<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
</head>
<body text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
<div class="container content-width3" style="--font-size:20px;">
<div class="header reader-header reader-show-element" dir="ltr"> <font
size="-2"><a class="domain reader-domain"
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/israel-pushing-palestinians-leave-gaza">https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/israel-pushing-palestinians-leave-gaza</a></font>
<h1 class="reader-title">Israel pushing Palestinians to leave
Gaza</h1>
<p class="node__submitted">
<span class="field field-author"><a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/maureen-clare-murphy">Maureen
Clare Murphy</a></span> <span class="field field-blog">-</span>
<span class="field field-publication-date"><span
class="date-display-single"
content="2019-08-19T20:56:37+00:00">19 August 2019</span></span>
</p>
</div>
<hr>
<div class="content">
<div class="moz-reader-content line-height4 reader-show-element"
dir="ltr">
<div id="readability-page-1" class="page">
<div>
<article>
<figure id="file-82931"><source media="(min-width:
72rem)"><figcaption><small><span></span></small></figcaption></figure>
<p>Israel is actively encouraging and ready to
facilitate mass emigration of Palestinians from Gaza,
according to a senior government official.</p>
<p>“Israel is ready to carry the costs of helping Gazans
emigrate,” and would potentially use air force bases
in Israel for that purpose, <em>The Times of Israel</em>
<a
href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-actively-pushing-palestinian-emigration-from-gaza-official-says/">reported</a>
on Monday.</p>
<p>The unnamed official, in Kyiv as part of Benjamin
Netanyahu’s delegation to Ukraine, added that more
than 35,000 Palestinians left the coastal enclave last
year.</p>
<p>Two million Palestinians live in the Gaza Strip,
which has been subjected to a punishing Israeli
economic blockade for 12 years and repeated military
offensives.</p>
<p>Residents of the territory have been plunged into
poverty and cut off from the rest of Palestine and the
wider world.</p>
<p>Every two in three Palestinians in Gaza is a refugee
from lands inside what is now Israel. That government
forbids them from exercising their right to return as
enshrined in international law because they are not
Jews.</p>
<p>The senior Israeli official was reported by <em>The
Times of Israel</em> as saying that his government
is asking countries to absorb Palestinians emigrating
from Gaza.</p>
<p>“The official said the National Security Council had
been spearheading the effort, with Netanyahu’s
blessing, for about a year,” <em>The Times of Israel</em>
added. It has also been “discussed in the security
cabinet several times.”</p>
<p>No European or Middle Eastern country has agreed to
participate in the scheme, according to the
publication. The official did not say whether any
other governments are cooperating.</p>
<p>The revelation is an example of how ideas that
supposedly exist only at the extreme fringes of
Israeli politics are often not far from government
policy.</p>
<p>During Israel’s 2014 assault on Gaza, Moshe Feiglin,
then deputy speaker of Israel’s parliament, <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/concentrate-and-exterminate-israel-parliament-deputy-speakers-gaza-genocide-plan">proposed
a plan</a> to “concentrate” Palestinians in Gaza in
border camps and “exterminate” any who resisted, while
destroying all civilian housing and infrastructure.</p>
<p>Feiglin, who represented Netanyahu’s ruling Likud
Party, suggested that “Israel will start searching for
emigration destinations and quotas for the refugees
from Gaza.”</p>
<h2>Increased emigration from Gaza</h2>
<p>Emigration from Gaza – including among recent
university graduates, who face the highest
unemployment rates in the world – <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/chasing-dreams-outside-gazas-walls/26286">has
been on the rise</a>.</p>
<p>It is no secret that Israeli leaders have maximalist
designs on all of historic Palestine. Making life
unbearable to coerce Palestinians to leave their land
is the primary motivation of many of Israel’s policies
in the West Bank and Gaza.</p>
<p>But Israeli officials generally don’t admit to it or
tell media that government offices are executing such
plans.</p>
<p>Human rights groups have long stated that the
economic blockade on Gaza is an act of collective
punishment, imposed after Hamas took control of
internal affairs in the territory in 2007. Israel says
it is a security measure.</p>
<p>The International Committee of the Red Cross has <a
href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-israel-blockade-icrc/israels-gaza-blockade-breaks-law-says-icrc-idUSTRE65D00R20100614">affirmed</a>
that Israel’s siege is an illegal act of collective
punishment.</p>
<p>Critics of the blockade contend that Israel’s siege
and repeated military assaults on Gaza are aimed at <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/israel-wants-break-gaza-once-and-all">breaking
resistance to the occupation</a>.</p>
<p>Since early 2018, more than 200 Palestinians in Gaza
have been killed during <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/great-march-return">Great
March of Return</a> protests calling for an end to
Israel’s siege. Those demonstrations have also
demanded that Palestinian refugees be allowed to
exercise their right to return.</p>
<p>Israeli occupation forces have killed more than 100
Palestinians in Gaza outside the context of protests
during that same period.</p>
<h2>Eight Palestinians killed in Gaza</h2>
<p>On Saturday, three Palestinians were killed by
Israeli helicopter and tank fire along the northern
Gaza-Israel boundary.</p>
<p>Israel <a
href="https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/palestinians/three-palestinians-killed-by-live-israeli-fire-gazan-health-ministry-reports-1.7692937">claimed</a>
that the slain men – <a
href="https://twitter.com/press221/status/1162958718092357632">identified</a>
by Gaza’s health ministry as Mahmoud Adel al-Walayda,
24, Muhammad Farid Abu Namous, 27 and Muhammad Samir
al-Taramsi, 26 – were armed.</p>
<p>Israeli media reported that the deadly strike on Gaza
followed the launch of three rockets from the
territory, causing no injuries. A rocket was also
reportedly fired from Gaza on Friday and intercepted
before it landed in Israel.</p>
<p>The killing of the three men brings to eight the
number of Palestinians from Gaza slain by Israel in a
single week.</p>
<p>Occupation forces <a
href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/attempt-by-heavily-armed-palestinians-from-gaza-to-enter-israel-thwarted-army-says-1.7655783">killed</a>
four armed Palestinians as they allegedly attempted to
breach the Gaza-Israel boundary on 10 August.</p>
<p>The following day, Israeli forces <a
href="https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/palestinians/.premium-hamas-shakes-off-responsibility-for-operative-who-shot-at-israeli-forces-1.7659608">killed
another Palestinian</a> who shot at soldiers while
he attempted to cross the boundary.</p>
<p>On Monday, factions in Gaza <a
href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-gaza-is-a-volcano-about-to-erupt-palestinian-factions-warn-israel-1.7696268">warned</a>
Israel that the Strip is “a volcano about to erupt.”</p>
<br>
</article>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div> </div>
</div>
<div class="moz-signature">-- <br>
Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
415 863.9977
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://freedomarchives.org/">https://freedomarchives.org/</a>
</div>
</body>
</html>