CW: This article discusses genocide, extremely dehumanising rhetoric, settler colonialism, and cultural destruction.
I was recently elected as Editor-in-Chief for The Edge, the university of Southampton’s entertainment magazine. I was also elected as Head of Design for this magazine. I’m extremely grateful for receiving these creative roles, because I’m aware that what we create is integral to our identity.
I speak to one of many Palestinian individuals on Instagram named Mohammed Nayef Salem, or “Uncle Tito.” He works alongside others as a clown to entertain and uplift the mental health of the children in Gaza. While I will be writing about struggle, I also want to set this article’s tone with the sense of hope that he gives to the children. To donate to his Chuffed fundraiser (using a phone is advised), click here: https://chuffed.org/project/129067-help-uncle-tito-continue-to-bring-joy-in-north-gaza
When I engage in my own Romanian culture, I feel like I’m part of a scene. If I ever walk though the Transylvanian forests, I’ll imagine a circle of iele (nymphs) appearing, and inviting me to dance with them. I imagine being inside the overlap of multiple Romanian friendship circles like a Venn diagram.
But never have those circles had checkpoints between each of them, or bombs that shattered the circles into tiny specks. I feel very lucky to not know of people who want to see rivers of my blood, as Israeli journalist Yehuda Shlezinger proclaimed about Palestinians on Israel’s Channel 12.
Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the UN’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem, Oxfam, Doctors Without Borders, and many countries have stated that Israel’s actions in Gaza constitute genocide against the Palestinian people. Melanie o’Brien, the president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, agrees. This article was first drafted on the 18th June, and as of late August, the International Association of Genocide Scholars passed a resolution to recognise Israel’s actions in Gaza as genocide. On the 16th September, the UN Commission of Inquiry reaffirmed this conclusion with a 72-page report on how Israel has commited the first 4/5 acts listed in Article II of the UN’s 1948 Genocide Convention:
- killed people,
Armed illegal Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank in April 2023 [File: Ariel Schalit/Reuters] - caused serious bodily or mental harm,
- deliberately inflicted conditions of life calculated to bring about the destruction of the Palestinians,
- imposed measures intended to prevent births.
The genocidal remarks that Yehuda Shlezinger and many others Israelis have made certainly reflect these conclusions. The broadcasting of such incitements bear similarity to the Rwandan radio station, Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM), which spread genocidal rhetoric about Tutsis before – and during – the Rwandan genocide in 1994.
All these claims alone cannot legally convict Israel of genocide. That is up to the International Court of Justice, which received South Africa’s ongoing case against Israel for genocide. However, the claims are from reputable organisations that have all reached the same conclusion. But in what ways might Israel, the IDF (Israel Defense Forces), the Israeli government, illegal occupiers in the West Bank, and other Zionist apologists of Israel’s crimes, be erasing Palestinians in ways we haven’t considered yet?
When drafting this article, I wanted to acknowledge the ongoing crimes and famine, but I also wanted my main argument to be that Israel also aidwashes its extermination of Palestine’s heritage. That rather than defining Palestinian identity by acknowledging the importance of cultural cornerstones like mosques, churches, libraries, universities (which it has destroyed), and recognition of Palestine as a sovereign state, Israel defines it with a description of them as a constant humanitarian “issue.”
But a month after, the USA and Israel founded the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a militarised food distribution scheme. 171 charities called for it to be dismantled due to its orchestrated murder of Palestinians trying to collect aid. On the 22nd August 2025, the IPC (Integrated Food Security Phase Classification) confirmed famine in Gaza. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), UNICEF, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and the World Health Organization (WHO) backed this decision. Therefore, not only does Israel erase identity using aid, it also uses aid to orchestrate its intentional killings, according to Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF – Doctors Without Borders). Massacres of civilians trying to collect aid have occured repeatedly throughout this genocide.
Polish-Jewish laywer and Holocaust survivor Raphael Lemkin included the destruction of culture as a major tenet when he coined the term “genocide.” While his definition differs from the UN’s 1948 Genocide Convention‘s own – which is the legal definition that the ICJ and ICC use – academics continue to use Lemkin’s in a scholarly or critical context. One example is the Taliban’s destruction of the Buddhas of Bamiyan in 2001, which was a holy site for Buddhists on the silk road. Another is Azerbaijan’s destruction of multiple Armenian churches and cemeteries in 2020. The ICJ condemned and called for the punishment and prevention of this, having regard to the UNESCO Declaration Concerning the Intentional Destruction of Cultural Heritage of 2003. Again, while the ICJ and other supranational organs do not name these events as “cultural genocide” verbatim, many academics, critics, and Lemkin himself, have done so when they discuss international law.
As of writing, Israel historically opposes recognition of Palestine as a sovereign state. Recently, their reason was that they view it as a reward for Hamas. Israel has also condemned the UK, France, Canada, Australia, Portugal and Malta for preparing recognition themselves. From the Nakba in 1948 – on which Israel was founded – to now, Israel’s opposition to recognition is one example of its erasure of Palestine.
Israel uses humanitarian aid as a tool of cultural genocide with its emphasis on how “much” aid is entering Gaza – with this claim, it suggests that Israel is preserving the Palestinian population with essentials. However, given the Israel’s systematic destruction of Palestinian cultural sites, it is precisely this emphasis on essentials that reduces the entire Palestinian nation to a humanitarian problem.
Natasha Hausdorff is a British Barrister and legal director of the NGO UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI). This NGO takes action against what it claims as anti-Israel and/or antisemitic activities across the UK. On Piers Morgan Uncensored, she debated with political commentators Piers Morgan and Dave Smith about Gaza, claiming:
“there were over 25,000 trucks of aid that were facilitated into the Gaza Strip by Israel… the volume of aid that Israel has facilitated into Gaza, and this is not being reported by the international media, but it is available, publicly available information published by COGAT [Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories], [is]over 1,700,000 tons of aid, which has been facilitated into the Gaza Strip, which is more than required for the civilian population.”
Despite his consistent pro-Israel stance since October 2023, Piers replies, “Why are they so hungry then?” which the recent declaration of famine by the IPC confirms. But what Natasha also doesn’t mention in the debate is that Israel’s pattern of conduct has often included destruction of cultural heritage. In my most recent article, I revealed how an IDF soldier, Asaf Freed, admitted that the IDF were destroying buildings in Gaza – not due to a military objective, but because of their belief that destroying the enemy meant destroying national symbols.
For example, The IDF attacked a building from the Saint Porphyrius church compound on 19 October 2023. The strike killed 18 civilians, including eight children, and Amnesty International did not find evidence of a military objective in or near the building. Another Israeli strike also hit Gaza’s only Catholic church, and killed 3 civilians sheltering there. The IDF claimed they would investigate the incident, yet no one has been held responsible.
Furthermore, Leader of the Popular Forces, Yasser Abu Shabab, admitted that his men – armed with Kalashnikov rifles – stole half a dozen aid trucks intended for starving Palestinians.
The Popular Forces is a militant gang in Gaza that Israel funded and trained to counter Hamas. This gang has members with alleged connections to ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, according to Al Jazeera and Haaretz. ISIS has committed genocide against Yazidis, enforced sexual slavery, destroyed cultural heritage, and forced non-Muslims to convert, among other human rights abuses. When Netanyahu released a statement responding to revelations that Israel collaborates with the Popular Forces, he asked, We made use of clans in Gaza that are opposed to Hamas… What’s wrong with that?” he said in a post on X last week. “It’s only good. It saves the lives of Israeli soldiers.”
Plenty of Israeli protesters have destroyed aid destined for Gaza. After the events of this hyperlinked video, only four were arrested, which reveals the systemic enabling of these consistent violations of international humanitarian law. But Israel also claims that it has delivered aid into Gaza, and they have even hired influencers to push these claims on social media.
This combination of destruction and distribution begs the question – when Israel sends aid to Gaza, is it out of care, or because they want to reduce the Palestinian people to nothing but a humanitarian “concern”? And considering MSF’s report condemning the GHF, and the fact that many Palestinians struggle to receive aid, it is reasonable to claim that Israel uses (limited) aid to define the Palestinian identity, instead of ensuring that their cultural heritage remains preserved.
As an individual with creative roles like Editor-in-Chief and Head of Design, it is important to acknowledge all cultures that have been systemically erased, and make sure that such erasure has no place in the spaces that you help run. It is vital to listen to voices from those cultures, to read their books, look at their art, listen to their music, to eat their food, to support their local businesses, and to make sure that they don’t fade away. Each act of preservation brings hope. One example is the V&A exhibition that displays beautiful Tatreez, Palestinian embroidery. I would love to attend this exhibition to keep the image of Palestine fresh in my mind.
Link to the UoS’s Palestine Solidarity Network: https://linktr.ee/psn.uos
