Gazacide: Palestinians From Refugeehood to Ontological Obliteration

Abstract

This article addresses the ongoing genocide in Gaza and argues that it must be understood in a larger historical context of settler colonialism. While Israel has always sought the completion of its settler-colonial project, I argue that the current genocide seeks immediate results of dispossession and annexation. My study examines the plight of refugees and contends that the right of return is at the center of Palestinians’ struggle. Return, land, and resistance are three key elements of the Palestinian identity that should be stressed in genocide studies. I argue that Israel’s approach before 7th October constituted slow-motion genocide and after that date its approach marked an accelerated form of genocide. I employ the new term Gazacide to encompass Israel’s approach in Gaza since the 1948 Nakba. To gain a deeper understanding of genocide and the destruction inflicted upon Gazans as a social group, I employ figurational sociology. I conclude with a discussion on culpability and intent and argue that all levels of the Israeli bureaucratic system as well as individuals must be held accountable.

Introduction

When Nazi Germany invaded Poland in 1939, thousands of Jews including Raphael Lemkin fled a looming genocide and sought refuge in the United States. Later, Lemkin embarked on a life project to achieve recognition of the crime of genocide that had no name before. He coined the term in his book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe published in 1944 (Lemkin, 1944). As a survivor, Lemkin was motivated by the wide-scale destruction that the Holocaust inflicted on various groups. By codifying genocide in international law, Lemkin hoped to uphold the post-Nazi pledge of ‘Never Again’.

On 27th January, Israelis commemorated Holocaust Remembrance Day while their country was perpetrating genocide against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip with the blessings of multiple Western countries including Germany. The commission of the ‘crime of crimes’ by some of the Holocaust survivors’ descendants constitutes an insult to the efforts of Lemkin and the legacy of those who suffered from the Holocaust. The complicity of Germany and other countries in enabling and abetting genocide in Gaza represents a violation of the ‘never again’ pledge. Abetting genocide also violates the recent ruling of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) (2024) which concluded that Israeli crimes in Gaza constitute a plausible case of genocide. Regardless, Israel was not deterred by the ruling as it continues to inflict irreparable damage upon the Palestinians.

Genocide is a combination of geno meaning race or tribe and cide meaning killing or elimination. For Lemkin, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when that materializes through mass killing:

It is rather a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups proper. The objectives of such a plan would be the disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and even the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups. Genocide is directed against the national group as an entity, and the actions involved are directed against individuals, not in their individual capacity, but as members of the national group. (Lemkin, 1944: 79)

Lemkin also argues that genocide has two phases: one entails the destruction of the national pattern of the targeted group; the other is the imposition of the national pattern of the oppressor. This imposition is not necessarily made upon the targeted population, but rather upon the territory alone without its population (Lemkin, 1944: 79). This part of the definition is crucial because Israel is not interested in the Palestinian population, but in the land only—more on this later. This is evident in the calls made by Israeli far-right ministers Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich and Zionist organizations such as Nachala advocating for the re-establishment of settlements in Gaza and the dispossession of the population (McKernan, 2024). This goal, as I show later, is being gradually and slowly achieved in the West Bank, indicating Israel’s intent to annex all Palestinian lands. Lemkin (1944: 82–90) understood genocide as a multi-dimensional or total process that encompasses many aspects including political, social, cultural, economic, biological, physical, religious, and moral. He placed particular emphasis on the cultural aspect of genocide, which was excluded from the final draft of the UN Convention on the Prevention of Genocide. This suggests that Lemkin did not consider one aspect in isolation from others, but saw cultural genocide as inseparable from physical genocide that involves the mass killing of oppressed groups (Moses, 2008: 12; Woolford, 2009). The destruction of one aspect necessarily affects other aspects and Lemkin thought the cultural component is of significant importance because culture is what holds group members together (Moses, 2008: 12–13).

Lemkin efforts contributed to the recognition of the crime of genocide, in part, with the drafting of the United Nation Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (UNGC). Article 2 of the convention reads,

In the present convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group as such:

(a) Killing of members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

My goal here is not to criticize the convention as that I have done in a previous article (Nijim, 2022). Nor do I intend to prove that Israel is committing genocide based on the clauses of the convention because that has been cogently done by the South African team at the ICJ. This article aims to offer a new theoretical analysis of genocide in Gaza by introducing the new concept of Gazacide. Gazacide is a genocidal process that entails the destruction of key social structures or figurations along with their collective actors, not only during the current genocide in Gaza but throughout the history of occupation. I argue that the pace of this destruction before 7th October 2023 was slow, and thus represented a form of slow-motion genocide (Nijim, 2022). However, Israel’s lunatic approach after this date constitutes an accelerated and ever-brutal form of genocide. While slow-motion genocide was looking for destructive outcomes over the long term, the current genocide seeks immediate dispossession of refugees and elimination of Gaza. Thus, current genocide is characterized by immediacy. The current genocide marks the peak of Israeli destruction and brutality against Palestinians throughout the history of struggle. It aims at making up for all past setbacks in Gaza and overcoming the nightmare or insoluble problem of Gaza. Both Gaza and the West Bank have been historically referred to as the ‘unfinished business’ that Zionism regrets not completing in 1948 (Pappé, 2017: 45–60). While Israel’s colonial and expansionist efforts are advancing smoothly in the West Bank, Israel’s approach has failed; hence, the perpetration of the current genocide. Gazacide also encompasses the colonial configuration of Gaza that initially transformed Gaza into a warehouse of refugees and later into an uninhabitable enclave. I begin this article with a historical overview of the issue of refugees in Gaza and stress that the right of return constitutes the backbone of Palestinians’ struggle. This is followed by an examination of the failure of various Israeli strategies in Gaza and the ultimate resort to genocide. Although Lemkin wrote about the significance of identity, it seems that genocide research on Palestine overlooked discussions of the Palestinian identity. Such scholarly works have not addressed what binds Palestinians together as a group and why they are deliberately targeted. This is the discussion of my third section. In this part, I explore the connection to the land and Palestinians’ historical identification with their villages or towns. In the fourth part, I employ Norbert Elias’ figurational sociology in an attempt to answer, ‘What does Israel kill or destroy in Gaza’. I follow in the footsteps of Christopher Powell (2007, 2011) and stress the need to understand the reciprocal and dynamic relationship between individuals and various social structures. This enables us to grasp a better understanding of genos and thus what genocides destroy in specific. I conclude my article with a discussion of culpability and intent and demonstrate how relational sociology can aid us in bringing criminals to justice.

