By Sara Haddad

I was raised in a tiny Lebanese ‘village’ in Castle Hill, a suburb that was once semi-rural but is now a sprawling mini-metropolis in the middle of Sydney’s Bible belt.

That’s the best way I can describe my upbringing – one of many children in a multi-family, multi-generational home, reared on the abundant fruits of the land that captured my family’s hearts because it reminded them of their mountain village in Lebanon. To the land they brought sustainable practices acquired over many generations. In the house they continued the traditions of an ancient culture and fostered an environment that encouraged equity and communal support. We even had our own chapel.

In 1967 – the year of my birth and the year of Al Naksa, ‘the setback’, with the Six-Day War – members of my extended clan began their considerable involvement in the issue of Palestine. For as long as I can remember, Palestine was always there: in discussions over coffee, in keffiyehs worn to keep out the cold, in exasperated insults fired at the TV as news reports relayed the latest of Israel’s innumerable atrocities in the region.

My family are Maronite Christians who hail, like most Lebanese Australians, from north Lebanon. My grandparents, born at the end of the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th, were deeply devout.

In church my grandfather read Aramaic, widely considered by scholars to be the language spoken by Jesus. Some of their children, however, were politically motivated and intellectually curious. Two of my uncles, for example, were young enough to receive an education when they arrived in Australia in 1949, and later held academic positions at the University of Sydney.

Throughout the seventies and eighties, I remember many visiting intellectuals, many people from many countries and other faiths moving in and out of our house. And the question of Palestine was the single biggest political issue in that world.

So, when I began writing my novella, The Sunbird, in December 2023, almost two months into Israel’s genocide of Gaza, I did so as someone who had inherited a cause. As a child I wasn’t interested in the issue, but that didn’t mean I didn’t absorb everything that was going on around me. I learnt a valuable truth and I learnt it young: that what had been done to the Palestinian people was undeniably and terribly wrong. From there, I set my own path.

It is important to note that my Maronite Lebanese family were in many ways atypical, not least in their support of Palestine. The reasons for this are many and varied and easily warrant an essay on their own, but geographical distance between us and the wider diaspora certainly played its part. As did the political influence of at least a couple of important characters, in both the old country and the new.

It was almost unheard of for Lebanese Christians of my father’s generation to advocate for Palestinian liberation. In Lebanon itself, sectarianism determines allegiances and, to a substantial extent, these loyalties are reflected in the views and the activities of the diaspora.

It is much less rare, though still not common, for Lebanese Christians of my generation to support Palestine. Regardless of the generation, involvement seems to be far less determined by ethnicity than by leftist politics and a fierce commitment to social justice.

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Before 16 May 1916, when the British and French divided the Arab territories of the Ottoman empire into distinct geographical areas under their control, Lebanese and Palestinians – and Syrians and Jordanians – shared one area of land known as Bilad-al-Sham, ‘the land to the north’. At roughly 800km long and 150km wide, this region equates to roughly half of Victoria. It’s not large.

Like all complex societies, the people who still share this land, despite those map lines, have many things in common – language, cuisine, social customs, to name a few – but they also differ in ways that manifest from village to village. Before colonisation restricted movement and separated people from their neighbours, the people of this land occupied one world – an intricate and diverse world woven over millennia of continued civilisation.

The quest for Greater Israel, an ambition long held, is now in overdrive. Twenty-nine months into its genocide of Gaza, Israel directly occupies 58% of the Strip. Ancient cities like Rafah are no more, reduced to rubble under which are buried the bodies of the slain, a blood-soaked wasteland earmarked for real estate development.

In the West Bank, ethnic cleansing continues unabated, and settler violence, encouraged by the government and the military, is at an all-time high. In East Jerusalem, the occupation has closed both the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to worshippers. And in Lebanon, following Israel’s invasion of the south of the country, more than 1,000 people have been killed, countless villages have been destroyed, and one million people have been forcibly displaced.

Now Lebanon, like Palestine, is in a literal fight for survival. It is not hyperbolic to say that we are on the precipice of a cataclysmic shift. The land – all of it – is under immediate and serious threat. If ever there was a time to reclaim our past, to embrace the world that existed before colonisation succeeded in dividing us, it is now. If ever there was a time to put our differences aside and come together as one people, it is now.

Sara Haddad is a writer and editor who lives and works on Gadigal land. She is the author of the adult novella, The Sunbird, and the companion volume of the same name for children, which was recently released by University of Queensland Press. Both books can be purchased at all good bookshops, online and via the publisher’s website: https://www.uqp.com.au/books/the-sunbird

Got a tip? Drop an email to tips@deepcutnews.com or send an anonymous Signal to @deepcut.25.

Even before the strikes on Iran began, it was clear that Israel had drawn Donald Trump into a war he could not control, against an opponent he did not understand. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s slip of Israeli stage-managing left no room for doubt.

But this is more than merely an exercise in appeasing a rogue state. While the pro-Israel lobby has captured US decision-making – as political scientist Prof. John Mearsheimer has long argued – in Trump’s case, it has done so by wrapping Israeli interests around a neoconservative vision of American global power.

That vision is expansionist, belligerent and nostalgic for a colonial era of imperial domination. It’s a furious rejection of the global shift to multipolarity and its prerequisite condition that all great nations, including the US, share power. As renowned economist Prof. Jeffrey Sachs stated on Sunday, the US is not in the game of “co-responsibility with anybody”.

Chinese geopolitical analyst Prof. Jiang Xueqin made similar observations this week, noting that current US actions spoke of a declining empire lashing out, unable to accept the inevitable shifts in global power dynamics that are eroding its dominance.

In true Trump style, the bullying has not been directed at great power rivals like China and Russia, but at weaker states. By targeting smaller powers like Venezuela, Cuba and Iran, the US is hoping to remind the world of its ability to project its military might whenever and wherever it pleases.

But all the world can see with its ill-fated foray into Iran are holes being punctured in America’s armour.

Signs of weakness

1. The ease with which US bases are being hit

   Iran says it has hit 27 US bases in the region, some – like in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the UAE – repeatedly. The US says seven of its troops have been killed – a number believed to be understated by analysts such as Xueqin, given the volume and precision of the Iranian strikes. Small powers worldwide readily signed up to a US presence on their soil, Australia included, thinking such bases afforded protection and security guarantees. What the current Gulf Arab example shows is that such protection is never assured.
   

2. Impotence at defending the Strait of Hormuz

   ‘Impotence’ was a word used by seasoned US analyst, Prof. Marc Lynch of George Washington University. That Iran – a nation under US-led sanctions for over four decades – can so easily cripple a vital shipping route has stunned Gulf Arab states who have spent billions on US military hardware, and aligned themselves to Washington precisely to prevent such a scenario.
   
   Adding to that ‘impotence’ was Trump’s irrational Truth Social post last week when he said that the US navy would escort ships through the Strait of Hormuz, putting US warships in direct range of Iranian drones and missiles. The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp (IRGC) mocked Trump’s post, saying they were “awaiting their presence”. Trump has since ratcheted up his threats, warning the US would hit Iran “TWENTY TIMES HARDER” if it didn’t allow ships passage through the strait.

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3. Loss of expensive, sophisticated hardware

   China and Russia are no doubt taking stock of Iran’s speedy destruction of advanced US radars and anti-air systems. Reports say the US lost at least US$2bn in hardware in the initial days of the war, including THAAD radars, a separate $1bn radar in Qatar, F15 fighter jets and MQ-9 drones. This doesn’t account for damage sustained at the US Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain, as well as other damage to its bases across the region.

4. Hi-tech vs low-cost production capabilities

   The Iran and Ukraine wars are testing America’s attrition capacity. The Ukraine war already exposed US production shortfalls, and attempts to ramp up production of Patriot missiles in 2023 and 2024, for example, still only resulted in 25% of the Pentagon’s needs. The outsourcing of manufacturing over recent decades, as pointed out by Xueqin, has eroded the US’s industrial base, hobbling its production output despite an obscene US$1.43 trillion defense budget favouring hi-tech gear. Russia and Iran, with far smaller military budgets, mass-produce cheap drones and munitions, which are proving effective in both arenas.
   

5. Turning to Ukraine and Australia for help, and walking back sanctions on Russia

   Within a week of suffering Iranian drone attacks, the US sought help from the very country Trump has been berating for the past year – Ukraine. Adding to that humiliation was the forced retreat Trump made in a phone call with Vladimir Putin vis-a-vis sanctions on Russian oil, to help with soaring energy prices. The deployment of Australia’s E-7A Wedgetail aircraft – as well as 85 personnel – is also an interesting choice. The Wedgetail is known for its “long-range reconnaissance capabilities”. Could the US have requested Australian assistance because the Iranians knocked out the radars the US and Israel relied on?

Australia’s deployment and international law

Lara Khider, acting executive director of the Australian Centre for International Justice, says there are “risks” of Australia’s deployment “becoming a party to the conflict”, particularly given the war on Iran is a breach of international law.

“The broader legal context is clear: the UN Charter prohibits the use of force except in self-defence against an actual or imminent armed attack, or with Security Council authorisation; treating attacks on Iran as lawful ‘self-defence’ despite the absence of an actual or imminent attack is a clear violation of the prohibition of the use of force,” she told Deepcut.

“Even deployments framed as ‘defensive’, such as surveillance, refuelling, or intelligence sharing, may in certain circumstances contribute to a State’s participation in hostilities or raise questions of international responsibility.

“It is possible that Australia’s contributions could amount to participation in hostilities under international humanitarian law, rendering Australia a party to the conflict and exposing it to responsibility for breaches of international law, including the prohibition on the use of force,” she said.

Greens Senator David Shoebridge criticised the deployment in a statement, saying it went against Australia’s national interest.

“This request for Australian troops may well have been sent from the Gulf, but it originated in Washington,” he said.

“Every military asset Labor sends to the Gulf frees up US and Israeli assets to continue to the illegal attacks on Iran.”

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Iran update

• Human toll:

  • Israel and the US have killed at least 1,332 Iranians, according to the Iranian Red Crescent. However, that figure has not been updated since Friday. In regards to material damage, the Iranian Red Crescent said as of yesterday that 13,785 civilian structures had been damaged in airstrikes, including 65 schools.

  • In Israel, 11 people have been reported killed and at least 2,142 sent to hospitals since the war began. It must be noted that Israel imposes strict censorship of Iranian missile damage, prohibiting the recording of strikes.

• Economic toll:

  

  • As of writing, crude oil dropped to $88 a barrel after surging to almost $120. The retreat is owed to Trump’s statements that the war could end “soon” and was “very complete, pretty much”. This conflicts, however, with earlier statements from the Trump administration that the war could drag on for weeks, suggesting Trump made the remarks to temporarily cool oil prices with no clear end to the war in sight.

• Environmental toll:

  • Black rain fell on Tehran following the Israeli bombing of the city’s oil depots last weekend. WHO head, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said the attack “risks contaminating food, water and air – hazards that can have severe health impacts especially on children, older people, and people with pre-existing medical conditions”. Axios reports the Israeli attack “went far beyond what the US expected when Israel notified it in advance”.

Lebanon update

• Human toll:

  • Israel has killed at least 486 people, including 83 children. At least 700,000 Lebanese – including 200,000 children – have been displaced after Israel issued evacuation orders for south Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs, with thousands of families sleeping on the streets.

• Political feuds:

  • Angered by Hezbollah’s entry into the war, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun expressed readiness to engage in “direct negotiations” with Israel and disarm Hezbollah, which received the support of US-backed Syrian leader Ahmad al-Sharaa. This came after Prime Minister Nawaf Salam banned Hezbollah’s military activities last week. The Lebanese government is playing a weak hand, however, without the means to enforce these measures. Lebanese army commander Gen. Rodolphe Haykal has resisted calls to disarm Hezbollah, citing concerns over an internal rupture.
    
    The Trump administration and Israel also reportedly gave a “deeply cool” response to Aoun’s request for negotiations.

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• Long war:

  • Israel is preparing for a prolonged campaign in Lebanon, mobilising 100,000 reservists. The ground incursion began last week, with Israel confirming the deaths of two soldiers and Hezbollah claiming to have destroyed three Merkava tanks.
    
    Israeli analyst Amos Harel argues a long campaign in Lebanon would allow Hezbollah to regain its image as resisting an occupying force, serving Netanyahu’s goal of ensuring “ongoing military friction”. I argue that beneath this surface-level political objective is a deeply-held Israeli desire to, should the opportunity present itself, colonise south Lebanon. From an Israeli viewpoint, there is no better opportunity than now.

New book coming out

Speaking of war and misery, my book Rebirth: A Love Story from the Depths of War, is finally done and will be out in May (pre-order is available here). It’s been two years in the making and draws on my mother’s experiences living on the frontlines in the first two years of the Lebanese Civil War. It weaves love, tragedy and forced migration with a window into Lebanese history.

There will be book launches in Melbourne and Sydney and a number of speaking events, which I will share over coming weeks.

