All of this is part of Israel’s transformation of the Gaza Strip into a concentration camp. The ongoing genocide is part of long-term strategy of ethnic cleansing to clear all Palestinians out of Gaza so that Donald Trump can have his “Riviera of the Middle East”. His plan, of course, is not only fundamentally flawed, but also illegal and potentially a crime against humanity.

The question remains: how long can Israel and its backers sustain such strategies after trying them for decades without achieving their desired results? If Israel wants to end the Palestinian resistance in Gaza and beyond it must first end its occupation of the land that it has been stealing over the past eight decades, not only in Gaza but also in the West Bank including East Jerusalem (as well as Syria and Lebanon).

Israel will not have peace until it views Palestinians as human beings and not “human animals” (Gallant again); people with legitimate rights within Israel itself and beyond. The idea that lethal, overwhelming force will, one day, destroy Palestinian identity and force the people of Palestine to accept the status quo is a fantasy. Years of oppression, killing and ethnic cleansing have not prevented the rise of Hamas and other resistance groups, or their ability to fight back despite their losses. Resistance is a symptom of Israel’s brutal military occupation, not its cause. End the occupation, and there is no need for resistance, and what is possibly the world’s only 21st century concentration camp can return to normal.

OPINION: Israel’s brutal aggression in Gaza continues with impunity

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.