Rabat – In a letter sent to the UN Security Council in early March 2025, Riyad Mansour, the Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine to the United Nations, accused Israel of breaching the terms of the ceasefire agreement that was supposed to come into effect on January 19. The Palestinian official reported that Israel has violated the terms at least 962 times in just over six weeks, with an average of 23 violations per day.
The letter stated that Israel’s attacks killed over 116 people and injured at least another 490. The number of Palestinians killed has since risen to 150 even before Israel’s massacres on March 18.
In the early hours of Tuesday, Israel released a barrage of airstrikes that killed over 404 Palestinians – actions that international media and world leaders are calling the effective end to the ceasefire, even though there have been prior Israeli violations. Many around the world are condemning the the violent terror attacks despite the fact that some have been quiet for a year and a half of genocide and constant aggressions.
Germany’s foreign minister Annalena Baerbock said on Wednesday that Israel’s attacks on Gaza “are shattering the tangible hopes of so many Israelis and Palestinians of an end to suffering on all sides.”
“The lives of dozens of hostages, including Germans [and] of many thousands of Palestinians” depend on peace, she said.
Baerbock’s statement — which equates the experiences of the Israeli occupiers and their hostages to the suffering of Palestinians living under 76-years of brutal occupation and genocide — is a far cry from being pro-Palestinian. It is, however, a notable step up from her previous Hitlerian statement where she hailed Israel’s right to self defense and threatened that civilians’ buildings in Gaza could lose protected status under international law.
In fact, one year into the genocide in Gaza, Baerbock made remarks in Germany’s parliament marking the anniversary of October 7, where she said that “self defense means, of course, not only attacking terrorists, but also destroying them. This is why I have made it so clear that when Hamas terrorists hide behind people, behind schools, then we end up in very difficult waters.”
“But we’re not shying away from this. This is why I made it clear at the United Nations that civilian sites could lose their protected status if terrorists abuse this status.”
A letter cosigned by 300 academics called for the German minister to retract her bloodthirsty remarks, and Hamas even called upon the International Court of Justice to consider Berbock’s statement as evidence of her country’s complicity in genocide.
While there is no evidence to support the claims that Hamas has been using civilians as “human shields,” they have been Israel’s and its allies’ long-sung pretext for targeting civilians.
If anything is to be learned from heist movies, it is to first and foremost not bomb the bank with the hostages in it while also starving everyone in the building; which is what Israel has been doing since October 7, not only to the civilians of Gaza but also to its own hostages.
While Israel and its handlers have been shouting “Bring them home!” to circumvent addressing accountability for the genocide in Gaza, Hamas reported that 33 Israeli hostages died by December 2024, largely due to Israeli airstrikes. Former Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant even confirmed that Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) used the Hannibal directive against Israelis on October 7, thus confirming what Hamas had been claiming since the attacks.
During the shaky ceasefire, Hamas has released 33 Israeli hostages in exchange for nearly 1800 Palestinian prisoners. Around 59 Israeli hostages reportedly remain in Gaza, with half believed to be dead by Israeli estimations, while 9500 Palestinians are still detained in Israeli prisons under inhumane conditions and largely with no due process.
The now-tarnished ceasefire initially contained three stages, but Israel refused to move to the second phase, which would have entailed the withdrawal of the IOF forces from Gaza. Instead, in violation of the terms, they attempted to coerce Hamas into releasing the remaining hostages without abiding by its end of the deal.
During the last developments of the ceasefire, Hamas had agreed to hand over soldier-captive Edan Alexander as well as the bodies of the American-Israeli captives, but Israel, supported by the United States, refused to cooperate. This exchange, alongside US retaliation for the recent Yemeni attacks in defense of Gaza, accumulated to the March 18 attacks.
UNICEF reported that more than 130 children were among the hundreds of Palestinains killed earlier on Tuesday, representing “the largest single-day death toll in the last year.”
The report also decried Israel’s humanitarian aid blockade, which was renewed on March 2, and its electricity blockade since March 9 – actions that have cause Palestinian suffering comparable to those during the genocide.
“We urge all parties to immediately reinstate the ceasefire, and we call on countries with influence to use their leverage to ensure the situation does not further deteriorate. International humanitarian law must be respected by all parties, allowing the immediate provision of humanitarian aid, the protection of civilians, and the release of all hostages,” said UNICEF.
As world leaders and pro-Palestinian activists, and Palestinians themselves are reeling wondering what’s to come, some search for answers as to find logic in Israel’s reasons for breaking the much-needed ceasefire. Yet, a darker reality looms – that this was Netanyahu’s plan all along.
