Remember if you will the outrage expressed over the limited supplies of vital drugs in Iraqi hospitals allegedly caused by Saddam syphoning off money from the oil for food program and the horror at the (false) reports of babies thrown from Quwaiti incubators during the first Gulf War.
Now imagine if that had gone even further. Elderly women thrown out of well equipped hospitals to die in agony from what might have been treatable cancer. Young kidney patients having to wait 6 hours for their turn for dialysis because there were no spares to mend broken down machines, the hospital running out of filters to use in the ones that worked, even running out of tape to hold down the tubes running from the patients’ arms. A father having to return without the drugs his son with cystic fibrosis needs because there are none in the pharmacy.
That is the reality in Gaza today because the Palestinians voted for a government the US, Israeli and major EU governments did not like.
The position goes back to the election of a Hamas led government in Palestine earlier this year. This prompted the USA and EU to stop aid to the Palestinian Authority and Israel to stop transfering the tax it collects in the Occupied Territories to the PA. The Israels have also stopped any movement of any goods into or out of Gaza. That includes drugs.
Scotty McLellan explained the reasons for stopping aid in one of his press briefings:
The Quartet has spelled out what Hamas needs to do. They laid out some very clear principles and has called on Hamas to agree to abide by those principles. That includes committing to nonviolence, recognition of Israel, and fulfilling obligations and previous agreements that the Palestinian Authority had made with Israel and others.
If failing to “commit to non-violence” and renaging on “previous agreements” makes a country a pariah state, I suggest Scotty look slightly nearer home and consider whether ignoring the UN, the Geneva Conventions, the Kyoto Accord, the Convention on Torture etc is helping the status of the US with the rest of the world. Anyway, back to Hamas and what they claim is being done.
In terms or — you know, we also announced recently our humanitarian assistance for the Palestinian people. We’re increasing that. But we’re not going to fund a government that does not abide by those important principles — and we’ve made that very clear — fund or support a government in any way. And the Quartet has made that very clear, as well. Now, if they change their ways, then we can address the matter at that point.
“Funding a Government” sounds scary doesn’t it. Until you remember that the money goes via the Health ministry to pay the wages of the doctors and nurses and to buy the drugs and equipment they need. “Humanitarian aid” in this context appears to refer to the excess US grain production dumped on the third world as aid. The money also goes towards paying the wages of teachers. And the policemen and security forces. That’s not particularly clever when you are calling on the PA to arrest the miliants – even less so when Israel bombs their prisons and poice stations. All these government employees have just missed out on the second months’ salary since the punishment for voting how the west did not want them to started.
On Tuesday Channel 4 News in the UK showed the effects of the aid stoppage, tax theft and closure of the checkpoints. You do not need to imagine the suffering of the cancer, kidney and cystic fibrosis patients, you can see the effects on the video report from this link.
Note that the elderly woman with cancer had been awaiting a course of chemotherapy in an Israeli hospital and was thrown out of that and sent to Gaza when Hamas was elected. The window may be too small to see the grief and tears welling up in her doctor when he calmly explains her condition has become very serious while knowing she is now dying without drugs to stop the pain.