Gaza: An Ongoing Refugee Crisis

This section provides a historical overview of the refugee crisis in Gaza, bolstered with some snippets from the history of my family. My Hamula (extended family) is among thousands of families who were forced out of their homes in 1948, making their way to Gaza. Today, more than 70% of Gaza’s population identify as refugees as a result of the 1948 Nakba or catastrophe (UNRWA, 2023). My Hamula (Nijim or Al-Shatir) hails from a village called Qatra, located in the district of Ramleh. On 13 May 1948, the leaders of the Gedera Jewish settlement located near Qatra came to see Qatra’s notable Hasan Arafat and informed him that the Haganah gangs would attack the village. Those Jewish leaders advised Arafat not to fight so that they could stay in Qatra. After deliberations with Hamulas heads, Arafat decided not to resist given the crimes committed by the Haganah in other villages. However, an armed group that had been formed during the 1936 great revolution did not conform to the notable orders and decided to resist the Haganah attack on the village. This group consisted of 20 men who clashed with the invading troops. Due to the military superiority of Zionists, these clashes did not last long, and the village fell into Zionist hands. The head of the armed group Abdelhafidh Al-Qatrawi (2000: 72–73), a member of the oldest family in the village, along with other comrades, were killed as a result of the invasion. All village Hamulas and the 1404 residents were forced out of Qatra without being allowed to carry any possessions (Al-Qatrawi, 2000: 43). The village was later renamed ‘Kidron’ and turned into an agricultural moshav or settlement (Al-Qatrawi, 2000: 28–29). My grandfather’s Hamula, one of the chief landholders in Qatra, lost their lands that were mainly planted with citrus, grains, and olives (Al-Qatrawi, 2000: 33). The story of Qatra reflects the broader plight experienced by 531 Palestinian villages that were obliterated in 1948, leading to the dispossession of 750,000 Palestinians (Abu Sitta, 2007; Khalidi, 1992). My Hamula has held the ‘refugee’ status ever since.

The 1948 Nakba led to significant geographical changes across historic Palestine. Zionist colonization of vast lands led to the displacement of Palestinians into confined areas such as Gaza and the West Bank. Thus, the Gaza Strip of today is a colonial design; it did not exist with the clear geographical demarcations of today. Prior to 1948 and historically, Gaza was part of larger districts in Southern Palestine such as the Gaza District and the Ramleh District (Roy, 2016: 13–16). The Gaza Strip became a distinct geographical unit after the Zionist colonization of the surrounding cities and towns and the displacement of its inhabitants into the Gaza area. Israel then prohibited Palestinians’ return to their homes, especially after the enactment of laws such as the Absentees’ Property Law of 1950 and the Prevention of Infiltration Law of 1954 (Filiu, 2014: 79–82; Pappé, 2015: 221). The first law rendered all properties of displaced Palestinians as ‘absentee property’ and transferred it to Israeli trusteeship. Hence, even if some Palestinians succeeded in returning to their villages, this law would prevent them from reclaiming their properties. Jewish settlers moved into homes that were fully furnished including kitchen items, mattresses, and Tabun ovens. They also took over shops, cattle, and cultivated lands that were ready for harvest (Ryan, 1974). Many Palestinians who attempted to return sought to go back so that they could at least harvest their crops. The second law defined Palestinians who attempted to return as ‘infiltrators’ and imposed severe penalties on them including imprisonment and deportation. Israel used military force to enforce these laws. From Gaza alone, Israel killed annually more than 500 Palestinians who tried to return to their homes in the years following the Nakba (Roy, 2016: 68–69). Thus, the Gaza Strip grew into a warehouse of refugees, a status perpetuated by Israeli laws, military force, and an absence of a political trajectory for peace.

It is estimated that approximately 250,000 Palestinians were displaced into the Gaza Strip. The Nakba left devastating impacts on Palestinians who suddenly found themselves refugees out of their homes and lands (Roy, 2016: 13). My late grandfather and his generation lived with an enduring hope of return. Besides the socio-economic transformations, the significant refugee population defined the reality of Gaza for decades to come. Native Gazans were severely affected because of the Nakba and the influx of refugees. The refugee population was considerable compared to the native Gaza population which amounted to 60,000 before 1948. The local population lost access to vast plots of productive lands, their commercial links with surrounding localities were cut off, and their resources were constrained because they had to share them with refugees (Roy, 2016: 75). The locals could not provide much support to refugees, but they allowed them to set up dwellings in their lands. Most refugees, having fled their homes without any possessions, became largely dependent on the relief assistance provided by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) established in 1949 in response to the refugee crisis (Bocco, 2009). My grandfather recalls that his family initially settled down in Jabalia, which quickly became Gaza’s largest refugee camp and relied primarily on the provisions of UNRWA. The UNRWA’s mandate in Palestine is contingent upon the settlement of the refugee crisis. Once this plight is resolved, the UNRWA mandate will come to an end, which partly explains the vehement attacks by Israel and its allies on UNRWA amid the ongoing genocide (Hamdan, 2024). In other words, the existence of UNRWA implies the existence of the Palestinians and their connection to the stolen lands.

