Tel Aviv, February 18 (RHC)-- Former Mossad official, Rami Igra, has said all Palestinians in Gaza over the age of 4 deserve to face Israel’s collective punishment policy of withholding food and humanitarian aid.  Igra said in an interview broadcast on Israeli television on Tuesday that the “goal” is to force Palestinians to “dislike” the resistance movement Hamas.

“In Gaza, everyone is involved.  Everyone voted for Hamas.  Anyone over the age of four is a Hamas supporter.  And our goal at the moment … is to turn them from Hamas supporters to Hamas dislikers,” Igra said. 

Igra’s comments echo other Israeli officials' remarks that dehumanize Palestinians and normalize violence against them in Gaza and the West Bank.  Israeli president Isaac Herzog recently claimed that there are “no uninvolved civilians in Gaza” to justify the genocide happening in Gaza.

In November, the Israeli minister of heritage Amihai Eliyahu said that dropping a nuclear bomb on Gaza is a possible solution to destroy it and an option that must be studied.  “Death does not frighten the residents of Gaza, and we must know what scares and terrifies them, to force them to leave, and wipe them off the face of the Earth.  They should tremble in fear and terror,” Eliyahu said.  He further said that there are no civilians residing in Gaza and “there is no difference between them and Hamas.”

While Israeli officials claim that they would not target children in Gaza, human rights organizations have repeatedly warned that Israel is violating children's rights by killing and maiming them every day in Gaza.

On average, more than 10 children per day have lost one or both of their legs in Gaza since Israel launched an all-out aggression on the besieged territory early in October, according to Ason Lee, Save the Children’s country director in the occupied Palestinian territories.  Children in Gaza are also suffering the psychological consequences of Israeli bombings while losing their families and belongings as they are suffering from acute shortages of food and water.

The Israeli regime’s relentless bombing of Gaza, calling it “collective punishment” of the Palestinians has forced the helpless residents to flee towards the southern town of Rafah, bordering Egypt.

Rafah is now Gaza’s most populated area where 1.5 million people are sheltering as their last resort – over half a million of them children.

Nearly 29,000 Palestinians, mostly women, children, and adolescents, have been killed so far as a result of the brutal military onslaught.