The first will be at Manly Writers Festival on Saturday, March 21 at 2.30pm. Details here. If you’re planning on attending, please say hi!

Anthony Albanese’s statement expressing support for the war on Iran exposed two truths: first, how dangerously entrenched Australia is in the unhinged US/Israeli alliance; and second, how utterly feeble and out of depth Albanese is to lead Australia at a time of great global upheaval.

Let’s take stock of this global context, and Australia’s position in it, before diving into the specifics of the Iran war. The United States is not an ‘ally’ of Australia – it is whom this nation’s leaders have chosen to depend upon for Australia’s national security. There is no equivalence in this relationship – Australia outsources its defence to the US military (at an exorbitant cost to Australian taxpayers) in the hope that the US will always come to Australia’s aid in its hour of need. It’s why Australian leaders have continuously followed America down its destructive path of endless wars.

Those leaders, such as Albanese, have remained unflinching – naively so – in refusing to accept rapidly shifting global conditions. The United States is wallowing in its own rot, and at the core of this rot – as the Epstein files and the last two years of the genocide in Gaza have shown – is Israel and its perverse class of billionaire supporters. The same billionaire class who form the backbone of the various pro-Israel lobbies strangling western democracies, including our own.

US analysts, and indeed much of the wider public, see Trump’s war on Iran as an obvious war on behalf of Israel. Understandably, public opinion continues to turn against Israel. A recent Gallup showed, for the first time, that more Americans sympathise with the Palestinians than the Israelis.

‘America First’ pundits would have surely been enraged to hear the US president admit, with an air of indifference, that American lives would be lost in this needless war – and the death toll has already started.

US decision-making has been captured by the Israel and the pro-Israel lobby, which renowned US political scientist John Mearsheimer routinely says is “unprecedented in history”. Trump is not acting in America’s own national interest, but sending US troops to die for Israel. And by supporting this war, Albanese too is prioritising Israel’s ambitions for a ‘Greater Israel’ over Australia’s interests – assuming he has a coherent vision for those interests at all.

As expected of an out-of-control, narcissistic billionaire (with credible allegations of child rape and molestation contained within the Epstein files), Trump is wildly deploying America’s military might across the world and unravelling the ‘rules-based order’ that the Albanese government so regularly professes to uphold. Trump’s violence isn’t limited to the global arena – he is also doing it internally, tearing away at whatever remains of the American democratic project.

All of these various strands of Trump’s Israeli-backed lunacy – wars abroad and authoritarian assaults at home – are converging into a crisis so deep that former US diplomats are sounding the alarm of the “end of the US republic”.

But Albanese – and the rest of Australia’s hapless political and media class – appear stunningly blind to the world around them, clinging onto the foolish hope that some illusory centrist ‘normalcy’ can be restored. That Trump is a blip and all Australia needs to do is ride through the moment until America corrects itself.

If that is indeed the political establishment’s view, then it demonstrates a profound misunderstanding of the tremendous geopolitical shifts underway, and shackles a naive Australia to the mountain ridge as the volcano spews above.

Seismic moments in history require bold leaders with a clear vision. We are living in such a moment without a leader up to the task.

Key updates on the war on Iran

Carnage from Tehran to Tel Aviv, Bahrain to Beirut

Iran

• US-Israeli strikes have hit civilian targets in Iran, including residential districts, the headquarters of IRIB – Iran’s state television – as well as Tehran’s Gandhi Hospital, with footage of infants in incubators being rushed out. The attack on civilian targets comes a day after a strike hit a girls’ primary school in Minab, southern Iran, killing roughly 150 people, the majority of them schoolgirls. UNESCO, the UN education agency, condemned the attack as “a grave violation of humanitarian law”.

• Israel says it carried out 1,200 strikes in the first day of the war, which killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as well as a slew of top officials.

• Iran has been launching missiles and drones around the clock targeting US bases in the Gulf Arab states and Jordan. At least three US service members have been killed thus far, with reports that the deaths came in an attack on a US airbase in Kuwait. The Pentagon is investigating how Iranian drones were able to penetrate US air defences. The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) says at least 200 US service members have been killed or wounded in attacks on US bases.

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• Other key US and western targets struck by Iran include:

  • Al Udeid air base as well as radar systems in Qatar – America’s largest base in the region, serving as the forward headquarters of CENTCOM

  • US Navy’s Fifth Fleet headquarters/Naval Support Activity in Manama, Bahrain, as well as radar systems and Bahrain International Airport

  • Al Dhafra air base, as well as Dubai and Abu Dhabi international airports in the UAE

  • French naval base, Camp de la Paix, in Abu Dhabi, UAE

  • Ali al-Salem air base in Kuwait, where three US service members were confirmed killed

  • Prince Sultan air base in Saudi Arabia

  • US bases in Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan

  • Camp Victory at Baghdad airport in Iraq (used by NATO; Iraqi militia group Saraya Awliya al-Dam has claimed responsibility)

  • Muwaffaq Salti air base in Jordan

  • UK’s Akrotiri air base in Cyprus

• Iranian missiles and drones have repeatedly struck Israel since the beginning of the war, with footage showing destroyed buildings in Tel Aviv. Nine Israeli deaths were confirmed in a strike on Beit Shemesh. The Israeli military censor forbids disclosure of targets struck in Israel, obscuring what information gets released.

  • Quick analysis: Iran would be feeling more confident after the 12 Day War last June. It learnt it could drain Israel’s air defences within a short timeframe, and it has the missile stockpile to sustain attacks for a significant period. Both sides to this war excel in offensive capabilities, but are light on defence. US bases in West Asia and its ships in the Arabian Sea are sitting ducks and will continue to be targeted by Iran, limiting US offensive power over time, with public anger in the US likely to rise (both at Trump and Israel) the longer the war drags on. The race for US and Israel is in taking out Iran’s missile launching capabilities – a daunting effort given the size of the country and a missile inventory rumoured to be in the thousands – before their air defence stockpiles run out.

Oil

• Iran has closed the Strait of Hormuz and has attacked ships disobeying its command. At least five tankers are said to have been attacked, with Danish shipping firm Maersk suspending operations in the strait. Roughly 20% of the world’s oil supply transits through the Strait of Hormuz. Brent crude jumped 10% with fears oil prices could spike to $100 – adding steep inflationary pressure on western economies (fuel prices will skyrocket if the strait remains blocked).

• Iran also struck Saudi Arabia’s Ras Tanura oil refinery, one of the largest in the region with a capacity of 550,000 barrels per day. Saudi Aramco shut the facility after the attack. Qatar Energy also suspended LNG production at its Ras Laffan facility after being hit by an Iranian projectile. European gas prices have jumped 28%.

  • Quick analysis: On top of bodybags of American troops, Trump will have to contend with the severe economic pain of crippled energy supplies and surging oil prices. Saudi Arabia and Qatar are talking tough about retaliating against Iran, but it’s unclear what more they can do given their defences are heavily dependent on the US – which is already proving incapable of stopping the Iranian missile barrage.

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Lebanon

• The war has spread to Lebanon after Hezbollah fired rockets and drones into northern Israel. In a statement, Hezbollah said it fired the rockets in “retaliation” for Khamenei’s killing, as well as the past 15 months of thousands of Israeli violations of the ceasefire in Lebanon. Israel responded with heavy bombardment of Beirut’s southern suburbs and the Bekaa in eastern Lebanon, killing 31 people. The Israeli army has also ordered the evacuation of more than 50 Lebanese villages in the south, with hundreds of thousands fleeing north.

• Israel assassinated Mohammed Raad, a longtime Hezbollah MP in the Lebanese parliament and not a member of the party’s military wing, in its first round of strikes, according to media reports.

• Tensions are at fever pitch internally with the Lebanese government moving to ban Hezbollah’s military activities and the Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam demanding Hezbollah surrender its weapons.

  • Quick analysis: Both sides have been waiting for a resumption of war. Israel sees an opportunity to move deeper into southern Lebanon, deliver a final blow to Hezbollah and expand its occupation, potentially laying the groundwork for colonisation. Hezbollah sees an opportunity to push Israel back and re-establish a level of deterrence, particularly if Iran succeeds in exhausting Israel’s air defences over the coming weeks. Hezbollah will, however, have to grapple with internal Lebanese anger at entering the war.

Protests

• Khamenei’s killing has sparked protests among Shia Muslim communities worldwide. Twenty-three people were killed across Pakistan, including 10 in Karachi when protesters tried to storm the US consulate. Similar scenes were seen at the US embassy in Baghdad, and hundreds of protesters clashed with police in Bahrain.

Ceasefire push and American ‘paranoia’

• Trump is reportedly seeking a swift end to the war, stupefyingly assuming it would be a “four-to-five day operation”, according to Israeli media. The report says Trump, through Italy, sought a ceasefire with Iran “today or tomorrow”. Iran rejected the offer, with its military leadership vowing to escalate. Now there’s “anxiety” and “paranoia” within the Trump administration that “the fighting will extend for weeks, further stressing limited US air defence stockpiles”.

• US officials are now changing tune, saying the war will “last multiple weeks” with Trump conceding that more US troops are “likely” to die.

  • Quick analysis: This is what happens when fools sit atop large militaries. Trump thought he could do a swift Venezuela-like operation – kill the leadership, get a new one that will negotiate and surrender. According to Israel’s Channel 12, they had hoped Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian – seen as a moderate – would have negotiated and capitulated to US/Israeli demands following Khamenei’s killing. That hasn’t happened, and anyone who understands Iran knows that was never going to happen.
    
    Trump is now in a mess of his (and Netanyahu and the pro-Israel lobby’s) making, and hundreds more – Iranians, Americans, Israelis, Lebanese – are going to die as a result.

Continued Israeli attacks on Lebanon since a ceasefire in November 2024 have resulted in over 1,100 casualties, Lebanese government data reveals, with Israeli strikes escalating since last December.

A collation of all incidents publicly documented by Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health shows that Israel has killed 350 people in Lebanon since the ceasefire began — an average of 22 deaths per month — and wounded a further 793.

A separate data log by Danish intelligence solutions firm, Atlas Assistance, and obtained by Deepcut listed almost 3,000 Israeli attacks on Lebanon since the ceasefire.

The updated death toll comes less than a week after the deadliest Israeli attack so far this year, when 10 people, including a Hezbollah commander, were killed in a strike in the Bekaa Valley. Twenty-four people, including three children, were also wounded. Hezbollah said in response that it “no longer has any option” but to defend itself.

Ongoing ceasefire violations

A UN report last November revealed that Israel had violated the ceasefire 10,000 times, including land, air and sea violations. Atlas Assistance – whose figures are drawn upon by humanitarian organisations – listed a total of 2,932 Israeli attacks on Lebanon since November 2024 (excluding February 2026), with an uptick in December 2025 and last month.

The Atlas figures include Israeli attacks via warplanes, drone strikes, shelling and cross-border shooting as well as explosive building demolitions and arson inside Lebanon.

Israel still occupies five outposts in south Lebanon, and, in addition to deadly strikes, has destroyed homes and reconstruction equipment in border villages, built walls inside Lebanese territory and allowed Israeli settlers to enter the country.

According to the ceasefire terms, both Israel and Hezbollah were required to “implement a cessation of hostilities beginning at 04:00 hours on 27 November 2024”. That day, however, Israel carried out numerous attacks on Lebanon resulting in 14 deaths and another 14 wounded, according to Lebanese government figures.

Those attacks set the tone for Israel’s approach to Lebanon – a ceasefire it considers applicable only to the Lebanese side, while it strikes as it pleases with impunity.

The Lebanese government’s record of incidents since show that Israeli attacks have persisted on a near-weekly basis, primarily in southern and eastern Lebanon. The two longest pauses in Israeli violence were 24 days over the new year period heading into 2025 and 17 days in February that year.

The deadliest month was November 2025, when Israel killed a total of 40 people and wounded 91.

As the data shows, most of the attacks have been limited to single-digit fatalities, with an occasional attack resulting in mass casualties.

Iran backdrop hangs over Lebanon

Israel has imposed new rules of engagement on Hezbollah, and Lebanon more broadly, since the November 2024 ceasefire. Through its continued attacks, it’s asserting free rein to dominate Lebanon’s skies and target villagers and Hezbollah members alike.

Operating in tandem is the Trump administration, which is heaping pressure on the Lebanese government to disarm Hezbollah.

The government has sought to tread a delicate line between avoiding a civil war – a likely consequence of any attempt to disarm Hezbollah – and appeasing Trump with repeated gestures toward a phased disarmament plan.

Hanging over this fragile scene is the spectre of a US-Iran war, with the US deploying a massive force to the region at a cost of at least US$350m. A US-Iran war could potentially ensnare Lebanon.

Hezbollah has already indicated it will not remain neutral if Iran is attacked, prompting an Israeli warning this week that it would target Lebanon’s civilian infrastructure, including Beirut international airport, in response.

