Lest we think that the carnage in Palestine is something new, twenty-two years ago yesterday, Rachel Corrie, a young American activist, was protesting the Israeli demolition of homes in the Gaza Strip.  Corrie was a member of the activist International Solidarity Movement, which helped Palestinians with the olive harvests, protected children on their way to school from settler attacks, and stood against IDF house demolitions. Corrie, a 23-year-old college student, was staying with the Nasrallah family in Rafah.   In a March 2003 interview with the Middle East Broadcasting network Corrie said, “In the time I’ve been here, children have been shot and killed. I feel like what I’m witnessing here is a very systematic destruction of people’s ability to survive. And that is incredibly horrifying.”

Two days later, an IDF bulldozer driver ran over Corrie and killed her. 

IDF bulldozer driver did not stop

A bulldozer had already destroyed nearby houses, water wells and half of Rafah’s water supply. The IDF then set up to demolish the home of Nasrallah, a pharmacist where Corrie was staying.  Wearing an orange fluorescent vest and speaking through a bullhorn, Corrie stood alone on a mound of earth in the path American-manufactured Israeli Caterpillar D9R armoured bulldozer.  She and others expected it to come to a halt, as other bulldozers had done when faced with international protesters. As NPR reported,

“But it kept going, and, as her fellow activists screamed and tried to stop it, the bulldozer crushed the 23-year-old college student from Olympia, Washington, to death. The Nasrallah family’s children watched in horror through a crack in their garden wall.”

According to an Israeli pathologist, “her death was caused by pressure on the chest (mechanical asphyxiation) with fractures of the ribs and vertebrae of the dorsal spinal column and scapulas, and tear wounds in the right lung with hemorrhaging of the pleural cavities.”

Eight years later, in 2012, Israel’s top court decided that no one was to blame – in other words not the bulldozer driver, the IDF, or any Israeli body.  One judge said her death was the  ‘result of an accident she brought upon herself’.

In 2015, an appeal of the decision failed.  But organizations including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the Israeli groups B’tselem and Yesh Din disputed the findings.  

In 2006,  Bradley Burston, a Haaretz columnist,  said that in the case of Corrie’s death the “incidental killing is no less tragic than intentional killing”.  Burston wrote:

“Of all of the tragedies and casualties of the intifada, in which more than 4,000 people were killed over five years, the case of Rachel Corrie still stands apart, the subject of intense world interest and fierce debate…. Part of it starts with us. ‘They had no business being there‘ is no excuse for what the Pentagon long ago christened collateral damage. We’ve learned much. But we’re still not there. We should have saved Rachel Corrie’s life that day, either by sending out a spotter or delaying the bulldozer’s work. Right now, somewhere in the West Bank, there’s an eight-year-old whose life could be saved next week, if we’ve managed to learn the lesson and are resourceful enough to know how to apply it.”

Israel has destroyed 92% of all housing units in Gaza

Home demolitions were ubiquitous in Gaza and the West Bank long before 7 Oct, 2023. More than 123,000 home demolitions have been carried out by Israel since 1967. 

According to the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), before Oct. 2023, there were four kinds of house demolitions.  

1. Punitive demolitions – demolitions against Palestinians whose family member(s) may have fought back against Israel’s illegal and brutal occupation accounted for only 1% of demolitions.  Once banned in 2005 because the demolitions tended to enflame Palestinians, Israel started to destroy houses again as a policy in 2009.  
2. Administrative demolitions: Houses demolished for lack of a building permit. But Israel won’t allow building permits in most of the occupied territories.  And even if the home is in area B (under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority) Israel can say it’s close to a military base, a closed military area or a road used by settlers, so it can still be destroyed. That kind of demolition is about 20% of demolitions.   
3. Judicial demolitions: These are demolition orders issued by Israeli courts against homes that are inhabited or buildings that are in use. 
4. Land-clearing operations/Military demolitions: This is what happened  the mass destruction of homes and villages during the Nakba (1948).  They account for about 66% of houses demolished by the IDF since 1967. The home destruction highlighted in the recent Academy-Award-winning film No Other Land is of this type.

