A catastrophe is unfolding in Gaza. The world watches, scrolls, and debates while an entire population is systematically erased. According to a recent estimate by Israeli researcher Yaakov Garb, published through the Harvard Dataverse, at least 377,000 Palestinians in Gaza have disappeared since October 2023. Many are presumed dead. Half of them are believed to be children.
This is not war. This is not self-defense. This is annihilation.
Israel has repeatedly bombed densely populated civilian areas. It has targeted aid convoys, hospitals, schools, and refugee camps. The Gaza Health Ministry, which has long tracked casualties, reports nearly 60,000 confirmed deaths. But that number does not begin to capture the scale of this atrocity. Entire families have vanished. Neighborhoods have been flattened. And the rubble remains sealed over tens of thousands of lives never counted.
The numbers do not lie. Gaza’s population before the war was estimated at 2.227 million. Today it is believed to be around 1.85 million. That is a difference of 377,000 human beings. Where did they go? They did not flee to Egypt. They did not cross into Israel. They were buried. Crushed. Burned. Disintegrated. They were wiped out by a state with the full backing of American money, weapons, and silence.
This is the real meaning of genocide.
The Rome Statute defines genocide not merely as mass killing, but as any act committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. That is exactly what is happening. The Israeli government under Benjamin Netanyahu has made no secret of its intentions. It refers to Palestinians as human animals. It blocks food, water, and fuel. It justifies every act of destruction as self-defense, even as it targets children collecting bread.
Let us be clear. This is not about politics. This is about humanity.
When a state disappears over a quarter of a million people in eight months, that is not collateral damage. That is premeditated slaughter. That is a crime against the soul of the human race.
The targeting of aid zones by the Israel Defense Forces has been documented. Civilians were lured into so-called safe areas and then bombed. The United Nations has condemned this. Human Rights Watch has documented patterns of indiscriminate attacks. And still, nothing changes.
This is a war crime. And Benjamin Netanyahu must be arrested.
He must be arrested not because he is a politician. Not because he is unpopular. But because he has led a campaign of genocide with open contempt for international law. The International Criminal Court has issued warrants in less egregious cases. If it does not act now, it declares itself meaningless.
The world cannot claim ignorance. The world cannot pretend it did not know. The evidence is published. The data is available. The New Arab, Al Jazeera, and multiple human rights groups have confirmed the disappearance of hundreds of thousands. And the silence from Western governments is deafening.
We call the genocide of the 1940s the Holocaust. We say never again. We build museums. We host remembrance days. And yet now, in 2024 and 2025, another holocaust is taking place. Another slaughter of innocents. And instead of stopping it, we are funding it. Instead of confronting it, we are denying it.
There is no justification. There is no defense. This must stop.
The United States must end all aid to Israel immediately. The weapons must stop flowing. The diplomatic cover must end. The lie that Israel is acting in defense must be exposed. And the international community must do what it claims to stand for.
Arrest the war criminals. Stop the bombing. Free Gaza.
There are no excuses left.
Veritas Lux Mea
Truth is my light.