Regardless of whether a US-Iran war breaks out, the status quo of weekly Israeli attacks is intolerable for communities in southern Lebanon. They face an impossible choice: endure ongoing Israeli strikes, or risk a renewed war that might restore deterrence – with no guarantee of success and at a high cost.

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Was Jeffrey Epstein part of a satanic cult of ‘Baal’ worshippers who sacrificed children?

That’s one theory that has gone viral since the Trump administration released two tranches of Epstein files – the latest being last month’s dump of three million redacted files.

The theory centres on two specific files. The first, an email from Epstein in 2009 that had “Baal” written as the name of a financial account.

Online chatter has connected ‘Baal’ – also the name of an ancient Canaanite god that was the focus of a child sacrificing ritual – to another file that surfaced: the disturbing, yet still unproven, allegation sent to the FBI in 2019 of cannibalism on a yacht involving infants, which we previously reported.

MAGA-supporting rapper Nicki Minaj ran with that connection in a viral tweet that’s amassed over 24 million views.

The baby-killing-cult theory gained further momentum when far-right American podcaster Candace Owens, in an episode titled ‘BAAL SO HARD: The Epstein Files’ – which has 2.6 million views on YouTube – said, “The people we are fighting are effectively pagan gypsies who have been wearing the cloak of Judaism since the fall of the missing Khazarian empire”.

Adding specificity to the ‘satanic cult’, she referred to “ancient pagan festivals and ceremonies that centre around the earth’s cycles of death and rebirth”.

Also making renewed rounds on social media is a separate podcast episode from last year with an Anya Wick – who claims to have been born Anya Beth Epstein and to be Jeffrey Epstein’s niece. Wick alleges her Epstein family were part of a “Phoenician satanic fertility cult”. Despite her claims not being verified, that episode on YouTube received more than 3 million views and has since been cut into viral reels on Instagram and TikTok.

While the Epstein files have justifiably taught us to question everything, it is also spawning algorithm-led rabbit holes that are tying very loose threads of ancient history and mythology to a current political and criminal setting.

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And as historians – who have studied these matters for decades and produced volumes of research – will often point out, retrofitting contemporary matters to an ancient world (or vice versa) is almost never a shoe that fits.

So here’s some historical clarification, grounded in academic research, on the specific ancient child-sacrificing pagan belief in question.

Who is Baal and was he ‘satanic’?

Baal – meaning ‘lord’ in western semitic tongues (spoken in the ancient Levant) – was a preeminent god in Canaanite religious traditions that were widely observed in modern-day Lebanon, Palestine and Syria for roughly 3,000 years before Christ.

The words ‘Canaanite’ and ‘Phoenician’ are used interchangeably for the same people – Phoenician being the Greek word ascribed to the sea-faring people from the Levantine coast who established colonies throughout the Mediterranean. To avoid confusion and maintain consistency, we’ll stick to ‘Canaanite’ in this article.

Owens references an earth cycle of death and rebirth, which is a famous mythical story known as the ‘Baal Cycle’ discovered in a major archaeological find in Syria in 1928.

But far from being ‘satanic’, Baal – as revealed in the Baal Cycle – was worshipped as a storm god who replenished the lands after being restrained by an evil god, Mot (which later evolved into the Arabic word for ‘death’ or mawt), in the underworld.

The story is tied to an agricultural cycle of rain (Baal) coming after long summers and droughts (Mot), lending to a philosophical meaning of rebirth and renewal (something I explore in my upcoming book on the Lebanese Civil War, which I coincidentally titled ‘Rebirth’ – no, I’m not in a satanic cult).

Did child sacrifice happen?

Yes, but, as always, history is nuanced and context is critical to the current theories running wild on the internet.

Child sacrifice was said to have taken place primarily in Carthage – a Canaanite colony founded by settlers from Tyre (a coastal city in present-day Lebanon) in the ninth century BC.

Archaeological discoveries of Carthaginian settlements have found remains of burned children in specific sanctuaries said to have been dedicated to communal activities and ritualistic sacrifice. The sanctuaries had similar inscriptions including the Canaanite/Phoenician word molk, meaning an offering to the god, Baal.

But according to historian Josephine Quinn, child sacrifice was not a widespread Canaanite practice. Instead, she writes, the child-sacrificing worshippers might have been a small, extremist cult among the Canaanites who were shunned in the ancient Levant precisely due to this horrific ritual.

She notes that the Levantine colonial settlements in the western Mediterranean that included the child-sacrificing sanctuaries were often congregated near one another, suggesting an offshoot of religious extremists that set out from the Levant and built communities elsewhere.

“No equivalent sites have yet been found on the Levantine coast, or anywhere else in the Near East. It seems likely, then, that it was only in the colonial world that the practice became fully institutionalised and ritualised with special sanctuaries,” she writes in her book, In Search of the Phoenicians.

Another important faction in the ancient Levant, the Israelites, also explicitly repudiated the practice, as written in the Hebrew Bible.

Okay, but where’s the disconnect?

Owens claims that Epstein and his clique of Zionist billionaires were essentially masquerading as Jews, and actually – as Wick alleges in her viral podcast episode – adhered to a Phoenician child-sacrificing cult.

She alleges that this cult has been in existence “since the fall of the Khazarian empire”.

Khazaria existed briefly as an ostensibly Jewish medieval kingdom in parts of present-day Russia between the seventh and ninth centuries AD. In other words, more than 1,300 years after the last record of child sacrifice occurring in the Near East, and 900 years after the Romans destroyed Carthage.

What online pundits – who, we must stress, are not historians – don’t explain is how child sacrifice, or any other Canaanite religious practice, suddenly emerged a millennium later in a corner of Russia, amongst an entirely different set of people who have no historical, cultural or ethnic ties to the Canaanites in the Levant.

There is no evidence that Canaanite or Mesopotamian mythological beliefs were adopted beyond the Caucasus, deep into the Eurasian steppes.

This was also at a time when Islam dominated the Near East and North Africa, while Christianity moved into Europe. This was not a period of Canaanite ritualistic revival, but the opposite – of the extinguishing of ancient pagan religions as Abrahamic empires expanded.

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Don’t lose your mind

The Epstein files have shattered all notions of what we consider possible and impossible.

Could Epstein and his billionaire pedophile ring have conjured some fantastical allegiance to an ancient deity like Baal while performing their heinous acts? Sure.

Could they actually be a continuum of a 3,000-year-old ancient Lebanese extremist cult that was booted out of Lebanon, sacrificed kids in Tunisia and somehow managed to get to Russia in medieval times and to Little Saint James island in the 21st century? Nothing would stroke the Lebanese ego more than to know we gave birth to an illuminati society that has been secretly running the world for thousands of years (clearly not to Lebanon’s benefit).

Sadly, however, historians exist, with actual research that dismembers fantasies – irrespective of algorithms and celebrity tweets.

Does this rule out the theory circulating the internet? No, but it does mean a significant amount of historical evidence needs to be produced to connect dots spanning 2,000 to 3,000 years.

What is more plausible is that the billionaire pedophile ring is an outcome of extreme mental and moral deterioration – or, put simply, malignant narcissism. An example of how the human mind and soul becomes devilishly corrupted with an accumulation of power and wealth, feeding an insatiable desire for more.

Unchecked power and impunity are the drivers of these abominable crimes, not religious tradition – neither current nor ancient.

Got a tip? Send an email to tips@deepcutnews.com or send an anonymous Signal to @deepcut.25.

This piece is part of our series, West Asia Focus, where we take a closer look at the region’s geopolitics, grounded in expertise and indigenous perspectives.

There have been enough protests in Iran in recent years to acknowledge that genuine, public discontent exists.

Yes, it’s likely that Mossad cells are active in Iran, given they revealed their presence in last year’s 12-Day War. It’s probable too that US intelligence is also operating in the country, as suggested by the 50,000 Starlink terminals said to have been helping users bypass an internet shutdown.

But to dismiss the protests outright is to simplify the challenges Iran faces, and deny the hardship of millions of Iranians struggling to make ends meet. What these protests reveal is the effectiveness of US sanctions and the underlying economic pain they have caused over the years.

If the US, supported by Israel, were intending to create unrest by making Iranian lives miserable, the protests show it’s working, to an extent.

Sanctions put Iran on back foot

The protests began as a sincere outburst of economic frustration – a fact acknowledged by Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian, who said in late December that protesters had “legitimate demands”. The spark was a collapse in the nation’s currency at a time of ballooning inflation.

Even as Pezeshkian expressed a determination to “eradicate corruption, smuggling, and bribery”, there is little denying that the sanctions have been the primary source of Iran’s economic misery.

Iran has been under US sanctions since a revolution toppled the US-backed autocrat, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, in 1979. Those sanctions intensified under the Obama administration in 2011 with the aim of crippling Iran’s oil trade, and have largely remained in place ever since.

According to one study, the sanctions since 2011 are estimated to have cost Iran at least US$1.2 trillion (A$1.78 trillion) and 23% of its economic capacity. A World Bank report noted “the economic cost of ongoing sanctions” as a major drag on growth.

The report also makes clear the significant economic risks of another direct war – a potential 7% contraction in Iran’s GDP. It’s a point no doubt shaping Iran’s aversion to a renewed war with Israel and the US.

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Iran denied a $1 trillion economy

Iran has the largest gas reserves and fourth largest oil reserves in the world. Yet, it has been in the midst of sanctions-induced economic stagnation since 2011. The below World Bank chart shows Iran’s GDP per capita – once among the highest in the region – barely growing in real terms, only to be eclipsed by other upper middle income countries.

Living standards have, predictably, declined, but an alternative path was briefly unveiled in 2015 when Barack Obama signed a nuclear deal with Iran.

With promised sanctions relief, Iran, according to a McKinsey report at the time, had “the potential to add US$1 trillion to GDP and create nine million jobs by 2035”.

McKinsey identified Iran’s economic potential, in particular its diversified economy, domestic production base, large consumer market and high number of science graduates as strengths waiting to be realised.

But one obstacle stood firm against the 2015 deal: Benjamin Netanyahu. The Israeli prime minister’s vehement opposition, championed by the pro-Israel lobby in DC, saw the deal scrapped after the ascension of Donald Trump in 2016.

Israel understood, as McKinsey illustrated, that an Iran free of sanctions would become a West Asian economic powerhouse, denting its own ambitions at regional supremacy.

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Iran’s strategy of force and compromise

While it’s difficult to ascertain the exact scale of this month’s protests, Iran’s rulers have also shown an ability to see off bursts of domestic unrest with a combination of force and compromise.

This is what occurred in 2022 when, in response to the killing of Mahsa Amini over a compulsory headscarf violation and the widespread protests it provoked, Iran’s leadership reportedly scaled back its enforcement of the hijab.

The response to the 2026 protests appears to be on par with Iran’s track record of protest crackdowns – Human Rights Watch reports growing evidence of “mass killings of protesters” and Ayatollah Khamenei himself admits thousands have been killed. Nevertheless, it would be a misreading to assume Iran’s leadership governs by force alone.

Iran’s leaders are acutely aware of the country’s economic pressures and have tried to massage the pain through monthly direct cash transfers. The World Bank report notes that the cash transfers as well as other social programs have “played a significant role in poverty reduction”. Between 2021 and 2023, “6.1 million Iranians were lifted above the poverty line”.

But these efforts have only softened the pain of sanctions. The stagnant economy has been unable to create a sufficient amount of jobs to absorb a high volume of educated workers. Iran’s overall labour participation rate is, according to the World Bank report, only 41.3% (Australia’s by comparison is 66.8%) – and dives to an abysmal 14.2% for women. Youth, university graduates and women are those “experiencing significantly higher unemployment rates”. No wonder they’re angry.

A well-understood intention of sanctions is to incite popular unrest through economic grievances. It’s an outcome Iran’s leaders seem to expect, and have experienced over the years. Far from being on the verge of crumbling, they appear to have a strategy in hand to deal with the outbursts of unrest – a blend of the carrot and the stick.

Ultimately, it’s a question of time, and whether Iran’s leaders have enough carrots to outlast US sanctions, and outlive broader US and Israeli efforts to undermine their rule and see Iran break.

If you have a story tip, drop an email to tips@deepcutnews.com or send an anonymous Signal to @deepcut.25.

Welcome to the first of our new series, West Asia Focus. This section aims to provide essential insight and context on a region that is often misunderstood – cutting through shallow and misleading headlines to tell the full story. We hope you find it both informative and engaging.

“Why are you interfering in our internal issues?” the Algerian president, Abdelmadjid Tebboune, indirectly asked the United Arab Emirates in October.

The UAE is rapidly gaining notoriety as a wrecking ball across Arab and African states.

Its backing of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan stands out as one of the most brutal examples, with the group said to have massacred as many as 27,000 civilians after capturing El Fasher in Darfur last month.

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The UAE’s nefarious activities stretch from Libya to Yemen, leaving a trail of destruction in their wake. Analysts describe the UAE as a “sub-imperial” power. Central to this status is its overt alignment with the US and Israel, allowing it to project its power beyond its borders and exert outsized influence.

