From the Guardian article "Childhood in ruins":
The shelling of the Abu Elaish family was unusual in that it caught the attention of the Israeli public, but what Ghiada continues to endure 12 months on is shared by many of Gaza’s 750,000 children – half of its population.
More than 1,400 Gazans were killed in the 23 days of the Israeli assault, including several hundred children. The actual number is in dispute. The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) documented 313 deaths, almost 40% of them less than 10 years old. Other Palestinian groups say the toll was much higher. More than 1,600 children were injured.
But the 23-day war is only part of the story. The long history of Israeli assaults on Gaza, and the two-and-a-half-year-long blockade of the territory after Hamas took power, has exacted a toll on almost every aspect of children’s lives: schooling, housing, leisure time, what they eat, what they wear, how they see the future.
A Gaza Community Mental Health Programme (GCMHP) survey earlier this year found that about 75% of children over the age of six were suffering from one or more symptom of post-traumatic stress disorder. Almost one in 10 ticked off every criteria.
The article ends with the following statistics:
The 23-day war in numbers
Statistics from the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme
• 1,420 Palestinians killed, 446 of them children
• 5,320 injured, 1,855 of them children
• 4,000 houses destroyed
• 16,000 houses damaged
• 94.6% of children aged six-17 heard the sound of sonic jetfighters
• 91.7% of them heard shelling by artillery
• 92% saw mutilated bodies on TV
• 80% were deprived of water or electricity
• 50.7% left home for a safer place
• 25.9% report one symptom of PTSD
• 39.3% report more than one symptom
• 9.8% report full criteria of PTSD
Statistics from the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights
• 1,414 Palestinians killed during the conflict, including 313 children, of which: – 31% girls, 69% boys
– 15% under 5; 23.3% 5-10; 62% 11-17
– 73% died from bombs; 19.8% from artillery shells; 5.4% shot; 1.5% from white phosphorous
• 5,300 Palestinians injured, including 1,606 children
• 36 UN schools damaged
• Approximately 20,000 homes completely or partially destroyed
Excellent post Mr. Horowitz, it helps to bring the tragic human element into the picture. Which in turn shows us why Israel must be held to account. In fact, it was so good I posted it on my blog.
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But didn’t Palestinians deserve to be punished by democratically electing Hamas? Didn’t they deserve to be punished by having fighting/resisting occupation neighbours?
Didn’t they <deserve to be punished by not abandoning their houses, as advised, and wading into the sea for the duration of the Cast Lead?
Kids killing kids!
oops wrong story comment sorry I meant that for the previous article.
good thorough stats thanks for the great reporting
These are the western democracy standards?
Hamas should be held to account, for shifting the status of the conflict from skirmishes to war.
Tell me, Witty, when has Israel not been engaged in war against the Palestinians? When have the purges and the bombing runs and the assassination strikes and the razing and the shootings and the beatings and the torture and the herding into prison camps not been an ongoing Israeli practice? When did Israel declare peace with the Palestinians and restored to them their part of the UN partition?
Guys, don’t fall for this. It’s the same old defense strategy:
“In a defensive war, everything’s fair, so they are at fault for attacking us”. Wrong! In a defensive war, the rules of war still apply. And Israel, that much should be obvious by now, broke them deliberately and systematically by their targeting of civilian infrastructure and criminal disregard for civilian life.
To give governments carte blanche as far as their military policies are concerned, provided they fight a “just” war, can be used to justify anything, including genocide, because nobody ever fights an unjust war.
Yeah, exactly. Even if one fully accepted Witty’s “Hamas started it” BS, it wouldn’t make the slightest bit of difference in how one evaluated what Israel actually did in the Gaza slaughter. Richard Goldstone understood this. Witty does too, which is why he also took the backup position while shrieking at Jeff, which is that Hamas has deliberately murdered Israeli civilians (true), while Israel merely was careless in its conduct, and of course there’s no moral equivalence between civilized but careless Israelis and those uncivilized horrific brutes on the other side.
Hamas kept to the cease-fire. Israel broke it. Israel planned the war in advance right down to the PR campaign.
Israel launched the attack when children would be coming home from school.
They purposefully targeted civilians and civilian infrastructure to punish the Gazan population for voting for Hamas. This was another Israeli attempt to get the Palestinians to convert to Zionism.
Being the Nazi cockroach that you are Dick Witty, you blame the victims. Only, you choose Hamas to be that conduit because well, they’re Hamas.
Don’t refer to defenders of war crimes as “cockroaches”. Defending the crimes of one’s own tribe is a very human thing to do, unfortunately. Not even hypocrites should be referred to with dehumanizing rhetoric.
I agree completely. Anyone who goes down that road is allowing extremists to goad them into degrading themselves. Why would anyone hand them such an easy victory?
Same hasbara lie from Witty, still denying the fact that it was Israel who started the war with an act of naked, murderous aggression.
Israel is still conducting war against Gaza, despite the ceasefire from the other side, precisely because it has never been held to account for its aggressive warmongering. Its politicians are protected for doing what the Nazis were hanged for.
Witty, I am not trying to be over dramatic, but seriously – if I had to act like you in regard to this tragic issue I might off myself. I just could not live with myself, seriously.
This is an insane level of hypocrisy. Hamas is responsible for the WHOLE war because they escalated it at one point, after Israel escalated (started) it and before Israel escalated it again (in mass killing)? Including maintaining the siege, there were 3 distinct escalations from Israel after the cease-fire agreement.
“[...] shifting the status of the conflict from skirmishes to war.” How in the world does that NOT precisely describe Israel’s role in the conflict? Were you being serious?
Witty, Yonira and co i think you should be held to account, for complicity in War against humanity, Hamas is another Israeli assault against unarmed Palestinians, You made it and you reinforce it.
Witty, Yonira and company are very apt demonstrations as to why comparisons between Israelis and their supporters and Nazis and their supporters are not only viable, they are fitting. No crime is too large for Witty to overlook, as long as an Israeli committed it.
The outrage is even greater than that Israel first, destroyed the homes of Gaza’s children, then, denies them the ability to rebuild them.
Bret Tzedek Shalom, purportedly an American Jewish group seeking peace, and purportedly created to ameliorate the extremism of AIPAC, Brit Tzedek is trotting Izzeldin Abu Laish around the country, to appear at Jewish community centers where BTS can display him like a prize poodle,
“See, this Palestinian loves Jews. He thinks Gazans and Jews should get along. Aren’t we just too terrific people for bringing him to speak to you, our fellow Jews, about how great we Jews are?”
Just to be fair, 13 Israelis were killed, including 4 IDF soldiers killed by friendly fire, and
3 non-combatants.
For Witty and co killing soldiers during war is an act of terrorism, and killing at least 360 children and melting thousand of bodies with white phosphorus is self defence.
I appreciate that certain media outlets release stories like this, but to call it a war is absured, call it for what it was, a massacre. No war took place!!!
Israel should be held to account, and so should those who have supported Israel and done its bidding from abroad.