Palestinians were resentful of the new colonial arrangement that resulted in their displacement. They hoped that international community organizations such as the United Nations would resolve their plight. When that turned out to be elusive, they formed their own guerilla groups to undo Zionist injustice. Palestinian attacks intensified under the Egyptian administration in Gaza, especially after Israel’s hostile attitude manifested in its attack on Egypt alongside Britain and France in 1956 (Khalidi, 2021: 89–91). Palestinians established their own unions, associations, and some political bodies such as the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and Fateh who called for armed struggle against the new colonial state (Roy, 2016: 65–103). It should be noted that Arab nations in the region shared the same sentiments toward this colonial state implanted by Britain and they supported Palestinians in their pursuit for liberation. This reality rendered Israel a pariah state in a predominantly Arab region. In 1967, Israel attacked Egypt, Jordan, and Syria, occupying further Arab lands including Gaza and the West Bank. The occupied territories were subjected to a military regime with governors having unlimited power over the population thanks to the emergency regulations that Israel inherited from Britain (Khalidi, 2021: 198; Pappé, 2017: 19–20). Economically, Israel took advantage of the resources of the occupied territories and their human capital. Israel built additional settlements in the occupied territories and employed Palestinians in the Israeli market which was expanding due to colonization (Ryan, 1974). The defeat in the 1967 war had a considerably negative affect on Arabs in the region including the regimes who grew more indignant as a result of Israel’s blitzkrieg. Consequently, these regimes started to openly express their support for different formations of Palestinian resistance groups which declared an armed struggle against Israel and demanded the return of the occupied lands to the Egyptian administration. Gazans, especially Yassir Arafat, developed a great relationship with Egypt and its leader Gamal Abdel Nasser who was calling for pan-Arabism. This relationship was shaken when Egypt’s Anwar Sadat signed the Camp David agreement with Israel, trading Gaza for the return of Sinai. As a result, Palestinians had nobody to trust except Fateh who dominated the PLO and who represented the line of armed resistance against Israel (Khalidi, 2021: 132–134). The years following the 1967 war were characterized by economic exploitation, poverty, brutal suppression, and political uncertainty, leading to the outbreak of the First Intifada in 1987 (Roy, 2016: 117–161). The Intifada was sparked in the Jabalia refugee camp, an indication that refugees, the right of return, and land were at the core of Palestinians’ struggle. As I am writing, Jabalia is being subjected to a violent campaign of bombardments accompanied by the second ground invasion during this ongoing genocide, leading to widespread displacement and profound fear and certainty among families who are perplexed about where to go. The Intifada was so fierce to the extent that Israel succumbed for the first time to a diplomatic trajectory of negotiations embodied in Madrid and Oslo efforts. Palestinians placed high hopes on Arafat and PLO leadership and were confident they would strike a favorable deal that would end their misery and lay the foundations for Palestinian statehood. Throughout the struggle, Palestinians have never abandoned the path of resistance but gave way to diplomacy to reach a settlement. The Oslo process failed mainly because Israel shirked its obligations and instead used the peace process to further its domination and fragmentation of the Palestinian territories. The PA, however, turned into a security subcontractor for Israel, facilitating its operations in the West Bank and crushing resistance groups (Pappé, 2006: 228–240). Israel’s economic cooperation with the PA as well as the international aid largely contingent upon the PA’s continued commitment to Oslo obligations, which primarily involves maintaining Israel’s security and expansion (Dana, 2021). The PA was given a nominal sovereignty that has eroded with the continuous loss of land. Thus far, Israel has colonized more than 70% of the total lands of the West Bank and built settlements where more than 700,000 settlers are residing. Those settlers systematically attack Palestinians in their homes and farms, rendering their resilience or Somoud in the land more difficult. The PA often assumes the role of a spectator when Palestinians are attacked either by settlers or Israeli forces. This apparatus has no power to force Israel to stop its bloodbath in Gaza. Thanks to Oslo, the West Bank is today divided into hundreds of cantons separated by segregation walls, checkpoints, and roadblocks, weakening social solidarity among different Palestinian communities. The neglect of key issues such as an independent Palestinian state, borders, the status of Jerusalem, and the return of refugees compounded the misery of Palestinians and left them in a state of uncertainty. Fateh’s popularity started to dwindle due to the failure of Oslo and collaboration with Israel. Through Oslo, Israel managed to contain Fateh and the Fidayeen, or freedom fighters and integrated them with an apparatus that today serves its colonial interest. Put differently, Oslo institutionalized occupation (Said, 1996: 140–147).

The failure of Oslo led to the outbreak of the Second Intifada in 2000. The uprising was sparked after the desecration of the Al-Aqsa Mosque by Ariel Sharon, a visit authorized by Ehud Barak, the Israeli Prime Minister. While Arafat was serious in his efforts to reach a final settlement with the Israelis, the latter have been elusive and never shown serious willingness for peace (Filiu, 2014: 253–256). During this uprising, Israel employed excessive violence to quell protests and used F-16 fighters and helicopters to conduct bombings and targeted assassinations of national leaders. Hamas and Islamic Jihad took an active role in this revolt and recruited suicide bombings as a new tactic, an indication of the state of despair and frustration that overwhelmed Palestinians. During the Intifada, Arafat was poisoned and ironically replaced by Mahmoud Abbas, the mastermind of the Oslo Accords. The uprising was contained in 2005 by efforts from the United States as well as enhanced security cooperation between Abbas’ PA and Israeli military (Pappé, 2006: 275–280).

The United States encouraged the PA to initiate reforms within its structure due to increasing allegations of corruption. The PA held parliament elections in 2006; however, the results were not satisfactory for Israel and the Western bloc (Chomsky and Pappé, 2015: 183). Palestinians having lost their faith in Fateh, who largely integrated its members into the PA apparatus, cast their votes for Hamas, punishing Fateh for the renunciation of the path of resistance and their failure to produce a final settlement in Oslo. Hamas’ government was not able to persist due to the Israeli and Western boycott of these elections and their designation of Hamas as a terrorist organization. Under international law, Israel and other Western countries should not interfere in Palestinian elections as that would violate the principle of non-interference in the domestic affairs of a sovereign nation. This situation can be compared to Palestinians declaring the elections of a far-right Israeli government as unsatisfactory. It is inappropriate for external powers to influence or question the legitimacy of a nation’s election process. This political crisis, fomented mainly by Israel and the West, resulted in a military battle between Hamas and Fateh and ended in Hamas’ full control of Gaza in 2007. Subsequently, Israel arrested most of the Hamas ministers in the West Bank, and declared Gaza a hostile entity and introduced a stringent siege on Gaza (Chomsky and Pappé, 2015: 183–184). In short, Israel and its Western allies punished Palestinians for their democratic choice, causing a national divide between Gaza and the West Bank that persists to this day. The siege rendered more than two million Palestinians imprisoned in a tiny strip of land. The siege and other suffocating policies took place after the dismantling of Israeli settlements and the redeployment of Israeli troops to the borders of Gaza in 2005.