Far from a simple lust for power, this aggressive posture stems from a deep paranoia. Like Israel, the UAE sees its primary enemies coming from within the Arab and Islamic world.

The enemy within

The Arab Spring protests of 2010-2011 ignited an Emirati campaign to crush the democratic tide. The UAE’s rulers saw popular movements as existential threats to their autocratic grip. In the years since, they have spearheaded counter-revolutionary efforts to thwart democratic transitions in Egypt and Tunisia, and turned uprisings in Libya, Yemen and Sudan into theatres of war.

Fear of democracy in the Arab world is one shared by all regional autocrats, but for the UAE, it takes on an added level of paranoia.

The UAE’s tiny native population denies its rulers a powerful social base to legitimise its rule internally, unlike Saudi Arabia’s Wahhabi establishment. The nation’s very title – United Arab Emirates – belies the reality that the majority of the population is in fact South Asian, not Arab. The UAE ceased conducting population censuses in 2010 due to the sensitivity of Emiratis constituting a minority in their own country.

But estimates from the International Labour Organisation in 2019 suggest that of 9.5 million residents, only 1.25 million (or 13%) were actually Emirati. Pew Research in 2017 found that 5.5 million migrants were from India and Pakistan alone, the majority of whom were working class, representing 58% of the population. The UAE also has sizeable migrant communities from other Arab countries.

And herein lies its weakness. Large expatriate Arab communities mean ideas and movements taking hold in other Arab states can be easily transmitted to the UAE, while its non-Arab majority working class – who hold no loyalty to the state or its rulers – makes it susceptible to popular agitation.

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Limits of power

Despite towering sovereign wealth funds placing the UAE third globally behind the US and China, these riches do not translate into traditional state power. Its small native population means a small army and limited domestic market, leaving it vulnerable to regional giants like Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt.

To compensate, the UAE has adopted three militaristic pillars:

• aligning with a great power – the US – for defence

• upgrading with high-tech capabilities – see its AI-chip deal with the Trump administration and closer military ties with Israel

• backing non-state actors and recruiting mercenaries to do its bidding.

But neither AI (yet), smart drones nor mercenaries can supplant the necessity of manpower in times of war. The world has been reminded of this fact with Russia’s grinding gains in the Ukraine war, owed to superior manpower (outnumbering Ukrainian forces 3-to-1, and in some battles 10-to-1). Israel, too, has encountered this limitation – despite its technological superiority and air power – with its failure to fully occupy the Gaza Strip or enter Lebanon without sustaining serious casualties.

The UAE’s own campaigns have encountered the same constraint. Its invasion of Yemen in 2015, alongside the Saudis, failed to dislodge the Houthis. Its support of warlord Khalifa Haftar in Libya was not enough to defeat the Tripoli-based Government of National Unity (GNU). Even its support of the RSF in Sudan has so far only resulted in a devastating conflict of swinging momentum.

In all these wars, the Emiratis have also experienced the limitations of their power vis-a-vis other regional heavyweights. In Yemen, its technological prowess was not enough to overcome Iranian support for the Houthis. In Libya, Turkish backing of the GNU placed a check on Emirati ambitions. And in Sudan too, RSF gains in Darfur have only prompted Egypt and Turkey to increase their support for the Sudanese army.

Angering a region

Emirati tactics have succeeded, at least temporarily, in halting democracy and Islamist movements in the region. But chaos alone bears its own consequences, and its aggressive regional posture is spawning new enemies and alienating key allies.

Two incidents in recent weeks provide a glimpse of rising regional anger toward the UAE. The first was Mohammed bin Salman’s visit to the White House, where he reportedly took the unusual step of asking the US president to impose secondary sanctions on the UAE for its support of the RSF.

The second was a drone attack last week that struck an Emirati-owned gas facility in Iraqi Kurdistan. A warning, perhaps, that the fires the UAE is spreading across the region may soon return home.

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Other important West Asia news

• Is war about to resume in Lebanon? Lebanese outlet Al Jadeed reports that the US informed Beirut of an end-of-year deadline to disarm Hezbollah, and that “things will not be the same” after Pope Leo XIV concludes his current visit to Lebanon. US envoy Tom Barrack, who was named in the Epstein files, also warned Iraq to prevent Iraqi Shiite militias from supporting Hezbollah in the event of an Israeli attack.

• Israel’s retreat from Beit Jinn in southern Syria, after killing 13 Syrians, appears to have been due to local resistance efforts. Israel originally tried to blame a Sunni Islamist group in Lebanon, al-Jamaa al-Islamiya, which then denied responsibility. It then sought to pin the blame on Syrian security forces connected to the new Sharaa regime, but Israeli media conceded that there was “no indication so far that al-Sharaa’s people were directly involved”. The resistance appears to have been purely a local effort to defend their homes from an invading colonial force.

  • Disagreement has surfaced between Trump and Netanyahu over Syria. Trump posted on Truth Social urging Israel to “maintain a strong and true dialogue with Syria”, and is concerned continued Israeli incursions and strikes could destabilise the Sharaa regime.

  • “We are trying to tell Bibi he has to stop this because if it continues he will self-destruct,” a US official told Axios.

• As I suspected a few weeks ago, it doesn’t appear the US-led International Stabilisation Force for Gaza is getting off the ground. The Washington Post reports that no Arab country has committed to contributing soldiers, and Indonesia and Azerbaijan have back-pedalled. Unsurprisingly, governments are not too keen on having their troops “put in a position where they may be required to use force against Palestinians”.

  • Even egregious plans to build housing compounds for “screened Palestinians” in the Israeli-controlled zone of the Gaza Strip appears to be facing stumbling blocks. The primary hurdle? Money. “It is not yet clear how the project would be funded,” a New York Times report read. The plan was conceived as “an outgrowth of the Trump administration’s peace plan”, and is primarily the work of US rabbi Aryeh Lightstone.

  • Gaza, thus, appears to be left in genocide limbo. Aid is still trickling in, with Israel withholding 6,000 aid trucks filled with food supplies, tents and blankets, according to UNRWA. Israeli forces are still occupying more than half of the strip, shooting at those in the vicinity of the Yellow Line, including two brothers last weekend, aged between 8 and 11. Israel defended killing the children, saying the young boys posed “an immediate threat”.

I belong to a farming family from Birzeit in the West Bank. I am a diaspora Palestinian and moved here in 2022, but our family have been here for hundreds of years.

We’ve been farming grapes and producing wine since the 1990s, and olives since long before then. We also have some smallhold farms where we grow seasonal produce.

About three months ago, we received a notice from the Israeli army announcing the creation of a new ‘military security zone’ of approximately 7-8,000 square metres in an area between Birzeit and Atara, a neighbouring village.

At the centre of this new security zone is a Zionist settler outpost that was illegally set up by members of the Hilltop Youth movement, a fundamentalist militia group designated as a terrorist organisation in Australia, the United Kingdom and the European Union. This ‘security zone’ now includes some of our farmlands, as well as lands belonging to other families from our village and from Atara.

Since the establishment of their outpost, the Hilltop Youth have systematically invaded our farms, destroyed our crops, and herded their sheep – themselves stolen – to graze on our vineyards and orchards. They have set their sheep loose on at least 300 vines and deliberately cut 200 others – between a quarter and a third of our total vines. They have stolen our farming equipment, including water tanks, posts, irrigation hoses, and other tools we need to work our land.

This group in particular has already shot two people in Atara, seriously wounding them. They have burned cars, attempted to burn our homes in Atara, and carried out other acts of intimidation and destruction designed to terrorise us and make our continued presence on our land feel impossible.

In addition to wine grapes, we also grow table grapes. Most of those were planted by my paternal grandmother – some of those vines are older than the state of Israel. In the Hilltop Youth’s last attack, they cut those vines.

The tip of the spear

What is happening here is not a matter of a few ‘extremist’ individuals acting on their own, but a broader colonialist settler mobilisation project that is funded and supported by members of the Zionist movement both locally and internationally.

The settlers are the visible tip of the spear, carrying out the violence directly on our lands and bodies. They function as a paramilitary force that has been unleashed on the West Bank to create new ‘facts on the ground’ by stealing Palestinian land and evicting Palestinians from these areas.

The army and the police, meanwhile, create the legal and physical infrastructure that allows this violence to continue. They declare ‘security zones’, restrict our movements, look the other way when attacks happen, delay or refuse enforcement of court decisions, and then appear just enough to preserve the illusion that there is some kind of law or order being applied equally.

We are told that we can seek justice through the courts, and we have tried to do so, investing time, energy, and limited resources into these cases. We even ‘won’ one of them.

But a legal victory that is not enforced becomes a type of trap. The settlers remain, the outpost is rebuilt, the damage continues. Instead of protecting us, the legal system can end up disciplining us and keeping our resistance within tightly controlled, time-consuming, and often futile channels, while the reality on the ground keeps shifting in the settlers’ favour.

Our belief in sumud

At a more personal and communal level, this has deep psychological and social effects. Our days and nights are now structured around uncertainty. Will they come today? What will they destroy this time? How do we protect our elders, our children, our livelihoods, when the people attacking us are armed, protected, and feel completely untouchable?

Instead of planning for harvests or improvements to our land, we plan for documentation, for court dates, for emergency responses to attacks. The constant need to ‘prove’ what is happening to us by filming, by collecting evidence, by explaining ourselves again and again only adds another layer of exhaustion. It is not just our crops and equipment being taken; it is our time, our sense of security, and our ability to live a normal, dignified life.

At the same time, our choice not to respond with physical violence, despite everything, is not a sign of weakness or acceptance. It is a strategic and moral decision forced on us by a hugely unequal balance of power. Any physical confrontation with armed settlers backed by the army would likely end with us being arrested, injured, or killed and then blamed for ‘escalation’.

By remaining present on our lands, documenting what is done to us, and insisting on using whatever legal, political, and social tools are available, we are trying to assert a different kind of strength: one based on sumud (steadfastness), on refusing to disappear quietly, and on making it harder for this process of dispossession to remain invisible.

We are not giving up

For people in Australia, there are three urgent things I would ask. The first is: inform yourselves beyond the headlines and do it now, not later. Do not accept language like ‘clashes’ or ‘tensions’ at face value. Ask who has the guns, who has the backing of a state, who is being designated a terrorist or extremist group, and who is simply trying to harvest their olives and grapes in peace.

The second is: use your voice and your political weight. Talk to your MPs, your unions, your churches, your community organisations. Ask why Australia is not yet taking concrete steps, such as enforcing sanctions and restrictions on fundraising, to stop money and political cover flowing to groups and individuals involved in this kind of violence. If other governments can recognise these settlers as extremist or terrorist actors and sanction them, there is no good reason for Australia to remain passive.

Lastly, I would ask Australians to remember that your choices, even as consumers and citizens far away, reach us quickly and directly. Supporting Palestinian communities, human rights organisations and legal groups that document and challenge these abuses makes a difference on the ground. Question trade and investment that normalises or profits from the Zionist project, because that economic support helps keep this machinery running.

I want to be very clear: we are not giving up. We are not surrendering our land, our dignity or our humanity, no matter how much pressure is put on us. Our presence on this land, our refusal to leave, our decision to keep planting, rebuilding and documenting is an act of steadfastness and defiance.

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Dr Ezzideen Shehab is a young doctor from northern Gaza, born in 1995 and raised in Jabalia. He went to Arafat Gifted Secondary School and did his medical training in Iran at the University of Isfahan. He returned to Gaza just a few days before 7 October 2023 and has provided medical care to its people ever since.

The below is an excerpt from his upcoming book, Diary of a Young Doctor, available to purchase now through Readers and Writers Against Genocide.

17 July 2025

I am a doctor. And I cannot save a child. There: I have said it. What is a doctor, if not a liar with trembling hands? What is medicine, if not a prayer whispered into the dark, hoping something, anything, will answer?

Four months ago, the child fell ill. His name is Qasem. I say ‘child’, but I mean something more: I mean a flicker of grace in a world that has spat on grace, trampled it beneath tanks, suffocated it beneath bureaucratic signatures and steel walls. Almost two years ago, a bomb fell at four in the morning. A single bomb: that was all it took to erase forty-two names from the Book of the Living. My family, every last one of them, turned to silence in the span of a breath.

But Qasem lived. He and his mother crawled out from under the ruins, not because of skill or science, but because of some strange divine arithmetic I still do not understand. Surely the universe would not be so precise in its cruelty as to spare a mother’s life only so she could outlive all four of her children, and watch the last one vanish by inches.

Qasem bruises now. Not from injury, but from breath, from pressure, from life. His gums bleed. His tiny hands shake. His blood turns against him in slow, merciless rebellion. They call it Idiopathic Thrombocytopenic Purpura. An elegant name, too elegant for something so wretched.

And I, his doctor, his cousin, his useless, weeping doctor, have nothing for him. No treatment. No transfusion. No hospital bed. Only forms, permits, border checkpoints, and a phone that does not ring. We applied for his transfer. They marked his file Urgent: Category A. But no one comes.

