During the Nakba — May 15, 1948 — at least 15,000 Palestinians were killed and 750,000 (two thirds of the population at that point) were displaced from their homes to violently clear the way for Jewish settler colonies to be built. Many of those who were displaced were forced into the enclave of the Gaza Strip, where they and their descendants have lived as refugees ever since. This means that up to 80% of all Palestinians living in Gaza are refugees from the Nakba committed 78 years ago by Zionist death squads.

It is the modern-day death squads of the Zionist occupation military, the descendants of the paramilitaries that carried out the Nakba and drove so many Palestinians into Gaza, that now enacts genocide on the descendants of Nakba survivors. Since 7 October 2023, the Zionists have dropped the equivalent of 13 Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs of munitions onto Gaza. Close to 75,000 have been confirmed martyred, with the actual number likely in the hundreds of thousands. Since the so-called ceasefire, over 700 have been martyred, but this is no doubt also a conservative estimate. The weapons used by the Zionists are almost completely provided for them by the United States, making US imperialism fully complicit in the genocide and ecocide.

77% of the population are still facing acute food insecurity as a result of the Zionists’s ongoing obstruction of food aid to keep the prospect of famine looming over Gaza. Rafah crossing, a key passageway for aid and medical evacuations, has been closed following US-Zionist strikes on Iran. Gas supplies continue to be blocked, forcing Palestinians to use the wood of their destroyed homes.

Palestinian land and property is being razed on the Zionist-controlled side of the “yellow line” in parallel with the establishment of 13 new military outposts and infrastructural connectivity between them. The yellow line serves multiple functions:

Death-trap and constant source of terror: The line is ambiguously marked, with a shoot-to-kill policy for anyone who crosses it or is near to it. A precursory re-drawing of Gaza for full annexation: The line brings 53-58% of Gaza’s territory under Israeli military control, and it is continuously expanding to control more land. Making life unliveable: The line consumes an estimated 50-60% of agricultural land, enclosing the boundaries of the concentration camp and severing Palestinians from productive land and resources, thus enhancing the rapidity of starvation and spread of disease.