The redeployment of troops outside of Gaza allowed Israel to deploy more violent strategies. Since 2007, Israel launched numerous wars against the coastal enclave, resulting in the murder of thousands of Palestinians and further destruction of life in Gaza. These wars were notably more intense and violent compared to invasions preceding 2005; the death toll and the scale of destruction were substantially higher and more extensive. This was an indication, coupled with the so-called disengagement in 2005, that Israel is now following a more destructive approach toward Gaza and its predominantly refugee population. The siege as well as the Israeli strangulation policies resulted in the destruction of the already fragile Gaza economy. This reality led to further poverty and unemployment, especially among the younger generation and recent graduates (Nijim, 2022). More than half of the population continues to rely on aid provided by various non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and relief agencies such as UNRWA, indicating that little has changed since 1949 when UNRWA was established. Israel’s policies of economic strangulation, compounded by the ongoing siege, have contributed to the destruction of key sectors in Gaza such as agriculture, construction, and services. Agriculture, for instance, has been severely affected due to the chronic shortage of water. This sector has endured great losses also due to the ongoing restrictions that Israel places on essential products such as fertilizers and pesticides. Similarly, construction activities are largely impeded due to Israel’s stringent control over the entry of construction materials. Thousands of people who have lost their homes during Israel’s wars remain without adequate shelter. Gaza’s economy is fully controlled by Israel, which maintains a tight blockade and determines what goods are permitted to enter or exit the Strip (UN, 2017). In terms of the employment distribution in Gaza, the three principal employers are the Hamas-run government, the PA, and the UNRWA. UNRWA employs approximately 13,000 Palestinians in Gaza. Due to financial constraints, the agency is not hiring new permanent staff and instead offers temporary contracts (UNRWA, 2024). The PA, with approximately 41,000 personnel in Gaza, also faces severe financial constraints and has ceased new employment in Gaza since the battle with Hamas in 2007. Thousands of PA employees have had their salaries cut following the clashes with Hamas, and a great majority receives partial salaries due to the financial crisis (International Labor Organization, 2024). Similarly, the Hamas-run government has about 50,000 personnel who also receive partial payments due to the financial difficulties and the Western boycott of its government. People who work in other sectors such as agriculture, construction, or services receive minimum wages that range between US$3 and US$6 a day. The dire situation precipitated emigration within a broad spectrum of Palestinians in Gaza including recent graduates, professionals, and experts. Many families in Gaza now primarily rely on remittances from their relatives who have relocated to other countries for their survival (Nijim, 2022). The economic downturn combined with Israel’s occupation of Gaza, the absence of a vivid trajectory for peace, the refusal to grant Palestinians statehood, the normalization of relations with Arab countries, and the negligence of Palestinians and their plight are all factors that must be considered when scholars examine the case of resistance in Gaza. In sum, it is important to note that Palestinians have tried both violence and non-violence to resolve their plight, but neither strategy has worked with Israel. The last non-violent method attempted was the Great March of Return, which involved a series of mass protests that started in March 2018 along the Gaza–Israel border. Protesters’ demands included the right to return to their ancestral lands and an end to the Israeli blockade of Gaza. These protests which were largely peaceful occurred every Friday and continued for over a year with considerable turnout by all spectrums of Palestinian society in Gaza. The Israeli military often met the protesters with live ammunition, rubber bullets, and tear gas. Over 30,000 Palestinians were either killed or injured as a result of these protests, with a significant number of amputees (Jones, 2023). In other words, Palestinians have paid a heavy price either way and Israel constantly made clear that it is not interested in peace.

Israel’s Genocidal Approach

In 2022, I argued that Israeli strangulation policies, especially those enacted after the introduction of the siege in 2007, amount to slow-motion genocide and risk the destruction of the Palestinian society in Gaza in part or whole. My argument was backed by human rights reports and calls by many scholars warning of the catastrophic nature of the reality in Gaza such as Ilan Pappé, Richard Falk, and Steve Lendman, among others. In addition, my study was bolstered by firsthand testimonies provided by Palestinians who lived in Gaza. Numerous human rights organizations, lawyers, and scholars have underscored the enormity of the human tragedy in Gaza and warned that the situation will further worsen if no international intervention is made (Nijim, 2022). These calls and warnings fell on deaf ears as the world assumed the role of a spectator while Israel persisted in creating life-endangering conditions of utmost cruelty in Gaza. The international community has virtually done nothing to deter Israel and force it to undo its occupation of the Palestinian territories that goes back to 1967. No measures were taken to dismantle illegal settlements that continue to expand in the West Bank, and nothing was done to lift the decades-long siege on Gaza. On the contrary, Israel increased its punitive measures against Gaza with the support of the world’s leading democracies. Even Arab regimes such as Jordan, Egypt, and the PA have assumed passive roles, allowing Israel to further its colonization and control. This passivity has turned into active economic collaboration with Israel’s genocidal regime in an attempt to break the Houthi-imposed siege on Israeli naval trade that aims to pressure Israel into ending the ongoing genocide in Gaza. The inaction of Arab regimes coupled with unconditional Western support resulted in a horrendous Israeli genocide that is unfolding in Gaza for the ninth month. This genocide is a culmination of decades of Western support that has emboldened Israel to cross all the redlines and commit one of the most atrocious human tragedies in our contemporary times. Therefore, Arab regimes, Western powers, and the international community bear responsibility for their failure to deter Israel and force it to end its occupation of the Palestinian territories and recognize Palestinians’ rights to self-determination.

