Gaza Storms Deemed 'Terrible Situation,' Aid Blockades Unmentioned
Reporting on the 'terrible situation' of storms battering Gaza, Al Jazeera focuses on the natural elements, deepening an 'already dire humanitarian crisis.' This framing, while accurate on the surface, conveniently glosses over the manufactured humanitarian crisis preceding the weather. For instance, UNICEF reported in December 2023 that 90% of children under two in Gaza face severe food poverty ,
a statistic unrelated to rain. Meanwhile, the Israeli government continues to restrict aid entry , with UN experts condemning the use of starvation as a weapon of war. One might ask if the storms are just making a situation engineered to be dire, even direr. How many layers of 'dire' can a population endure before the euphemisms run out?