As conditions become more hellish in Gaza with each passing day, an ecumenical Christian peace advocacy, A Jerusalem Voice for Justice, issued an “SOS” on behalf of the Palestinian community on June 8, imploring an immediate cease-fire and the unfettered delivery of humanitarian aid across the embattled strip.
With the death toll rising and entire families obliterated as Israeli forces seek to strike diminishing numbers of Hamas targets, more impassioned appeals for an end to the violence have come from ecclesial and political leaders from around the world. A Jerusalem Voice for Justice, founded in April to ensure that world attention does not grow weary of the conflict, calls conditions on the ground in Gaza “terrifying,” with scores of people, including women and children and other noncombatants, killed “on an almost daily basis.” “Now, as we write these lines, the Israeli army is occupying more and more territory in the Strip, leading to more destruction and death,” the Holy Land Christian leaders wrote.
A brief cease-fire between Israel Defense Forces and Hamas militants, who provoked the conflict with a terrorist assault on southern Israel in October 2023, ended on March 2. A ferocious I.D.F. campaign began soon after. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu now seems to believe that an absolute I.D.F. victory is at hand, even as Hamas has proved capable of quickly restoring its ranks with new recruits.
The prime minister has again moved the goalpost on a potential cease-fire. Mr. Netanyahu seems to have fully embraced President Donald Trump’s stunning, apparently off-the-cuff suggestion that Palestinians be removed from the strip so it can be turned into a Mediterranean hotel and casino zone—an outcome long-time Middle East observers believe is preposterous.
Each week brings new images of civilian suffering in Gaza, now exacerbated by famine conditions that Human Rights Watch and other humanitarian groups say have been deliberately created by Israeli authorities.
A Jerusalem Voice for Justice reports: “In the past weeks, the situation has progressively deteriorated: in addition to the close to 55,000 dead and over 120,000 wounded, starvation and famine are being experienced (the UN recently identified 10,000 new cases of malnutrition). Hospitals and other civilian facilities are almost completely shut down. More than two million Gazans and the remaining 24 live Israeli hostages are all at risk of their lives at every moment.”
Read more: A Moral Reckoning in Gaza
The escalation “is presenting Gazans with a horrific choice: submit to full Israeli control or starve.” A Jerusalem Voice for Justice includes Holy Land leaders like the former Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem Michel Sabba, Greek Orthodox Bishop Attallah Hanna, the former Lutheran Bishop of the Holy Land Munib Younan and America contributor David Neuhaus, S.J.
In its statement, the group points out that the current Israeli military campaign suggests that a plan to ethnically cleanse the strip is being pursued. “The end-goal of removing the Palestinians has been repeatedly openly formulated by Israeli politicians, including members of the government, since President Trump first suggested it,” A Jerusalem Voice for Justice said.
Aid distribution in Gaza has been carried out since the end of May by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, an ad hoc entity backed by Israel and the United States that bypasses U.N. agencies and their established partners. Its various delivery efforts have been plagued by deadly incidents and chaos.
The International Committee of the Red Cross reported on June 8 that 29 casualties arrived at its field hospital in west Rafah after seeking aid at a G.H.F. site, eight of whom had died. Almost all had explosive trauma wounds, with two others suffering gunshot wounds.
A Jerusalem Voice for Justice said the new aid distribution scheme has proved merely “an escalation of the war,” utilizing humanitarian aid as “part of a war strategy, [something] explicitly prohibited by the Geneva Conventions.”
According to the assessment of these Christian leaders: “The Israeli authorities unveiled a new strategy, pretending that it aims at the distribution of much needed aid. However, this is conditional on yet further displacement of the population.” Humanitarian aid specialists have deplored this plan, warning that it will force desperate Gazans to cross into conflict zones and will result in more killing. In recent days those warnings proved prophetic as scores were gunned down by I.D.F. soldiers as they tried to reach aid sites. The I.D.F. has denied culpability in some instances of gunplay at aid drop-offs and acknowledged it in others.
A Jerusalem Voice for Peace urges the international community not to succumb to conflict fatigue related to the turmoil in Gaza. “While the people of Gaza are the first victims of this cruel war, the rest of us are under another, more invisible psychological and spiritual bombardment—flooded with images and competing narratives, we are left feeling hopeless, paralyzed by despair and unable to help. Exhausted!” Yet the international community “must intervene,” the group said. “Although our voices do not seem to be heard by world leaders, we encourage all who have ears to hear and eyes to see, to take action.”
“We beg you not to give up. Let us be filled with the energy of the resurrection and of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, and recommit to fighting for life and freedom for our brothers and sisters in Gaza and everywhere else in Palestine/Israel.”