Israel’s actions in the past years are indicative of its attempt to complete its colonial project in Palestine, which requires the colonization of the remaining Palestinian territories and the dispossession of the population. Israel has successfully colonized a considerable portion of the West Bank, amounting to 70% of the land in which it placed 700,000 settlers. This perhaps would not have been possible without the fragmentation of the West Bank, which was part of the Oslo Accords (Said, 1996: 140–147). This colonial arrangement combined with intimate security cooperation with the PA-facilitated Israeli annexation of large parts of the West Bank (Chomsky and Pappé, 2015: 36). This cooperation manifests in crushing any form of resistance and suppressing attempts at protest. Therefore, the mass expulsion of Palestinians coupled with transfer policies are advancing smoothly. It is a matter of time before Israel declares the full annexation of the West Bank and the transfer of its population most likely to Jordan. However, Gaza has constituted an insoluble dilemma for the Zionist project, largely due to the absence of a viable strategy (Pappé, 2010: 201–207). Following the 1967 occupation, Israel constructed several settlements in an attempt to gradually annex Gaza, but this tactic ultimately failed as Israel found itself forced to dismantle these settlements in 2005. The Israeli strategy shifted from colonial expansion to stifling and imprisonment, placing Gaza under a strict siege in 2007. It should be noted that the notion of ‘Gaza prison’ has existed almost since 1948 when Gaza became a warehouse of refugees who had been forced out of their homes in historic Palestine (Pappé, 2017). Living conditions improved relatively under the Egyptian administration but worsened in 1967 under Israel’s military administration. Israel separated Gaza from its Arab neighbors and severed connections with them. The siege imposed in 2007 did not yield the desired results embodied in the removal of Hamas from power and forcing the population to leave their land. These punitive measures backfired, leading to increasing discontent among Gazans and the rise of armed resistance popularity. Despite the siege, resistance factions in Gaza improved their tactics and locally made weapons over time. Israel, in turn, escalated its aggression, shifting to a combination of blockade and wide-scale assaults by employing excessive military power. This resulted in what I describe as a ‘slow-motion’ genocide (Nijim, 2022). While Israel claims to be waging wars against resistance groups throughout this period, the civilian population endured the bulk of the losses—a pattern that is being replicated in the current genocide. Israel has gradually lessened the distinction between military and civilian targets, asserting its intent to destroy the entirety of the Gazan society. It should be noted that these strategies forced thousands of Palestinians to seek emigration out of Gaza, but the majority of Palestinians are still residing in Gaza. Following the 7th October events, Israel shifted its strategy from a slow-motion genocide to an accelerated form, destroying everything in its way. The current genocide is characterized by lunatic bombardments and the use of unprecedented military power in the most densely populated area in the world. Although the majority of Palestinians have been internally displaced several times and thousands have fled to Egypt, all plans of mass expulsion and transfer have so far failed.

Although it could be the case that Hamas and other resistance groups have provoked Israel’s genocidal backlash (Shaw, 2024), it should be noted that the Palestinian resistance movement was born upon the Zionist colonization of Palestine and the systematic use of violence against Palestinians. The settler-colonial history provided above cannot be overlooked. Early statements by Holocaust and Genocide scholars partly disregarded the fact that 7th October was not the starting point and quickly adopted the Israeli narrative. Their hasty statement did not mention anything about Israel’s use of the Hannibal directive on 7th October which enabled its military to kill scores of Israelis by friendly fire (Grabowski et al., 2023; Kubovich, 2024). These scholars claimed that the Palestinian resistance killed hundreds of Israeli civilians and burned down towns and kibbutzim without evidence or transparent and complete investigations. While killing civilians is tragic and untenable, Palestinian resistance should be situated in a larger context of settler colonialism and viewed as a response to decades-long Israeli oppression and the latter’s insatiable desire for more land. Haidar Eid (2023), a Gazan academic who has been a witness to the many episodes of Israeli oppression toward Palestinians in Gaza, described 7th October as a ‘Warsaw Uprising moment’. Yet attempts to crush the walls of the concentration camp have been met with a crushing genocidal power by the Zionist regime. Patrick Wolfe (2006) warned that people who live under settler-colonial regimes should be closely observed to minimize the likelihood of genocide and Palestinians are a case in point. Similar conclusions were drawn by Ilan Pappé (2010: 204) who warned of the possibility of a more genocidal inclination in Israel’s approach, particularly if Palestinians in Gaza persist and escalate their resistance against occupation. What Pappé and Wolfe have feared is happening now in Gaza: an apocalyptic genocide materializing live on various media outlets.

Palestinian Identity: Land, Resistance, and Yearning for Return

One of the principal critiques that can be directed at the genocide scholarship that studies Palestine is their disregard of the Palestinian identity. These works do not touch on what binds Palestinians together as a group and why they are purposely targeted. The focus is often on the materialization of genocide and its various aspects, not on the intricacies of the Palestinian identity and how it took shape over time. The UNGC identifies certain groups that could be targeted by genocide, it is our task as scholars to elaborate on the identity of the target group. Some factors that bind groups together include religion, language, ethnicity, land, clan, and nationalism. I do not intend to discuss all these elements, but I want to explore the connection to the land or what I call ‘village affiliation’ because I believe it is an intrinsic element in the Palestinian identity. I examine the role of the village in enhancing the Palestinian identity and the relationship between Palestinians and their land. I argue that Palestinians as an entity have historically formed a robust identity grounded in the connection to the land and the longing for return after expulsion in 1948. The strength or the crystallization of the village affiliation has varied over time depending on the historical and political circumstances in Palestine. The Palestinian identity became more accentuated during times of adversity, especially when their presence on the land was threatened. The focus on the land or village affiliation does not imply that urban centers did not exist in Palestine; however, before the 1900s the majority of Palestinians identified as rural (Davis, 2021: 25; Sayigh, 2008: xxiv).

