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BOB GELDOF HAS strongly condemned the Israeli government amid the growing humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where international aid agencies have warned that the population is facing “mass starvation”.
International anger and condemnation has grown in recent days as images and footage of malnourished Palestinian children continue to emerge.
The World Health Organisation has said Gaza is suffering man-made mass starvation caused by Israel’s blockade of aid into the territory.
In a live interview on RTÉ’s Prime Time this evening, Geldof said that the only way for hunger crisis in Gaza to end is for the Israeli people “to equally rise up in disgust as the rest of the world is”.
“Their government is clearly out of control, and their army, probably, as well,” the musician and Live Aid campaigner told Miriam O’Callaghan on the programme.
“I fear that until they do, there’s very little we can do against the alliance between [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu and the Trump government.”
“I’m not sure that the world can continue to look at those images for much longer without something necessary happening,” Geldof said, adding that he was not sure whether this would be collective action from the EU.
It is a despicable disgrace, and for the Israeli people to allow this in their name is a despicable disgrace.
Even after Israel began easing a more than two-month aid blockade in late May, Gaza’s population is still suffering extreme scarcities.
Israel says humanitarian aid is being allowed into Gaza and accuses Hamas of exploiting civilian suffering, including by stealing food handouts to sell at inflated prices or shooting at those awaiting aid.
But in a joint statement, 111 aid organisations, including Doctors Without Borders (MSF), Save the Children and Oxfam, said that warehouses with tonnes of supplies were sitting untouched just outside the territory, and even inside, as they were blocked from accessing or delivering the goods.
Today, MSF said that one in four young children and pregnant women in Gaza are malnourished, with rates of severe malnutrition in children under five having tripled in the last two weeks alone.
“This is not just hunger – it’s deliberate starvation, manufactured by the Israeli authorities. The weaponisation of food to exert pressure on a civilian population must not be normalised,” MSF said in a statement.
According to the UN, Israeli forces has killed more than 1,000 Palestinians trying to get food aid since the US and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation started operations in late May – effectively sidelining the existing UN-led system.
Geldof told Prime Time that what is happening is “unconscionable”.
“[The Israeli government] are deliberately killing children by purposely starving them, and when their panicked mothers try and approach whilst they dangle food tauntingly in front of their starving bodies, they shoot them,” he said.
He said he found it ”utterly bizarre” and “bewildering” that he was talking about Israel “given the horror of their own past” and said the “shame of this” would be “yet another historic burden they may have to carry”.
“I’ve been in Gaza. I’ve been on the West Bank. I’ve been in Israel. They are an hour away,” he continued.
“They’re all eating their dinners right now, and they’re turning on Netflix and they’re watching their heavily censored news while they prosecute this action, while their government does this purposely. What are we living in?”
Geldof said the images of malnourished children reminded him of 1984 “but in completely different circumstances”, referencing the famine in Ethiopia that prompted him to organise the Live Aid concert to raise money for relief efforts.
He went on to say that it was “seriously telling” that France has announced it would recognise the State of Palestine, and that he would urge the British government to do the same.
He also said that Ireland “has something to say to this, because of our past”.
“Our diplomats are very clever and very respected. I’ve seen them at work in the UN. I think we step up now and we speak very loudly and very clearly about what we as a country feel.”
Need more information on what is happening in Israel and Gaza? Check out our new FactCheck Knowledge Bank for essential reads and guides to navigating the news online.
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