Meanwhile, the boy lies in a tent. Yes: a tent. There is sand in his hair. Insects at his feet. He no longer cries the way children cry. He cries like a man: quiet, long, accepting. His eyes are not angry. They are tired. Each morning, I go to him, like a priest visiting a parishioner. I kneel at his bedside, not to heal, but to witness. To bear the unbearable truth: That a world which allows this is not a world that loves children. That I am not a doctor, but a mourner-in-waiting. That Gaza is not a place, but a diagnosis.

Qasem is not alone. There are over 11,000 patients in Gaza: their names neatly stacked in files, their diagnoses typed in black ink, waiting on desks that do not move. More than 5000 of them have cancer. They do not ask for mercy, only for permission. They wait for chemotherapy, for radiation, for one open gate. And I, the man with the stethoscope and the shaking hands, cannot save even one. The death is not sudden. It comes in paper cuts, in stamps, in silences. It comes wrapped in the civility of diplomacy and the white lies of delay.

No: this is not war. This is accounting. And every day we wait, one more number is subtracted from the future.

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18 July 2025

It was 1:15 a.m. And I was not asleep; no, I was wrestling with myself, with the ghosts of my own insignificance, with that terrible heaviness that descends after long hours of service, when the world is dark, and your soul is darker still. And then, a cry. A woman’s cry. Not a scream, not a call for help. No, this was something else. It was the cry of existence itself. Raw. Ancient. Infinite. As though pain had taken human form and now walked barefoot down my street.

I staggered to the window. The street was devoured by darkness, so complete it felt like God Himself had looked away. She moved through it, trembling, crying. Each sob a shudder against the very order of things.

A man called out to her. His voice old, uncertain. ‘Why are you crying, daughter? What’s happened?’

She said: ‘I’m displaced.’

Only that. But the weight of that word. That one word held in it the screams of nations, the shame of kings, the silence of heaven.

‘I lost my family before sunset,’ she said, ‘and I stopped here to rest. I fell asleep. Now I’m alone. I’m afraid of the dark. I’m afraid of the dogs.’ And she pleaded. To strangers. To men at windows. To the night itself. ‘Walk me,’ she said, ‘just walk me to where they might be.’

And finally, a few came down. Young men, boys perhaps, carrying more doubt than courage. I stood at the window. I watched. And I did nothing. No, worse. I felt. I felt the shame of standing above. Of not crying when I should. She was young. Maybe twenty. She must have had a home once. A real one. With warm tea and soft lamps and parents who argued gently over dinner. They would never have let her walk alone.

But war takes everything. Everything. It takes the house and leaves the ceiling. It takes the bread and leaves the hunger. It takes the father and leaves the shadow. And worst of all, it takes dignity. Quietly. Silently. Like a thief who knows exactly what you value most. There is no nobility in war. No poetry. No glory. Only what remains after the screaming stops: Dust, silence, and the unspoken knowledge that something sacred has been desecrated.

This night, this woman, this moment of crying in the dark. It will not be recorded in any treaty. It will not be remembered in any speech. It will vanish. And that is the tragedy. For this was a war, too. A war without soldiers. A war without witnesses. A war fought in the soul of a woman afraid to walk alone.

Displacement, they call it. As if home were a folder to be misplaced. As if safety were a line on a map that moved by accident. But displacement is not just the loss of land. It is the exile of trust. It is the dismantling of silence. It is the breaking of the human frame, again and again, until what remains is not a woman or a man, but a being who simply continues, without hope, without rest, without question.

And for women, this exile comes wrapped in an even greater silence. Their fear, their wounds, their trembling dignity, it all remains hidden, swallowed by the thunder of men’s wars and men’s victories. They are not named in the headlines. But they bleed too. And often, they bleed alone. She was not crying only for herself. She was crying for all of us. For all the nights we chose silence over courage. For all the moments we watched and did not act. For every child lost to noise, and every woman abandoned to darkness.

I tell you: That night, something sacred walked barefoot in the street. And the world looked away.

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Asmaa al-Ghoul, a Palestinian journalist based in France, contributed to this story.

Hamas says Israel’s response to the October 7 attacks “exceeded all expectations” and that the subsequent genocide in Gaza revealed Israel’s “true face”.

In an exclusive interview with Deepcut, Mousa Abu Marzouk – a senior member of Hamas’s politburo – also said the Palestinian group was committed to the ceasefire “but we have legitimate concerns that Israel may partially or completely breach the agreement”.

“The problem lies in the fact that Israel – as experience has repeatedly shown – does not abide by its agreements. Evidence for this is historical, numerous and ongoing, from daily bombings in Lebanon to the current violations taking place in the Gaza Strip despite the existing agreement,” Abu Marzouk said.

He warned that Hamas “cannot stand by as spectators while crimes are being committed against our people. Defending ourselves is a humanitarian duty and a legal right, especially when children and women are targeted, cities and hospitals are destroyed”.

October 7 reflection

We asked Abu Marzouk if the group held regrets over the October 7 attacks, which killed 695 Israeli civilians and 373 Israeli military personnel, and provoked an Israeli bloodbath that has killed at least 68,865 Palestinians – although the actual death toll is said to be much higher.

“The operation of October 7 was not the beginning of the matter; rather, it came within a long historical context of ethnic cleansing, aggression, blockade, and settlement building,” he told Deepcut.

“Successive Israeli governments have refused to grant our people even their most basic rights, while marginalising the Palestinian cause and implementing extremist plans aimed at liquidating it. This left us facing difficult choices – either to surrender to Israel’s schemes, thus resolving the conflict in its favour, or to resist with the simple means available to us.”

The scale of Israel’s response took Hamas by surprise, but “what surprised us most was the extent of international complicity”, Abu Marzouk added.

“Many countries provided Israel with political cover for its genocide against the Palestinian people, as well as military support in the form of weapons, ammunition, and intelligence.”

A UN report published in October found 63 countries, including Australia, had “facilitated, legitimised and eventually normalised the genocidal campaign perpetrated by Israel”.

A fragile ceasefire

Israel has killed at least 238 Palestinians, including 97 children, since the agreement went into effect on October 11. Israeli forces also remain in control of roughly 53% of Gaza’s territory and, according to Gaza’s government media office, is still hindering humanitarian aid – permitting the entry of only 145 of 600 aid trucks on a daily basis.

Fears are mounting that Israel may seek to permanently occupy the territory it holds, with an Israeli government official stating reconstruction of Israeli-controlled zones could proceed without an agreed-to second phase of the ceasefire deal.

“There are still Israeli commitments that have not been implemented to this day – among them the reopening of the Rafah crossing, withdrawal to the agreed-upon lines, and allowing the entry of equipment necessary for rebuilding infrastructure and hospitals. In addition, the occupation forces continue to kill dozens of Palestinians even after the ceasefire came into effect,” Abu Marzouk said.

The senior Hamas official said responsibility for maintaining the ceasefire “falls on the countries that guarantee the agreement”, principally the United States.

“The US administration provided us with verbal guarantees and assurances that Israel would not return to its genocidal war. The United States, given its influence and its relations with Israel, bears a direct responsibility to restrain the occupation from committing further crimes,” he said.

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Can Hamas trust Trump?

Asked whether Hamas can trust the Trump administration will maintain pressure on Israel to abide by the agreement, Abu Marzouk said that “the Palestinian resistance does not base our political positions on trust in external parties”.

“Experience has taught us that successive US administrations – regardless of their [political] orientations – have always been biased toward the Israeli occupation. This is a reality we fully understand. However, it does not prevent us from engaging positively with any initiative that could end our people’s suffering and stop the aggression.”

Abu Marzouk said the negotiations in Egypt which brought about the October ceasefire “were intense and challenging, but we worked hard to reach an agreement”. He noted the “crucial role” played by US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

“We did not enter these negotiations to change others’ perceptions of us, but to save our people from genocide, restore life to the Gaza Strip, and prevent the occupation from continuing its daily crimes and violations,” he said.

“We viewed President Trump’s initiative as an opportunity to stop the bleeding and end the aggression against the Gaza Strip.”

Calls for Israel to be disarmed

Abu Marzouk rejected western calls for the Palestinian group to be disarmed, arguing that “weapons should be taken from the state with a nuclear arsenal that has committed crimes of genocide against our people – not from those who are defending their land and people from aggression and who possess only light arms”.

“We are the weaker party, and we are the ones most deserving of protection,” he said.

The ceasefire’s first phase included no stipulation that Palestinian groups be disarmed. This point was omitted in the final deal after the 20-point plan, proposed by Trump in late September, called for “a process of demilitarisation of Gaza under the supervision of independent monitors”.

Hamas was not consulted on the 20-point plan prior to its announcement, which Trump released alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – who is wanted by the International Criminal Court on war crimes charges.

“The Palestinian resistance today is a natural extension of our people’s struggle, which has lasted for more than a century against occupation and injustice,” Abu Marzouk said.

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Not seeking power in Gaza

Abu Marzouk said Hamas “is not clinging to ruling the Gaza Strip, and this position predates the genocidal war”.

“We have reiterated our position on many occasions, even during the war, that we are open to forming a Palestinian national unity government. If that proves difficult, we propose a technocratic government made up of qualified, non-partisan national figures,” he said.

The Palestinian group, however, remained vehemently opposed to foreign rule in Gaza.

“Our only condition is that Palestinians govern themselves, and we categorically reject any external guardianship over our people.”

The ceasefire deal mentioned an international taskforce made up of the US, Qatar, Egypt and Turkey to oversee its implementation. But it remains to be seen if the taskforce will ever see the light, with Israel firmly rejecting Turkey’s involvement, and Hamas adamant in protecting Palestinian sovereignty.

An Axios report yesterday revealed the US was seeking to deploy foreign troops in Gaza as an “enforcement force and not a peacekeeping force” – setting up a potential clash with Hamas and other Palestinian groups operating in the strip. A draft US resolution to be brought to the UN Security Council also called for a controversial ‘Board of Peace’ to govern Gaza until at least the end of 2027 – effectively placing the Palestinian territory under US-led foreign occupation.

“The Palestinian people alone are the decision-makers in their existential affairs; their sovereignty over their land and their right to determine their future are not subject to the decisions of external parties,” Abu Marzouk told Deepcut.

There are a lot of questions to ask someone of Chris Sidoti’s stature. He has had an extensive career tracking human rights abuses, including serving as a former Australian Human Rights Commissioner under two prime ministers and co-leading a UN investigation into allegations of genocide against Myanmar’s Rohingya people in 2017. His most recent work, however, may in fact be his most consequential: as a member of the UN Commission of Inquiry which, in September, found Israel has committed genocide in the Gaza Strip.

We sat down with Sidoti in Sydney, where we discussed the Australian government’s “avoidance” of Gaza; the “fear” among journalists reporting on Palestine; if there’s a future for international law; and what motivates him to keep going.

Thank you to our paid subscribers who submitted questions; we’ve managed to include four below. We do things a bit differently to the mainstream – we like to make sure our community feels part of these important conversations. These are topics that, ultimately, affect us all. It’s a model we’ll repeat, so if you can, become a paid subscriber for as little as $2.30 a week and join in on our next interview.

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This interview has been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.

Alex: The government routinely speaks about the genocide in Gaza in terms that actively conflict with reality. It refuses to use the term ‘genocide’; it refers continually to a ‘two-state solution’ that Israel has stated for years it will never allow to happen, and which its settlements have made functionally impossible to realise; it invokes Israel’s ‘right’ to self-defence, which is not recognised by international law; it says that Australia is abiding by international law by supplying what it calls ‘non-lethal’ parts of F-35 fighter jets to Israel.

What do you think are the main underlying reasons for the government’s response to the genocide?

Chris: It’s an avoidance issue. The government is avoiding the reality of the situation in Gaza. It doesn’t deny the existence of genocide, but it doesn’t accept it either. It hides behind the fact that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has a case before it dealing with the Genocide Convention, and the fact that that case will not be decided for another two or three years. So the government says it can delay taking any action in relation to the genocide until the International Court of Justice has given its final verdict on the subject.

To me, that’s using a fig-leaf to cover up the government’s lack of policy. We have obligations already under international law. We are on notice from the ICJ itself that there is a high risk of genocide. The court made its first set of interim orders in January 2024. Their decision on that occasion triggered the obligation of all states to prevent genocide, and yet there has been no significant action taken by Australia at all.

The government doesn’t have to wait. In fact, our obligation is not to wait – it’s to act. The same is true of war crimes and crimes against humanity. No matter how much avoidance that the government decides it will engage in, there are existing legal obligations. They have certainly been real for the last year and a half. I certainly would have expected that we would have seen action.

The government is moving slowly in conjunction with other western states similar to our own. In spite of the slow movement, I give the government credit for having moved. We’ve had a very long period in Australia of bipartisan, unquestioning, uncritical support for the state of Israel, no matter what it does, and it’s well beyond time that we started being far more critical. The government has been doing that, particularly over the last two years – the recognition of the state of Palestine is a good example.