Given the prevalence of agriculture in Palestine, peasants had been the dominant group in society for a long time. The land has historically been the primary means for their survival, either through cultivation or livestock farming. While in Qatra, my Hamula relied primarily on the cultivation of land, mainly olive, citrus, grapes, figs, watermelon, and legumes (Al-Qatrawi, 2000: 14, 33). A century later, members of my Hamula still identify with Qatra as if they had never been expelled. During the Ottoman era, the Miri system of cultivation was the predominant form of landholding. Under this arrangement, the state retained the ownership of the land while granting Hamulas and communities the right to usufruct. In return, peasants paid a 10% tax on their produce. The change to land arrangements took effect in the late Ottoman era, especially when capitalism was slowly penetrating (Sayigh, 2008: 27; Shafir, 1989: 18–20). In the second half of the 18th century, the Ottoman administration enacted two key laws aiming at integrating Palestine into the growing capitalist economy. These legislations, the 1858 Land Law and the 1876 Land Code, introduced land registration fees and increased farmer taxes. Most importantly, they allowed the private sale of the land (Abdo, 1984; Khalidi, 2009; Shafir, 1989: 32). These laws slowly fragmented the miri system, leading to the dispossession of peasants and their communities from the land to which they had long-standing traditional rights as cultivators. The laws also redefined the relationship with the land, rendering it more commercial and exploitative. The privatization led to bulk purchases of land by urban merchants (mostly from urban cities such as Beirut, Damascus, Haifa, and Yaffa), foreign diplomats, and Turkish government officials, mostly for business and profit purposes (Khalidi, 2009: 95–99). The introduction of capitalism was accompanied by improvements in roads and transportation infrastructure, which led to the thriving of commercial activities (Tamari, 2008: 9). The economic growth was a key motivation that led large merchants to invest and buy land in Palestine. These merchants, however, lived apart from the land and often hired Palestinian peasants to cultivate it. They were referred to as ‘absentee landlords’. Besides the economic growth, Zionism’s insatiable desire to buy land increased the demand for land in Palestine, boosting its value. The sale of land to Arab investors caused no issues because they would retain the employment of Arab peasants in the land. Issues would emerge mainly when the absentee landlords sell the land to Jewish agencies such as the Jewish Colonial Association (JCA). The latter was funded by Jewish philanthropists such as Baron Edmond de Rothschild who invested in plantation systems in the late 1900s (Shafir, 1989: 10–11). One notorious and oft-cited example of Arab sellers is the Sursuq family of Beirut. In 1872, the family purchased some 230,000 dunums in Marj Ibn Amir, one of the most fertile lands in Palestine from the Ottoman administration. The family hired Palestinian peasants who cultivated the lands for decades, and in 1910, they decided to sell the land to Keren Kayemeth Leisrael or the Jewish National Fund (JNF; Khalidi, 2009: 107; Shafir, 1989: 205).

The Ottoman capitalist measures stripped peasants of their primary means of production, rendering many of them landless. Even tenant farmers who were initially retained by some Jewish investors were slowly forced out of the land (Sayigh, 2008: 36–40). The gradual transfer of land, particularly after the 1900s, to foreign investors engendered resentment within the peasant communities, who besides the loss of land, are now losing their jobs. Jewish agencies such as the JCA and JNF embarked on replacing Arabs with Jewish workers, especially with the inception of the second Aliya, which was more radical compared to the first wave of immigrants (Khalidi, 2009: 94). Although many of the peasants were illiterate and unconscious of early Zionist colonial plans in Palestine, they were aware of the removal of traditional Arab cultivators happening in their localities. Forced evictions sparked peasants’ resistance because they realized that Jews were making transferred lands inalienable properties for Jewish people, banning the sale or lease to Arabs. Some of the early purchases that sparked resistance include Petah Tiqva in 1886, Tiberia region in 1901–1094, and al-Fula in 1910–1911 (Khalidi, 2009: 99). In Petah Tiqva, Arab peasants attacked Jewish settlers, killing one and wounding many others. The incident was triggered by the transfer of some land from the Yahudiyya Arab village to the colony of Petah Tiqva by some moneylenders and local Ottoman authorities. Such confrontations were frequent between Arab cultivators and the new Jewish settlers including the Gedera settlement, located close to my grandfather’s village Qatra. Another noteworthy instance is the al-Fula village, which was part of the fertile land of Marj Ibn Amir sold to the JNF in 1910 by the Sursuq family and their partners (Khalidi, 2009: 95–98; Shafir, 1989: 139). Peasants displayed fierce resistance because they slowly started to learn about Zionism’s colonial intent. The growing awareness of peasants about Zionism’s real intent can be attributed to the critical role played by newspapers, particularly after the 1908 revolution. Newspapers including al-Karmil, Falastin, al-Muqtabas, and al-Ahram became so vocal, educating the public about Zionist colonial activities and land purchases across the country (Khalidi, 2009: 123). Thus, one can argue that the majority of Palestinians relied on the land as a main source of survival, and the threats to drive them out of the land were met with fierce resistance, especially when they became cognizant of Zionist colonial intentions.

The confrontations with Zionism took a more serious turn under the British who chose their side from the very beginning by granting the former the right to establish a homeland in Palestine through the Balfour Declaration of 1917. The announcement constituted a declaration of war on the peasants who made up 80% of the Palestinian society in the late 1900s, making them the most vulnerable (Sayigh, 2008: 40). Unlike the Ottoman administration, the British were more repressive and established a rigorous taxation system enforced by military actions. The British enacted further capitalist laws such as the 1921 Land Transfer Law and the 1924 Rural Property Tax law, favoring Jewish investors and weakening Palestinian peasants which resulted in steady loss of land to British authorities and Zionist agencies (Abdo, 1984). This situation precipitated a feeling of discontent among peasants, often translated into riots, uprisings, and rebellions against the British and Zionism. This included riots in 1921, an uprising in 1929, and most prominently, the Palestinian Rebellion of 1936–1939. The latter represented the apex of Palestinians’ outrage over the British and was described as the most important event between the two wars (Khalidi, 2021: 68).

The 1936 revolution commenced as a spontaneous grassroots strike that persisted for 6 months and quickly spread out to other Palestinian cities and villages (Norris, 2021: 121–140). The British tried to placate the Palestinians by establishing the Peel Commission which proposed a partition plan. The plan divided Palestine between the Jews and Arabs but denied the latter’s right of self-determination and suggested annexing Palestinians to Jordan (Sayigh, 2008: 70). It should be noted that most partition plans failed because they entailed the dispossession of a significant portion of Palestinians from their lands. For instance, my family who lived in Qatra along with many other villages in Ramleh were located in the land that the partition would allocate to the Jews. Jews were to be given the most fertile Palestinian lands that were cultivated and inhabited by Palestinian families who had deep historical roots in them (Al-Qatrawi, 2000: 74–78). The rebellion reached its peak in early 1938 as about 15,000 militants, most of whom were peasants, were mobilized. Britain had to recruit two additional military divisions from other colonies to repress the revolution. It also imposed strict measures including the lynching of anyone who held a gun or bullet, demolishing the houses of the revolutionaries or those who collaborated with them, ariel bombardments, and exiling leaders to hinterlands such as Seychelles. Consequently, the outcome was that 10% of all adult Palestinians were either killed, injured, imprisoned, or exiled (Khalidi, 2021: 70–71; Sayigh, 2008: 43). This is almost the same percentage of casualties who were either killed or injured as a result of Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza. Crushing the revolution was perhaps the greatest service that the British had done to Zionism at the time as it set the foundations of Zionist colonialism in Palestine. On one hand, the Palestinian resistance movement was extremely enfeebled and was fully disarmed. On the other hand, Zionism grew stronger because it took an active role alongside Britain in repressing the rebels. Britain supplied Zionists with various weapons who in turn recruited more militants. This reality paved the way for Zionist militias in the following years to deploy military methods to forcefully seize more land (Sayigh, 2008: 70–73). Zionism realized that violence was the only way to dispossess Palestinians from their land because it was able to size only 6% of the land by means of purchase. In 1948, one day after the withdrawal of the British, the Zionist militias declared the establishment of Israel. Armed to their teeth, Zionist militias attacked Palestinians, destroying 531 villages and forcing out inhabitants, most of whom became refugees scattered in different countries.