Since the start of Israel’s post October 7, 2023 genocide, more than 92% of all housing units in Gaza have been destroyed–160,000 homes obliterated and 276,000 severely damaged and unliveable.

After Israel has killed nearly 50,000 Palestinians in the last 16 months, and has grievously injured  more than 100,000– Israel is well aware of its war crimes.  International courts have reminded Israel about them. More acres of Palestinians’ lands have been illegally grabbed by Israel in 2023 than in any year in the past 30 years. 

Israel wounds and kills international volunteers who help Palestinians

On 6 Sept 2024, 21.5 years after Corrie’s death, the Israeli military killed American-Turkish citizen Aysenur Ezgi Eygi.  Aysenur had graduated the preceding May 2024 from the University of Washington in Seattle, a student of psychology, an activist, and a recent volunteer with the International Solidarity Movement in the West Bank. 

There have been maimings and killings of other ISM volunteers.  On 5 Apr., weeks after the murder of Rachel Corrie, an IDF personnel carrier shot Brian Avery in the face. He had been escorting Palestinian medical staff in the street.

Nearly a month after Corrie’s killing, IDF soldiers fired at British national Tom Hurndall.  In a coma, he died nine months after a bullet pierced his brain.   He and another ISMer had been protecting children from Israeli gunfire.

In March 2009, the IDF critically injured US volunteer Tristan Anderson in Nilin. The IDF fired a high velocity tear gas canister that hit Anderson in the head.  He’s now paralysed and requires round-the-clock care,

The American-Turkish volunteer, Aysenur Ezgi Eygis, was the 18^th protester murdered in the Palestinian village of Beita since 2020.  

“Seventeen Palestinians have been killed while demonstrating against construction of illegal Israeli outposts on the village’s land. While we deplore each of these deaths, Aysenur was the first American killed in Beita, and our government has an obligation to act on her behalf.”

… even after 22 years, there has been no real accountability for Rachel Corrie’s death.  Yet Corrie’s parents continue to stand up for other activists killed by Israel  

Corrie’s parents, who started the nonprofit  Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice, insist that the Americans who died at the hands of the IDF – whether Corrie, Egyi or Al Jazeera TV journalist (a US citizen born in Jerusalem) Shireen Abu Akleh—must be investigated.  Though former Israeli PM Ariel Sharon promised a “thorough, credible, and transparent investigation” no such thing happened.  And we know that even after 22 years there has been no real accountability for Corrie’s death.  Yet Corrie’s parents continue to stand up for other activists killed by Israel. Parents Cindy and Craig Corrie point out,   

“Aysenur and her family deserve better than White House and Department of State platitudes and calls for Israeli investigations that never result in truth, action, or enforcement of U.S. law. We are demanding more. The time for accountability is now.”

I’d argue it’s too late for accountability. 

Corrie’s death was a grim foreshadowing of events that have highlighted the genocide now taking place.  Her killing was no mistake. Israel wants the world to know that International supporters or volunteers risk their lives to help Palestinians. Best to stay home.   

Netanyahu: his ICC arrest warrant is valid in 125 countries

Though prime ministers in countries such as the UK, Canada  and India might welcome Netanyahu, an ICC  (International Criminal Court)  warrant for his arrest is valid in 125 countries including these three—so it’s not advisable for Netanyahu to travel pretty much anywhere except the US (where Trump will not allow him to be arrested).  Netanyahu is an outlaw war-monger and mass murderer—one day he will be arrested just as Rodrigo Duterte, former president of the Philippines was last week.  Duterte is accused of having his police or hitmen kill more than 30,000 people in his “war against drugs” from 2011 to 2019 .  An arrest is one thing; a conviction providing for  a sentence of up to 30 years is another.  But as Manila law prof Romel Bagares noted “It’s going to be a long road from Manila to The Hague.”

Clearly Netanyahu’s arrest is a ways off. But the genocide continues unabated – in Gaza Israel has allowed no medicine, no food, no supplies and no clean water for weeks.  People – including more than 20,000 children have died of malnutrition, starvation, water-born illnesses, and violence by the IDF.

Image at the top is a detail of this portrait: