On 10 October 2023, US President Joe Biden publicly confirmed that he had seen evidence that 40 Israeli babies were beheaded by Hamas three days earlier.

Within a couple of days, this blatant lie, which was repeated by the US and Israeli presidents, was debunked and no evidence was found to substantiate it. However, there was little detectable appetite from the media to report on this clarification.

READ | OPINION: Quraysha Ismail Sooliman – Media lies and the choice between ethnic cleansing or genocide

For anybody who has been following the events in Gaza over the last eleven months, live videos and photographs of actual Gazan children who have been decapitated by Israel is not an uncommon daily occurrence to come across. Ironically, the media has ditched the graphic images and are no longer interested in being the arbiters of what constitutes a massacre or terrorism in showing these images – apparently there is no palpable need to make that clear to the public when the babies are Palestinian and not Israeli.

The images out of Gaza have been unrelentingly traumatic. After a year of the war, I find it difficult to function when confronted with these details anymore. The hopelessness and horror, coupled with my rage, feel too overwhelming. My complicity feels too overwhelming. What’s the point in writing when it’s now very clear that there are no red lines? Not the United Nations Human Rights Council terming this a genocide by Israel, not the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordering Israel to stop, and certainly not my opinion pieces. Israel is behaving like a barbaric madman and there are no boundaries or rules, especially when it comes to the children of Gaza.

More than 17 000 children killed 

As a doctor, last month I was horrified to learn that the first case of polio was found in a 10-month-old Gazan baby who had not been vaccinated. However, a disease which has been mostly eradicated for years due to routine vaccinations is the least of problems for the children of Gaza.

As of 19 August, at least 16 480 children have been killed as a direct result of the war, in addition to thousands more who remain missing, presumed dead. In addition to women, this represents more than 70% of all the casualties. Many children have starved to death, and “at least 3 500 children in Gaza are facing (the same fate) amid a lack of food and malnutrition under Israeli restrictions on the delivery of food,” a ministry spokesman said.

READ | OPINION: Aayesha Soni – What is happening in Gaza is beyond warfare

Additionally, so far, more than 17 000 children in Gaza have either lost one or both parents since the start of the war on 7 October 2023. One of the main reasons why Gaza’s children account for the majority of victims of the war is that homes, schools and displacement shelters have been the main targets of the relentless Israeli bombardment.

Recently, Palestine’s Education Minister Amjad Barham said that of the 309 schools, 290 have been destroyed as a result of Israeli bombing. According to a statement by the UN Experts last April, “more than 80% of schools in Gaza (have been) damaged or destroyed. It may be reasonable to ask if there is an intentional effort to comprehensively destroy the Palestinian education system, an action known as ‘scholasticide’,” they wrote. This has left 630 000 students with no access to education.

A hallmark of the Nazi persecution was how vulnerable children were and particularly targeted under the regime. It is a sick paradox that less than 100 years later, Israel follows this inhumanity in actions. No child, let alone a whole generation of children, should endure this much suffering, regardless of the political reasoning or context.

International and humanitarian law has designated a “special respect and protection” for children during times of armed conflict, but it appears that laws only apply to Palestinian children in theory.

So, I come back to my original question: what is the point of me writing this, or continuing to speak out despite the emotional fatigue of our apparent redundancy?

We cannot stop. All genocides begin with dehumanisation. This genocide was built on decades of Palestinians being demonised and dehumanised, and public consent for this assault on Gaza was manufactured with the help of dehumanising narratives designed to ensure nobody could think of a single Palestinian as an innocent civilian or even a human being, including the children. The answer is simple, we cannot stop until justice is achieved.

https://www.news24.com/news24/opinions/columnists/guestcolumn/opinion-aayesha-soni-gazas-children-the-overlooked-victims-of-a-relentless-conflict-20240918