As I mentioned earlier, almost a quarter million were displaced into Gaza including my family. The expellees have become refugees scattered across many camps in Gaza. Gaza was first administered by Egypt and later colonized by Israel in 1967. Under both administrations, Palestinians adopted resistance against Israel, attempting to return to their homes. While Egypt tolerated Palestinian resistance within reason, Israel crushed all forms of resistance under its rule (Khalidi, 2021: 90). What binds Gazans together today is the loss of land in 1948, further displacement and occupation in 1967, shared destiny as refugees, and the insistence on the right of return. The persistence of resistance asserts that refugees have never accepted the camp as a permanent solution for their plight. The refugee camp is only a temporary stop before the return to the point of origin. While the camp was configured to be a warehouse of refugees, it has served as a space where Palestinians reproduce themselves and cherish their ambitions of liberation and return. The refugee camp in Gaza is the birthplace of Fateh, and later Hamas and Islamic Jihad, both of which are currently leading the political landscape in the enclave. The failure of Fateh and the PLO brought people around resistance, represented mainly by Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The endorsement of resistance in Gaza should not be seen as an exception as resistance has been the response to early Zionist attempts to colonize the land and drive the peasants out.

The landscape of the camp today systematically references places and symbols of Palestine such as the Palestinian flag, the keys of return, the dome of the rock, the peasant keffiyeh, the olive tree, and other national icons, all of which reimagine the village and revive the right of return (Ramadan, 2013). The camp brings together various components of the collective Palestinian memory to which Zionism has inflicted substantial damage since 1948. The village contours that had existed prior to the 1948 Nakba were replicated in the refugee camp where similar village arrangements were established. In Gaza today, almost every village congregation has its own Mukhtar or chief who serves as a custodian sustaining the village culture. The Mukhtar holds a high status with social power and engages in various activities within the community including weddings and funerals, and often acts as a mediator in family feuds (Wishah, 2006). He also maintains great relationships with other village communities through similar activities. The community of Qatra, residing mainly in al-Nuseirat refugee camp, has its own association where members organize activities that aim to maintain their connection with Qatra through folk sayings, songs, embroidery, and various discussions. Describing villagers’ relationship to the land, one refugee notes, ‘They love their land in a very significant way – they touch it, smell it, know it piece by piece, stone by stone’ (Sayigh, 2008: 10).

Therefore, the loss of land and refugeehood are two key elements that bind Palestinians together as a social group. The right of return is central to the Palestinians’ struggle and should not be overlooked in genocide research. Palestinians’ life in the refugee camp is marked by temporariness, hoping they will return to their homes one day. The right of return and the centrality of land were stressed in the document that Hamas released in January 2024, explaining why it conducted its military operation on 7th October (Hamas Media Office, 2024). Today and for more than 75 years, more than seven million Palestinians remain refugees living in the diaspora unable to return to their homes.

Relational Sociology: What Does Israel Kill/Destroy in Gaza?

The concept of genocide remains a subject of controversy among scholars, and it will perhaps continue to be so in the foreseeable future. In a previous article, I discussed some of the main critiques directed at the conception of genocide as well as the UNGC convention (Nijim, 2022). In this section, I build on the contributions of scholars such as Christopher Powell (2007) in an attempt to answer the question of this section: What does Israeli genocide kill? Drawing on Norbert Elias’ (2001) relational or figurational sociology, Powell adopts a relational perspective to get a deeper grasp of the phenomenon of genocide. Powell criticizes the common trend in genocide studies that look at the phenomenon from subjectivist (liberal) or objectivist (post-liberal) perspectives. He also criticizes Lemkin’s structural functionalism as well as his definition of the ‘geno’ in genocide which is restricted to specific groups such as race, tribe, and nation. While Lemkin asserts the importance of social and cultural aspects of genocide, his theoretical stance according to Powell remains baffling and his analysis remains insufficient. Powell (2007) delves into the basics of social theory to unpack the definition of the ‘geno’ and provide a relational analysis that transcends limiting terms like race, tribe, and nation. Some of these terms are new such as race and nations, and tribe is a contested and complex concept. All these conceptions are social constructs, some of which were recently imagined and materialized. As such, these markings of difference in social groupings can vary in different groups and across time (Hinton, 2002: 4). The classifications and categories provided by Lemkin, although universal in our contemporary time, are not the only categories of the organization of human communities. In Palestine, for instance, people historically identified themselves with their clans or Hamula. Although largely Arabs, the Palestinian community includes other ethnicities, all of whom placed a strong emphasis on their nationhood after the European invasion of their country.

