Israeli attacks on populated neighborhoods in Gaza caused many civilian casualties and left many homeless.

The Israeli military announced its redeployment and withdrew from the places in Gaza that it invaded over the last few days. The military noted that the first stage of its big military operation, dubbed “Hot Winter” was finished and that the next stages will be conducted within the framework of the same operation.

In the last five days, at least 117 Palestinians were killed and 300 injured, dozens of them seriously. Sixty percent of the dead and injured were civilians, most of them children, old men and women. Many of the civilians were killed inside their own homes as Israeli warplanes and tanks shelled neighborhoods, particularly in Jabalya and other populated areas of Gaza. Many families lost more than one member, while some lost almost everyone.

Human rights organizations found new demands for human rights about which to speak. In a press conference, human rights activist Jaber Wishah from Gaza Center for Human Rights loudly proclaimed that “we are calling for the right to bury the dead and remove the bodies from under the destroyed houses.” For five days, everything that moves has been a target of the Israeli shells: ambulances, aid officers, animals in the streets and fields and even the birds, especially the peace doves which were killed in the air and over the rooftops. Through our contacts with people in Gaza and our friends there, we know that for five days, 100,000 residents of the Jabalya Camp were unable to sleep or even rest. If such an event occurred in other places, in Europe, for example, how many organizations, experts and specialists in sociology, psychology and education would be deployed, and how much money would be devoted to examining the effects on children?

The European Jews for a Just Peace (EJJP) press conference, held in Jerusalem on 3 March.

“Israel’s current military operation has failed and will not bring security to anyone,” noted Dror Feiler, Chairperson of EJJP. “The Israeli military operation is a macho show. People struggling for liberation, as the Palestinians are, cannot be stopped with force. History has proven this,” added Feiler. 

“Non-violent resistance is constantly being developed by the Palestinians, but is always met with Israeli violence, such as happens in Beilin, for example,” says Feiler. What kind of message is Israel thus sending to the Palestinian people? That there will be no peace, that negotiations will lead nowhere and that Israel will continue making facts on the ground.”

Israeli soldiers in the West Bank aiming to fire at Palestinian demonstrators.

West Bank Palestinians Protest Israeli Actions in Gaza; Israel Kills, Injures Palestinians throughout West Bank under the Cover of Media Focus on Gaza

While most of the world media was focusing on the Israeli incursions into the Gaza Strip, the situation in the occupied West Bank was also volatile.

A majority of schools across the West Bank were closed, and several marches and demonstrations took place in a number of Palestinian cities and towns.

The largest share of the action on 2 March occurred in Hebron. From the morning, demonstrations were organized in many locations and clashes between the demonstrators and the Israeli military occurred in Beit Awwa, a village to the southwest of Hebron. 14-year-old Mahmmoud Mohammed Masalma was killed when Israeli soldiers shot him the heart. An additional 45 people were injured, three of them in serious condition according to reports from the hospital. 

In heavily populated Palestinian areas, such as in the Gaza Strip, Israeli soldiers move from building to building by knocking holes through the walls of apartment complexes and offices.

In the past months, Israeli government ministers have become increasingly belligerent in their threats to the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. What began with growing calls for the illegal collective punishment of Gazan residents by cutting fuel supplies down to a trickle—a threat now implemented by Israel—has shifted into direct threats of assassination, indiscriminate bombardment and the wiping out of entire Gaza neighborhoods. On Israeli radio last month, Eli Moyal, the Mayor of Sderot, whose city has carried the brunt of Palestinian Qassam rocket attacks, was asked by interviewer Razi Barkai what he would do if he was Defense Minister. Moyal replied: 

"I would kidnap [Hamas leader Ismail] Haniyah, I would kidnap or kill the other leaders, I would bomb neighborhoods, etc."

Barkai: "And if you do all that and the next day are bombed with another 100 Qassams, what then?"

Moyal: "We did it in Lebanon in 2006; we wiped out a whole neighborhood, the Dachya, including tall buildings, sometimes with people in it, and—what can you do? It worked! We have had nearly two years of quiet from Lebanon since then."

Higher up the ladder in the Israeli government, Interior Minister Meir Sheetrit of the ruling Kadima Party stated explicitly that: "The heads of Hamas must pay the price. Hamas doesn't understand any other language; the problem is we are talking to them in English instead of in Arabic.  They only understand [the language of force]. The situation at present doesn't make sense; every other country faced with rockets on its citizens would go in and destroy the area.  We should warn the [Arabs in Gaza] in advance, give them a day's notice, and then wipe out a neighborhood. We should also hit their leaders, regardless of who or what they are.”