Kathriona Devereux: We cannot stand idly by, Gaza and its people need our help

You’ve seen the horrors. Or maybe you looked away, switched the channel.

Gaza is being bombed, starved, and dismantled before the world’s eyes, and 2.3 million people are being pushed to the brink.

It’s harrowing to watch the destruction of a people - and to live with hunger, no medicine, no electricity, and the constant threat of bombing.

If they survive, how will they ever recover?

Israel has been blocking humanitarian aid. The food in Gaza has run out - the average Gazan eats one meal every two or three days. This is engineered deprivation.

A 45km line of food trucks waits at the border, a shocking image of global moral collapse.

Condemnation is mounting.

Oxfam, Médecins Sans Frontières, UNICEF, the world’s most trusted humanitarian voices, are documenting mass malnutrition and death and are screaming from the rooftops to let aid in.

Peter Power of UNICEF Ireland told RTÉ last week: “What is happening now in Gaza is nothing short of barbaric and inhumane: there can be no justification for the withholding of food and water from starving children… This is not like a conventional famine due to drought or environmental conditions: The food is right there, kilometres away. But it’s being blockaded from getting in.”

At least 66,000 children in Gaza are suffering from severe malnutrition. Nine thousand required hospital treatment. And still, the siege continues.

But condemnation of Israel’s actions, and support for Palestine, is mounting steadily. Even long-time allies are breaking ranks.

In the UK, Conservative MP Mark Pritchard, once a staunch supporter of Israel, condemned its actions in Gaza in Westminster last week.

In the Dáil, Galway TD Catherine Connolly, along with many other TDs, outlined how Ireland is complicit by reportedly allowing Irish airspace and Shannon Airport to be used for the transit of weapons to Israel and for failing to enact the Occupied Territories Bill.

Even a former teacher of Simon Harris’s is fronting a campaign video urging him to pass the Bill.

Deeds, not words

Gazans can’t eat eloquent statements. Words of support or condemnation can flood in, but still food and aid does not.

“Deeds, not words” was the motto of the Suffragettes - and it applies here. Support must be tangible. We are beyond statements now.

Countries must compel Israel to stop the obliteration of Gaza.

Gazan writer, Aya Al Attab, in The Guardian last week, described the effects of hunger and feelings of abandonment. It “feels as though the Gaza Strip is no longer part of this world, as if we’re living in some distant, forgotten galaxy. Our lives are marked by suffering and strangeness, while the rest of the world carries on as if our reality doesn’t exist.”

The world carries on as if it is normal to see hospitals bombed, children starved, journalists assassinated, aid workers executed.

UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese wrote on X: “While states debate terminology - is it or is it not genocide? - Israel continues its relentless destruction of life in Gaza.

“This is one of the most ostentatious and merciless manifestations of the desecration of human life and dignity.

“The decision is stark: remain passive and witness the slaughter of innocents, or take part in crafting a just resolution.”

Boycott

Protesting is important, whether in letters, emails, calls to TDs or marches (I commend the Cork Palestine Solidarity Campaign, which has organised a march every Saturday for 83 consecutive weeks!) but the major force that seems to move Western governments is money. One of the most powerful tools we have is boycott.

As consumers, we must stop spending our money with corporations that support or profit from Israel’s system of apartheid and occupation.

The BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement is a powerful non-violent way of showing solidarity with Palestine.

For example, after sustained global pressure over Puma’s sponsorship of the Israeli Football Association - which includes teams in illegal West Bank settlements - Puma ended the deal. In response, BDS removed it from its boycott list. Economic and reputational pressure is leverage.

This May 15, on the 77th anniversary of the Nakba - the violent displacement and dispossession of more than 750,000 Palestinians by Israel in 1948 - BDS is calling for global mobilisations and boycotts.

A full list of companies and products to boycott are on the BDSmovement.net website.

Call to action

Israel continues to deny the facts presented by journalists, NGOs, the UN, and other right-thinking human beings, refuting the shortage of food and instead ploughing ahead, planning for Operation Gideon’s Chariots, the total takeover of Gaza.

Irish people are among the most vocal global supporters of Palestinian rights. In a way, it’s fitting that one of Palestine’s strongest protest tools, the boycott, is named after Captain Boycott, the British land agent ostracised for evicting tenants during Ireland’s struggle against colonialism.

He gave his name to the form of non-violent resistance now central to Palestinian civil protest.

The Irish government must urgently use every tool at its disposal to engage the international community to protect Palestinians.

Another letter to the EU Commission is not going to cut it. We must escalate our actions and urgently progress the Occupied Territories Bill.

We must close Irish airspace and airports to arms shipments.

We must stop enabling genocide.

How can we live with ourselves if we don’t?