But we want to travel as part of the pack. That’s fine, but it’s not enough. We also have our own obligations as an individual state under international law – not to wait for others, but to discharge our responsibilities. What’s been done to date has been too slow and too cautious, and our obligations go well beyond where we are.

In September, you said of the Netanyahu government’s response to the Commission’s finding of genocide in Gaza that “they’re producing the responses by ChatGPT these days”. You’ve investigated a number of genocides and conflicts where genocide was suspected or proven to have been taking place. What are the common threads you’ve noticed among the governments and armed forces committing those genocides? How do they talk about what they’re doing, both to the world and domestically?

The first situation of genocide I examined was the removal of Indigenous children in Australia. I was the Australian Human Rights Commissioner at the time the Commission undertook its inquiry into the removal of Indigenous children [the Dodson commission]. That introduced me intensively to the nature of the law of genocide and the experience of genocide.

This is the third time I’ve been required to investigate, to find facts and apply the law to situations that could constitute genocide. The three situations are very different, but they brought home to me how different the law of genocide is to popular understanding of what constitutes genocide. Genocide law was drafted at the end of World War Two. It’s derived from experience, not from theory – the experience of the Holocaust. The principal work on it was done by Raphael Lemkin, an international lawyer and a Holocaust survivor. The understanding that genocide requires mass slaughter is not correct. It requires an intention to destroy a group, in whole or in part, that is defined by race, ethnicity, nationality or religion. It doesn’t require a single death.

In the case of the situation in Gaza, we found that four of the five categories of genocidal act had been committed, and we found that genocidal purpose had also been established. That’s the fundamental groundwork of examining any situation of potential genocide.

One of the common characteristics of the three examples that I’m familiar with is denial. The authorities responsible for the activities deny point-blank that they actually occurred. That’s understandable – why would they accept accountability? It’s like a murderer pleading guilty to murder. Somebody who’s charged with such a serious crime will try to avoid responsibility for it.

But denial lies at the heart of the way in which governments respond, and that’s exactly what we see in the case of Israel now. The responses are routine, they’re trite. The government and military spokespeople persistently lie. They’ve done that for years, and this is just another example of it. It’s part of a common practice of denial, of lying, of personal vilification of those raising criticisms. It’s all an attempt to avoid accountability.

[Israeli finance minister Bezalel] Smotrich and [Israeli national security minister Itamar] Ben-Gvir are examples of another factor – brazen self-justification by way of boasting about what they’re doing. We saw that in Myanmar as well. In Myanmar, there were radical nationalist fanatics who spoke in very blunt language about the Rohingya people and what was going to be done to them. And that’s exactly the same kind of inciting, hateful, destructive language, violent language, that comes from Smotrich and Ben-Gvir and others within the Israeli leadership. For us as investigators, this is all evidence – including the very contradictions in what they’re saying. It’s all evidence of the motivation, the purpose, the objectives and the strategies that are being adopted.

In looking at the situation in Gaza, part of our evidence for concluding that there were genocidal purpose are the very words that come from the Israeli leadership. Smotrich and Ben-Gvir are among the people we named as having incited genocide, but those who are in more direct lines of control – [Isaac] Herzog, the president; [Benjamin] Netanyahu, the prime minister; [Yoav] Gallant, who in the beginning of the war was the defence minister. These are the people who have responsibilities for the operations themselves – more directly than Smotrich and Ben-Gvir.

At the Press Club, you spoke about Australian journalists recounting the pressure they’re coming under when they try to report on this, and that there’s plenty of fear around. Without naming names, can you give a couple of examples of what you mean?

I’ve had a number of journalists who have phoned me to get a background briefing and in doing so, have said, ‘I’d like to have a chat to you on background about what’s going on in Gaza and your assessment of it. I don’t know whether I’ll get approval to write up a story or produce a program about it – there are a lot of sensitivities about this in our organisation. I can’t guarantee that this is going to be used.’

I’ve been doing human rights work for 45 years, in a wide variety of organisations – non-governmental groups, official bodies like the UN, church-based organisations. I’ve dealt with an enormous range of issues since the late 1970s. And I’ve never encountered journalists saying this to me. And it’s not just Australian journalists. International and Australian journalists have said this to me on many occasions.

It seems to me this is a particularly sensitive issue, politically and even ethically. Politically because of the party-political fights that go on – certainly politics in western countries overall has become more polarised, and this is another one of those issues that’s a part of that. Another part of it is the sense that those who are uncritically supportive of the state of Israel will vilify, attack and seek to destroy those who are critical of Israel. That’s a worry for individual journalists and the organisations for which they work. So there is fear of being personally attacked, of being accused of being antisemitic. [There’s the] possibility of economic loss – of losing viewers or people on social media.

I wonder what you think about journalist Chris Hedges’ planned Press Club talk being cancelled earlier this month?

Look, I don’t know everything that’s gone on, especially behind the scenes. Personally, I felt somewhat embarrassed that he had been invited and then the invitation was withdrawn. When I accepted the invitation to the Press Club, I didn’t know he had been invited, and I didn’t know until it was made public that his invitation had been withdrawn.

It’s very disappointing, I have to say, particularly given that Chris is a highly respected international research and investigative journalist with a very strong track record who was visiting Australia for a short time. If I can be blunt, had I known he had been invited, I would have said to the Press Club, ‘well, he’s visiting, he’s an international [speaker], go with him, you can come back to me next year’. I live here, they can get me any time.

I do know that the whole thing is awful. It’s obviously personally hurtful to a very eminent investigative journalist. I wish it hadn’t happened.

Reader question from Kimberley:

In the absence of mainstream accountability and the ongoing impunity afforded to the United States and Israel, is the immediate and long term future of international law in jeopardy? If so, what does the break down of international law look like and what reverberations will that pose if it does break down?

The international law system has been built up over 85 years, since the end of World War Two. It has been one of the most significant postwar projects – to build a system of law and mechanisms that could ensure that what happened in World War Two never happened again. And 85 years on, we are seeing the whole thing in an existential crisis. The situation arising from Israel is one part of that, but the hatred of the international system by the Trump administration is unprecedented, and it could well lead to its destruction.

We have succeeded, over the last 85 years, in building an extremely good body of law that did not exist in 1945. The building of the mechanisms to implement the law has not been as successful. The International Criminal Court and the ICJ are very weak, so there are still great challenges. This is a project that is incomplete, and yet we may find that it is torn down before it reaches the stage of effectiveness in ensuring respect for the law that has been built so carefully. Israel is a key component of that, but if we didn’t have the situation in Israel over the last two years I think that crisis would still exist.

International law is just about the only thing that stands between us and the abyss. Without international law, states can do whatever they like to each other and to their own citizens. As weak as it is, as ineffective as it is, it’s at least an attempt to provide protection for people – an attempt that’s far from successful, but still far better than nothing. And without it, there’s nothing. The alternative is just chaos.

Reader question from Stefano:

A Carlton mascot was just fired for refusing to fundraise for IDF soldiers. While organisations keep funnelling donations to the IDF, opponents face career destruction (Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah, Antoinette Lattouf, Professor Peter MacDonald), and officials face no liability for approving fighter jet parts or Future Fund investments. How is materially supporting genocide legal in Australia while opposing it destroys lives? What legal mechanisms or avenues could reverse this, or activate the laws you’ve identified rather than leaving them dormant while enablers operate freely?

The major issue is not primarily a legal one. There are legal remedies – the case of Antoinette Lattouf has shown how those can be pursued – but they won’t cover every situation. It’s a legal problem, but it’s also a political problem and especially a moral and ethical problem.

Antisemitism and anti-Palestinian racism and hate speech are all very real issues, and becoming more prevalent. But we need to address these issues in comprehensive holistic ways and not rely on the law alone, with all its defects, or by saying ‘this is not a legal matter, we’ll deal with this by having a debate in Parliament’. That’s not good enough either. We’ve got a long way to go in this country of addressing issues of discrimination, vilification and hatred in a way that’s effective.

Alex: The response to antisemitic attacks or pro-Palestinian protests from several state governments, especially in NSW and Victoria, has been to pass new laws. In NSW, the laws outlawing protests in or near places of worship were recently struck down as unconstitutional; in Victoria, organisations that receive government grant funding are now required to sign a ‘social cohesion values commitment’. Do you have an assessment of whether that approach has been effective?

It’s not an effective approach, and one of the reasons why is because there’s still no evidence that these laws have been needed. These are examples of kneejerk lawmaking that’s not based on sound evidence or thorough consultation with affected communities and, for those reasons, does not effectively address the problem.

Antisemitism has increased. So too has anti-Palestinian attacks and Islamophobia. We’re seeing hate speech on the streets far more than we have in the past. I don’t deny the existence of very serious problems that need to be addressed, but kneejerk legislation almost inevitably fails.

It’s very concerning when we see governments failing to observe the fundamental principles of lawmaking that we know of our political system. We know how to make good law, and kneejerk legislation is not how to do it. Many other countries have seen similar activities – I would point particularly to the United Kingdom.

Reader question from Nikki:

In light of your previous appointment as Commissioner of the Australian Human Rights Commission, what is your view on how the AHRC and the various state and territory human rights commissions in Australia have exercised any responsibilities they may hold in responding to the genocide in Gaza and in influencing Australia’s stance on Israel and Palestine?

[The Commissions] have limited legal mandates. Their responsibilities are directed to what happens in Australia. They don’t have roles in Australian foreign policy, except to the extent to which servants of the Commonwealth – civil servants, the military – are committing violations of fundamental human rights. For that reason, I think they’ve played very positive roles when addressing public assembly, freedom of speech, the prohibition of hate speech and so forth. They could be more critical of the Australian government’s policies about activities within Australia that affect the relationship with Israel and Palestine. They have some scope for saying things there.

I think there’s a wish that these bodies could solve all the world’s human rights problems. That’s not their role. More than 30 years ago, when I was secretary at the HRC, the Commission made a report about racist violence in Australia, particularly about incitement to violence and hate speech, and that report was ignored. This was in the early 1990s. There are plenty of reports like that sitting on the shelves.

Theresa O’Sullivan, the NSW Coroner, has been outspoken repeatedly about Indigenous deaths in custody. Her recent comments brought together, I think, a very strong sense of frustration she has in dealing with all these cases still, more than 30 years later. Unless governments and political parties and the wider communities take what these commissions are doing seriously, they will always be voices crying in the wilderness.

Reader question from Karin:

You have seen and investigated many of the world’s horrendous atrocities as part of your work. How do you not lose faith in humanity? Do you have any advice for not losing hope?

If you mean I throw my hands in the air and walk away, then no, I don’t. I have a very strong sense that this is a project that is incomplete, and my role is to make any contribution that I can to that project – towards building it, strengthening it, ensuring that ‘never again’ becomes a reality and not just a slogan. I know that it’s slow. I know it’s far from perfect, but I also know there is no alternative if we want to see things better than they are now.

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Rasha Abou Jalal is a journalist from the Gaza Strip covering Palestinian political, humanitarian and social issues for multiple outlets, including Drop Site News, Al-Monitor, The New Arab and the Electronic Intifada. She is a permanent member of the judging committee for the annual Press House Palestine Award. In the photo above, Rasha’s children show off the ‘cake’ they made from sand to celebrate the ceasefire.

Although waves of joy swept through the displaced families in the Gaza Strip following the announcement of the ceasefire on October 10, that joy quickly faded in the face of a harsh reality – the road back to Gaza City is far from paved with hope, as many had wished. The residential neighborhoods that were systematically destroyed by the Israeli army during the war remain piles of rubble, and the return to them is slow, uncertain, and filled with fear.

The reasons behind the delayed return of displaced residents vary but all converge on a shared concern for the future: some fear the resumption of war amid ongoing Israeli violations, others cannot afford the exorbitant cost of transportation, while many see no point in returning to areas turned into forbidden zones lacking basic services or housing.

For now, tents and makeshift camps remain the only refuge for tens of thousands of families still waiting for a true moment of safety before they can return to the ruins.

Sitting in front of her tent in a shelter camp west of Deir al-Balah, Umm Yousef Yassin, 42, displaced from the Al-Daraj neighborhood in central Gaza City, watches her four children playing on the sand – the only playground they have known since being displaced nearly a year ago.

She sighs deeply and says, “When they announced the ceasefire on October 10, I couldn’t believe my ears. I cried with joy, hugged my children, and told them, ‘Finally, we’ll go back home.’ For a moment, I felt the nightmare had ended.”

But her facial expression quickly changes as she adds, her voice filled with sadness, “The joy didn’t last long. Just a few days later, on October 19, Israeli bombardments returned across Gaza’s neighborhoods. They said the army launched airstrikes after Palestinian resistance fighters blew up an Israeli military vehicle in Rafah, in the south. We started reliving the same fear, the same sleepless nights under bombing. That’s when I realised the calm was only temporary – the war could return at any moment.”

It was later reported that an unexploded ordnance may have blown up the Israeli vehicle.

Holding the torn cover of her tent, she continues. “Everyone here in the camp was waiting for the moment to go back to Gaza City, but after what happened, many changed their minds. We feel like returning now would mean walking back into death. As long as there’s no final agreement and no real guarantees, we’ll keep living on the hope of return – not the reality of it.”

She recalls the night she fled her home. “When we left Gaza City weeks ago, we ran under the shelling. We left everything behind – our house, our photos, our memories. I don’t want to relive that again. My son Imad, he’s nine years old, still panics whenever he hears a plane. Whenever there’s a sound in the sky, he runs to me asking, ‘Mum, has the war started again?’ How can I go back and make them live through that terror once more?”

Glancing toward her children playing with empty cans, she says, “Going back now is a gamble. Yes, I miss my home and my street, but my heart tells me the war isn’t really over. I can’t believe in a ceasefire as long as the bombing keeps flaring up and Israel continues to threaten. Here, we live in double fear – fear of staying in the tent, and fear of returning to the unknown.”

The exorbitant costs of return

In a small tent set up on the outskirts of Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis city, Mohammed Jibran, 47, sits beside a makeshift stove built from stones and tin cans. He was preparing a cup of tea over a weak fire as the desert wind whipped up the sand around him. “Yes, I was happy when they announced the ceasefire, like everyone else,” he says. “But going back to Gaza for me is now a distant dream. Not because I don’t want to – but because I can’t.”

Jibran, displaced from the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood in northern Gaza City, explains that returning home would cost far more than any displaced family can afford. “Truck drivers are asking between $600 and $700 to transport one family with a few belongings back to Gaza. I’ve been jobless since the war began; I can barely afford bread for my children. Where could I possibly get that kind of money?”

“Even if I sold everything I own here, I couldn’t collect enough for the trip,” he adds. “Sometimes I think about walking back on foot, but how could I carry my kids and our things? Nothing is free anymore – even returning home has become a business.”

Speaking of life inside the shelter camp in Al-Mawasi, Jibran says, “We live on aid, but it’s never enough. There’s no work, no income, and prices are sky-high. Many families here want to return, but they simply can’t. They don’t even have the fare for a small car. We are prisoners of poverty – not just in our tents, but in our entire reality.”

With bitterness, he adds, “People think the end of the war means the end of suffering. But in truth, the suffering has just begun. Those with money go home, and those without are left here to wait for the unknown.”

Residential areas turned into military zones

Inside her tent west of Deir al-Balah, Omniya Ghaban, 35, a mother of five displaced from the town of Jabalia in northern Gaza, holds an old photograph of herself standing in front of her home. Running her fingers gently along its edges, she says, “This was my house... small, but full of warmth. Today, I don’t even dare to go near it.”

“Our town is still classified within what they call the Yellow Zone – the area under Israeli military control. They prohibit anyone from returning, saying it remains a closed military operations zone. Anyone who approaches is targeted immediately.”

She raises her gaze to the sky, as if addressing it. “I just want to see my home, even if it’s destroyed. But we live between fear and military orders. I can’t risk my life or my children’s lives.”

Ghaban recalls how her hopes of returning home were dashed shortly after the ceasefire was declared on October 10. “We thought the truce meant we could go home right away, but within days we learned that not everyone is allowed to return. Northern Gaza, especially Jabalia, is still completely closed off. The Israeli army set up observation points there and forbids anyone from coming near.”

“Even if they allowed us to go back, where would we go?” she asks. “My house is now a pile of rubble, my children’s school was destroyed, and the hospital in Jabalia no longer operates. There’s no water, no electricity, no safety. Going back there now would be like returning to a graveyard.”

Just a few days ago, the joy many displaced people felt at the ceasefire turned into new shock after the Israeli army committed a massacre against the Shaaban family in the Al-Zaytoun neighborhood of eastern Gaza City.

On the afternoon of October 17, a civilian vehicle carrying 11 members of the Shaaban family – including seven children and two women – was returning from southern Gaza to their home inside the Yellow Zone under Israeli military control.

Unaware that entering the area would cost them their lives, an Israeli aircraft targeted the vehicle with a direct missile strike, killing everyone on board.

Witnesses said the army could have warned the family or prevented their entry by non-lethal means, but instead, it chose an immediate strike – turning their attempt to “go home” into a fatal journey.

Israeli violations

In a phone interview, Ismail Al-Thawabta, Director General of the Government Media Office in Gaza, warned that the ceasefire declared on October 10 is on the brink of collapse amid continued Israeli violations. He urged regional and international mediators to apply genuine pressure on Israel to ensure the truce holds and to protect civilians.

“The Israeli occupation has not truly committed to the ceasefire,” Al-Thawabta said. “Since the decision took effect, it has committed 80 violations across various parts of the Gaza Strip, resulting in 97 martyrs and 230 injuries, including 21 violations recorded just last Sunday.”

“What’s happening on the ground shows that Israel is trying to undermine the calm and drag the Strip back into war,” he added. “These violations include artillery shelling, limited airstrikes, and direct targeting of civilians attempting to return to areas that Israel itself declared as safe.”

Al-Thawabta noted that the continuation of these attacks is worsening the suffering of hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians waiting to go home.

“People here live on the hope of returning,” he said, “but Israel is making that return a life-threatening risk. Unless mediators intervene seriously, the ceasefire will remain nothing more than ink on paper.”

He stressed that the Government Media Office is carefully monitoring and documenting all violations with data, photos, and testimonies, adding that “the international community bears a major responsibility to pressure Israel to fully adhere to the terms of the ceasefire and reopen roads for the safe return of displaced civilians”.

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On the surface, it appears that all parties are finally on the same page on ending the genocide in Gaza. Hamas's lead negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya, announced yesterday that “we have reached an agreement to end the war”.

This followed similar declarations from US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – who remains an international fugitive with or without a ceasefire.

Trump’s primary motivation is, unsurprisingly, himself – a desire to bask in the glory of a Nobel Peace Prize. That the narcissism of a US billionaire could end a genocide is fittingly dystopian for the obscene reality the world has witnessed over the past two years.

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And this is precisely what Hamas is betting on – that Trump’s self-serving ambitions will restrain Israel from resuming its war on the Gaza Strip.

By agreeing to hand over the remaining 48 Israeli captives, living and deceased, Hamas is forfeiting its leverage. It has no cards left, save the resilient existence of the Palestinian people in Gaza.

This is a major gamble, given how the last ceasefire unfolded.

Like the current deal, the previous agreement in January also saw a phased approach. The first phase focused, similarly, on a prisoner exchange with the second and third phases to be negotiated. As Hamas prepared to discuss the second phase in March, Israel unilaterally broke the ceasefire, resuming its campaign after a 42-day truce that included a total siege of the Gaza Strip, which precipitated a man-made famine.

There is little reason to assume Israel won’t violate the ceasefire again – as it has done almost daily in Lebanon since entering a ceasefire agreement with Hezbollah last November.

And while all sides are heralding an end to war, few details have emerged of the trickier path towards a second phase of the agreement.

In its response to the US-Israeli 20-point plan, Hamas deferred several contentious points to future negotiations. The time for those negotiations has arrived, and daylight remains between several aspects of the plan and Hamas’s publicly stated position – that there be no foreign force or foreign governance in Gaza, that any Palestinian government in Gaza will remain armed and that Hamas will remain part of the Palestinian political scene.

News today that the US is deploying 200 troops to Israel – along with representatives from Qatar, Egypt and Turkey – to, as the agreement stipulates, “follow up on the implementation with the two sides and coordinate with them”, suggests Hamas has shown some flexibility on this point.

That the contingent will include Hamas’s two trusted regional hosts – Qatar and Turkey – also hints at US and Israeli compromise. Not mentioned, at least so far, is the highly controversial “board of peace” originally listed in the 20-point plan involving Tony Blair.

Nevertheless, several landmines exist on the path to a permanent end to the war. The first is the very reason we have arrived at this point – Trump’s narcissism. Should he not win the Nobel Peace Prize, what personal incentive remains for Trump to stay the course?

The second is Israel’s messianic extremists – national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and finance minister Bezalel Smotrich – who oppose the agreement and will be heaping pressure on Netanyahu to resume the war.

The third is Netanyahu himself, who prolonged the Gaza genocide – and expanded the war across the region – partly due to his own wish for a Greater Israel, and partly to thwart internal recriminations regarding the October 7 attack as well as corruption proceedings that could mark his downfall.

Looming over all of this is the risk that second-phase negotiations collapse and Israel resumes its onslaught.

What is facing Hamas is a new set of rules imposed by Israel and the US – one in which Israel ferociously pummels and besieges Gaza whenever Hamas disagrees with a negotiating point. If such a plausible scenario unfolds, the key difference is that Hamas will be without leverage, leaving the fate of Gaza’s Palestinians in the hands of others – the Qataris, the Egyptians, the Turks… and Trump.

Genocides, from a moral vantage point, are the lowest form to which mankind can sink. The industrial method of mass slaughter speaks to the gross, inexplicable perversion of the human soul. But from a geopolitical perspective, where morality has little bearing on actions, genocides serve a distinct, albeit grotesque, purpose – erasure in order to establish long-term viability.

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And in certain contexts, genocides have worked. In the face of a crumbling Ottoman empire, Turkish forces effectively erased centuries of rich Anatolian diversity – Armenians, Greeks and Assyrians – to create a near-homogenous Turkish nation-state.

Israel’s blunder, however, is that it has become beholden to its own military might. So drunk is it on its unrivalled material power, courtesy of its total subjugation of the US political class, that any capacity for strategic thought has been inhibited. Israel has failed to foresee the consequences of pursuing a genocide.

Far from erasing the Palestinians, Israel’s genocide in Gaza has turned Palestine into a global symbol against oppression.

Gaza genocide not a surprise

Anyone who has truly studied Zionism understands that genocide was par for the course. The Zionist quest to establish a Jewish-only, exclusive homeland in a historically heterogenous Arab region has never lost its focus nearly two centuries in the making. In a century of Zionist colonisation of Arab lands, it has exploited every opportunity to expand its reach. Within the Palestinian territories, Israel has consistently sought to create ‘facts on the ground’ by way of new Jewish settlements and apartheid measures to encourage Palestinians to leave, all the while providing a smokescreen of negotiating a ‘two-state solution’.

Israel, perhaps, could have continued on its course of gradual colonisation and it may have achieved its desired Greater Israel within a few decades, with the matter fading into the background of human consciousness. But that it chose to accelerate its intentions with a genocide has had the opposite effect, and may in fact spell the beginning of its own unravelling.

Two requirements need to be in place for a genocide to succeed. The first is the internal will – an extremism so pervasive and heightened that it eschews any sense of morality. The second are the external dynamics – conditions must be such that allow for such a seismic, violent alteration to demographics on a mass scale.

There’s no dispute that Israel possesses the first requirement. But its potential folly is in misreading the second. Both the Turks and Nazi Germany benefited from the conditions of global chaos during the First and Second World Wars respectively. Both also benefited from the technological status of their eras – there were barely cameras let alone smartphones livestreaming either genocide to every corner of the planet.

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Certain conditions have indeed worked in Israel’s favour. With the help of the US, it has over the decades vanquished its primary threats in the region. Egypt was subdued with the 1978 Camp David Accords. Iraq, Syria and Libya are broken, and Iran is too distant to pose an existential threat.

It seemingly makes perfect sense for Israel to seize this moment – a time in history when it is the undisputed military power in the region, with the US firmly in its pocket, allowing an open pipeline of military hardware, advanced technology and financial backing to assert its regional dominance.

But while the regional conditions may be in its favour, the global conditions are not. In contrast to the Turks and Nazi Germany, Israel has pursued a genocide at a time of relative global stability, thus drawing the gaze of the entire world upon it.

It is not a threat from the Arab world that Israel faces. More troubling for Israel, it has unleashed a threat from within the very source of its existence: the west.

Growing anti-Israel mobilisation in the west

Two years into the genocide, there are no signs the protest movement in western cities is losing steam. More than 250,000 protesters turned out in Amsterdam this week, dressed in red. Italy, meanwhile, is facing a near-popular revolt that appears to be only gaining momentum.

Accompanying the protests is poll after poll showing growing public discontent with Israel. A New York Times poll last week showed a majority of American voters oppose sending additional military and economic aid to Israel. A Washington Post poll followed with results showing 61% of American Jews believe Israel has committed war crimes in Gaza. And a YouGov poll in Australia, published yesterday in Deepcut, revealed a majority of Australians back sanctions against Israel – including 46% of Coalition voters.

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Anger with Israel is not just limited to the streets – the genocide has spawned a mobilisation of efforts firmly dedicated to ending western support for Israel. And the mobilisation is happening across professions.

Journalists disillusioned with mainstream media’s complicity in the genocide have branched off to create independent outlets – think Zeteo, Drop Site News, Novara Media and Ette Media. Healthcare workers have teamed up to advocate, fundraise and organise in support of Palestine. Lawyers are rallying to provide legal support within both international and domestic jurisdictions.

And political currents are shifting, as witnessed with Zohran Mamdani’s rise in New York, the French left’s top finish in the 2024 legislative elections and the massive public support shown for a new left party in the UK. The currents are also shifting right with a sharp MAGA split over Israel between America First nationalists and pro-Israel hawks.

For decades, the pro-Israel establishment in the west succeeded in quashing any discussion on western support for Israel. That era is over. As is the framing of Israel as a ‘peaceful democracy’ surrounded by Arab ‘terrorists’. Instead, the genocide has brought forth a more accurate framing that is solidifying in the western conscience – that Israel is a violent settler colony built on an extreme, racial supremacist ideology rooted in outdated 19th century thinking; and that, more significantly, Israel represents a barbaric past of colonialism to which many in the west no longer wish to remain attached.

Death can be a beautiful thing. It can bring people from different parts of the world together. And it can create a space where extended families are no longer extended, but immediate.

I first experienced this beautiful side of death in 2014, when my paternal jiddo (grandfather) Hajj Mohammad Abu Ali passed away after 89 years. More than 20 of us in Australia flew his body back to our village in south Lebanon, Al-Khiam, to lay him to rest. I knew then how special the moment was – for us all to be there, together, in our ancestral village, our home.

Fast forward 11 years and I am once again boarding a flight from Sydney to Beirut, this time alone to visit the fresh grave of my maternal jiddo and namesake, Hajj Ahmad Abu Ali. Except this time, there was no beauty in my heart, only a deep mourning.

Al-Khiam is an ancient village surrounded by lush hills, comprised of mostly Shia Muslims and a small Christian community that have coexisted peacefully for centuries. This has been the home of my ancestors for more than 300 years. It also sits only a few kilometres from the border with Israel, or occupied Palestine. It’s a border drawn by foreign colonisers – a border we, the indigenous people of the land, never asked for.

The village suffered immensely in the most recent war with Israel. More than 150 of Al-Khiam’s residents were killed, with many of their bodies still missing. The extensive Israeli air and ground assault also destroyed or damaged 75% of homes and buildings. The village continues to suffer as Israeli jets and drones continue to bomb it and its surrounds, in violation of ceasefire terms Israel signed in November 2024, preventing native inhabitants from returning to their homes, their lives. Nearby villages such as Kfarkela and Odaisseh have been completely obliterated.

But I returned. No airstrike, no drone was going to stop me from visiting my native lands, to pay respect to my grandfather as his body returned to the soil of his ancestors.

It normally takes an hour and a half to snake our way from Beirut airport up the hills to Al-Khiam. I had spent the flight imagining the feeling of my taita’s (grandmother) embrace. The reality is no imagination could capture what it felt like when we finally held one another, and she solemnly cried, “your jiddo has left us”. My tears held, blocked by a numbing grief.

The next morning, I woke for Fajr (dawn) prayers and went down to the cemetery to visit his grave. The sun’s rays streaked through the mountains from the east, coating the village as I walked to deliver my final farewell. His house overlooks the cemetery, so it’s fitting that his final resting place would be in the shadow of his home.

The cemetery, however, is mostly a patchwork of rubble, its tomb stones ravaged due to Israeli attacks. A new section has since been added, neatly arranged with polished tombstones of the dozens of resistance fighters who had made the ultimate sacrifice in defending Al-Khiam from an attempted Israeli invasion in the last war.

This is where I finally cried.

I cried from seeing images of their bright faces displayed over their graves. I cried from seeing their families draped in black sitting by their markers, in perpetual longing. I cried from the knowledge that many of them were younger than me.

I was overcome by a feeling of deep shame. I live freely in Australia. I go about my normal workday, go for my runs and bike rides, enjoy the beaches and nature that surround where I live in Wollongong, and sit on the couch and watch the footy. I do this all with a constant ring in the back of my mind that there is an Ahmad my age or younger in Lebanon or Palestine, dying to protect our native land. A land that I, the one who lives freely at the bottom of the world, may visit one summer for a holiday.

The only thing that separates me from them is mere chance. It is by chance that I was born in Australia and can live in relative peace. It is also by chance that they were born in south Lebanon, or in Gaza and thrust into a violent world imposed by foreign colonisers where resistance was the only way to survive.

I left the cemetery and walked around the village before the intensity of the summer heat forbade it. In previous trips, I would go for runs around the village. This time, however, runs were not possible. The village has been altered by the wrath of a setter-colony bent on genocide and destruction. Homes, mosques, schools, shops, council buildings, all gone. The southern part of the village which directly faces occupied northern Palestine is a no-go zone, falling in the line of sight of Israeli snipers with drones constantly buzzing overhead.

It’s surreal to imagine that my ancestors have lived here in relative harmony for centuries, only to now face an existential threat from a foreign occupier that knows no reason, no decency, no humanity. In addition to colonising Palestine, the Israelis have now established eight military bases on Lebanese soil. They fire at residents of the border villages who try to return to their ruined homes. Drones and fighter jets freely roam Lebanese skies striking anyone, anywhere, at any time.

I heard the hum of drones daily in the two weeks I visited south Lebanon. Small reconnaissance drones similar to those used by photographers would fly low, hovering above our heads as we sat down for breakfast outside my uncle’s damaged home. The occasional sound of an airstrike would echo into the village, plumes of smoke visible in the distance. WhatsApp or Instagram notifications would sound on our phones, sharing the name of yet another person who had been murdered.

South Lebanon has borne the brunt of the expansionist lust of successive Zionist regimes for decades, particularly the Shia-majority areas. The people, like my relatives in Al-Khiam, have grown accustomed to it all.

“That bang was far away; they usually hit that mountain.”

“That wasn’t a bomb, it was just a jet doing a sonic boom to scare us.”

“It’s Thursday, they normally do more strikes on Thursdays.”

“Helicopters are fine, only the UN flies those around here.”

“It’s normal, what are we meant to do?”

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During the so-called ceasefire, Israeli forces entered our village. My grandaunt’s home was used as a makeshift base of operations in Al-Khiam, while she and her family were forced to flee. When the family returned, they found everything inside trashed, with rubbish dumped inside. Walls were graffitied with the Star of David and racial slurs. Excrement, presumably from the soldiers, was smeared on the walls and floors. And her home was the lucky one – they didn’t destroy it when they finished defiling every corner.

On visiting her house, I was greeted by the towering, bright pink bougainvillea that I’ve known since my childhood. The ravaged interior I had seen in images months prior had been restored to its former self. Everything inside had been cleaned out, furniture replaced and walls painted. The last remnants of graffitied Hebrew in the garage will soon be removed. This revival is a testament to the will of our people to continue to return home no matter what the colonisers do.

Before it was called south Lebanon due to arbitrary colonial borders, we were known as the people of Jabal Amel – our closest mountain. The ancient people of Jabal Amel are steadfast and have stood in the face of colonial aggression for much of the last century. But, in these lands, resilience and exhaustion are two bindings on the same rope.

The people are tired. Tired of the machines of death flying above their heads. Tired of news of yet more martyrs. Tired of waiting for the next inevitable full-scale invasion. Tired of packing their bags and fleeing yet again.

But this is our home. It’s where loved ones assemble to revel in the glow of our ancestors. It’s where meals are shared as the cool summer mountain breeze brushes our cheeks. It’s the rivers and pine forests. Nothing can replace that. Staying away, not visiting home, means surrendering to the coloniser. It means abandoning the earth that embraces the bodies of our martyrs.

Due to Israel’s targeting of Palestinian journalists in Gaza, we decided to withhold the author’s name for this story as a safety measure.

One of our ambitions is to not only support writers here in Australia, but to provide a platform for those directly impacted by the world’s great injustices. In this case, that means amplifying Palestinian voices in Gaza – voices that Israel seeks to silence, and that are rarely heard in Australia.

Thanks to your support, we were able to pay this Palestinian journalist a one-off fee for their work. Our hope is to bring her on as a regular contributor – but we need your help to do this. Together, as a community, we can make a difference.

If you’re in a position to do so, please consider becoming a paid subscriber for as little as 33 cents a day, and help us give voice to those too often ignored, silenced, or erased.

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GAZA STRIP, OCCUPIED PALESTINE – When news broke that Al Jazeera journalist, Anas al-Sharif, had been assassinated, I was preparing to be displaced once again from my friend’s house. I had been living there with my family for many months after my home in Gaza City was destroyed at the beginning of this bloody war.

I was busy packing my children’s clothes into the same bags that have accompanied me throughout 22 months of war, during which I have been displaced 13 times.

My husband, who was reading the breaking news on his phone, told me: “They assassinated Anas Al-Sharif.” I was stunned, froze in my place, and broke into tears.

It was a cry mixed with despair — the despair of seeing no horizon to an end to this war, as though we are trapped with no control over our fates — and with the pain and humiliation of realising the world’s failure to protect Palestinian journalists, who are constantly targeted without any deterrent to Israel.

This attack also killed Al Jazeera correspondent Mohammed Qreiqa, cameramen Ibrahim Zahir and Mohammed Noufal, as well as freelance cameraman Moamen Alaiwa and freelance journalist Mohammed Al-Khaldi.

Until the very last breath

“Relentless bombing … for two hours now the Israeli aggression has been intensifying on Gaza City.” This was Anas’s last post less than an hour before his assassination. He attached a video showing the severity of the bombardment and the sound of explosions in the background.

I first met Anas during an interview I conducted with him at the end of March, after the Israeli army had placed him on its assassination list. At the time, Anas told me that he did not fear these threats and would continue his journalistic mission until the very last breath.

Just two days before his assassination, I met Anas by coincidence as I was passing by the gate of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza. I was returning home after a reporting assignment.

He greeted me with his warm smile. “Hello Anas, what a nice coincidence,” I said. We spoke briefly, and he told me that he expected to be killed because of his journalism. He was receiving constant threats from Israelis over the phone; they mocked him and told him his death was very near.

Anas joked with me, smiling as he said: “You’d better stay away from me now for your own safety, the strike could happen at any moment.”

His way of joking shocked me. I left him but kept thinking about him all the way back home.

I asked myself: Why did he tell me this? Had he already accepted his death? Or was he overwhelmed with despair and the bitter realisation that no one could protect him from these threats? Isn’t there international law to protect journalists? Don’t international institutions exist to defend journalists? Where are they? Or is the Palestinian journalist not like other journalists around the world?”

Anas offered his life as a sacrifice for truth, to expose Israeli crimes against Palestinians.

Between motherhood and journalism

Before October 7, 2023, and despite the hardships of life under the Israeli blockade imposed since 2007, I still had a sense of stability. Our neighbourhood, Al-Nasr, was full of life: the voices of neighbours, the smell of fresh bread, the laughter of children in the narrow alleys.

Every morning, I woke up to my children’s laughter as they prepared for school. I made them breakfast, kissed their foreheads before they left, and then began my day as a journalist. I moved between people’s stories: sometimes covering a community event, other times writing about a widow struggling to raise her children, or reporting on the electricity crisis that plagued our lives. In the evening, I would return home, prepare dinner, help my children with their homework, and feel that I was living my motherhood fully, without it conflicting with my passion for journalism.

But today, everything has changed. My neighbourhood has turned into rubble, and my neighbours have vanished. Life has become a daily battle for survival.

I used to complain of exhaustion from balancing motherhood and journalism, but I never knew what real division meant until now. Today, my motherhood is trapped by fear and hunger, as I struggle to provide my children with the bare minimum of safety. And my journalism has become a heavier burden than ever, yet also a greater duty: to write about grieving mothers, about children deprived of school who now sell sweets in the streets, about displacement and hunger that strip people of their dignity. And when I write about them, I am writing about myself as well. I write as if I am breathing.

Every night I sleep wondering: Will I wake up tomorrow? And every morning I wake myself up with one sentence: I must document. Because my story, my children’s story, and the story of every mother here deserves to be told.

Motherhood in wartime is no longer only about feeding children, sheltering them, and protecting them from the bombs. It has become a lesson in resilience. I must plant strength in my children’s hearts, teach them to face fear with courage and hunger with hope. They ask me every day: “Mama, when will the war end?” I invent answers that keep the spark of hope alive in their hearts, even if inside I am shattered.

As for journalism, it is my humanitarian duty that I cannot abandon. I owe it to my people and to the truth to write, to convey our suffering to the world, even if the price is my life. I walk a thin line between my desire to protect my children and my desire to speak the truth. I know that my pen is the only weapon I have, and that my silence would mean another kind of death, harsher than the airstrikes.

I have found myself caught in a cruel equation: a mother trying to keep her children alive, and a journalist trying to keep the truth alive. Both roles weigh heavily on me, but they also give me the deepest reason to continue.

A persisting nausea has crept into my stomach since the assassination of Anas. I have lost my appetite for everything. I feel that I may be next — or that any journalist who writes without fear may be next.

Will you believe me if I tell you that I am ready to face the same fate if the choice is between stopping writing, or being killed?