Genocide is the crime of crimes because its horror and destructiveness transcend any other form of homicide. In genocide, people are targeted not in their individual capacity, but because of their identity or affiliation to a given group. Thus, genocides target something more than a sum of individuals, argues Powell (2007). In other words, genocides target individuals as part of meaningful social groups. This necessitates a comprehension of the relationship between individuals and their respective societies or social groups. I follow Powell and Elias in stressing the need for a relational or figurational understanding of this relationship. Elias criticizes subjectivist or Weberian and Durkheimian or objectivist sociology. According to Max Weber (2013: 4–26), social action is any human behavior to which individuals attach subjective meaning taking into account the behavior of others. Social action is meaningful, intentional behavior directed toward others and influenced by their presence or expected reactions. The social world is thus mind-dependent and an outcome of human consciousness (Giddens, 1973: 145–154). Durkheim, however, adopts an objectivist stance and argues that the social exists as a structural pattern that cannot be reduced to human subjectivity. He defines the ‘social’ through the concept of ‘social facts’ which are ways of acting, thinking, and feeling that exist apart from human influence but exert control over people. These facts include laws, norms, values, and customs that shape individual behavior and make up the collective consciousness, binding groups together and maintaining social stability (Durkheim, 1982). The social, for Durkheim, focuses on the collective and coercive character of social norms and institutions that influence individual actions. Elias instead advocates for a relational understanding that transcends what he calls egocentrism and does not place a particular emphasis on the individual or social institutions singularly. According to him, a reciprocal relationship exists between the individual and other social institutions; they do not transcend each other but actively interact with one another to produce dynamic social networks and relationships. Societies, social systems, and various institutions enhance and maintain meaningful networks of relationships among individuals. Similarly, social institutions become meaningful because individuals interact with one another within these spaces. Therefore, the relationship and influence are reciprocal and dynamic. For instance, a Hamula becomes a meaningful social unit because of the interdependence and interaction among many families and individuals bound to each other by blood. These families and individuals who belong to the clan are influenced by the common norms, traditions, and practices that the Hamula determines as a social institution. However, it should be noted that this influence is reciprocal between individual actions and institutional norms. Similarly, schools and universities become meaningful social institutions because of the interactions between students and teachers within the school structure that has its rules. Therefore, social institutions cannot be fully understood by the actions of individuals, nor can individuals be fully fathomed without considering the larger social institutions. Such structures, argues Elias, are dynamic, contrasting the views of Durkheim and Talcott Parsons, for instance, who viewed them as static or universal (Dunning and Hughes, 2013: 53–54). The dynamic aspect of these structures explains why the world has a significant number of cultures that evolve and decline over time. To stress the dynamic nature of social structure and to avoid conflation with previous theories, Powell (2011) employs the term figuration. Figurations can be defined as ‘processes made up of dynamic social networks of social relationships and constituted through the material practices of concrete human individuals’ (Powell, 2011: 79). These figurations are characterized by power balances of different sorts (Elias, 1984: 14). Hence, ‘geno’ must be understood as figurations that genocide tries to eliminate or forcefully transform. The destruction of social networks can simply take place by killing all group members, or by other means that would cause the disruption or collapse of these networks such as the target of cultural institutions, government buildings, and religious facilities, among others. This theoretical analysis clears out the ambiguity in Lemkin’s position and encompasses his understanding of genocide which can happen through mass killing or other means that would undermine the essential foundations of social groups.

Genocide therefore should be seen as the violent obliteration of various figurations within the target group. And since figuration is a process characterized by power balances of different sorts, genocide is a relational process between two groups in which one dominates and seeks the destruction of the other (Dunning and Hughes, 2013: 52; Powell, 2011: 41). In the context of Palestine, it is Israel who assumes a dominant position and seeks the obliteration of Palestinians through a colonial process that started a century ago. To that end, the dominant employs racism to construct the identity of the other and reinforces it systematically. The perpetrator essentializes the identity of the victim group through various discourse devices as well as the commission of genocide that disrupts in full or part social transformation (Feierstein, 2014: 4–5). Powell argues that while genocide works to produce difference, it simultaneously produces identity. In other words, genocide is a process that produces relations of what he calls ‘identity-difference’ (Powell, 2011: 82). The identity of the victim is stressed as Other during the course of genocide. Within a relation of genocide, the genocidaires perceive the victims as having some identity, but concurrently they use violence to erase and efface this identity (Powell, 2011: 84). Hence, when Israel targets Palestinians in Gaza, it does not target them in their individual capacity, but mainly because they identify as members of a Palestinian community who has deep roots in the land of historic Palestine. Besides the mass murder of thousands of Palestinians, Zionism seeks the erasure of the Palestinian-ness of the victim and their identity. As noted earlier, this identity is grounded in the land and the longing for return, which represents threats to the Zionist colonial enterprise. Besides the destruction of the figurational networks of the victim groups, genocide also removes the traces of these networks from the perpetrator’s experience of the world. Since 1948, Zionism has obliterated hundreds of Palestinian villages and denied their Hamulas the right of return. The Palestinian features of these villages were effaced and replaced with Jewish inhabitants and contours. Other villages such as Deir Yassin were razed and turned into pine forests and national parks. Now Israel is completing the job in Gaza and erasing the refugee camp that is sustaining the memory of the village and embodying the right of return.

Other scholars such as Daniel Feierstein describe genocide as a social practice that aims to destroy or reorganize a given society. Put differently, it is a violent mechanism for social engineering that forces upon the victim group a new set of relations that aligns with Powell’s understanding (Feierstein, 2014: 1–6). This is true in the case of Argentina, which is the context of Feierstein’s study. In settler-colonial contexts such as Palestine, the Palestinians are not perceived as part of the colonizer’s society, but as outsiders who should be purged off. Palestinians have persistently been portrayed as the Other including those living in Israel. Therefore, assimilation or integration has not been an option for Zionists, who are interested in the land, not its inhabitants. Social engineering in Palestine is based on the entire exclusion of Palestinians from the land. This is evident in the systematic destruction of these social networks and the confiscation of more land. The main purpose of the current genocide is similar to the 1948 Nakba: more dispossession. This has been clear in the statements of Israeli ministers and through the military actions on the ground (South Africa, 2023: 59–70). The territorial expansion remains at the core of Zionist ideology.

Based on this theoretical foundation, one can elaborate on the current genocide with concrete examples. As of 19 June 2024, the Lancet reported the death of about 40,000 Palestinians and over 90,000 injuries as a result of the ongoing Israel genocide (Khatib et al., 2024). It is important to note that the majority of the casualties are civilians according to the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor (2024a). The genocide machine has destroyed about half the buildings in Gaza, burying more than 10,000 in the rubble. This makes the deal toll about 50,000 Palestinians thus far. According to an analysis provided by the Lancet, these numbers should be multiplied by four to account for direct and indirect victims of such wars (Khatib et al., 2024). The real number of deaths could be 200,000 and it is expected to rise with the continuity of Israeli genocide. Adding the number of the injured, the total number of casualties would amount to more than 10% of the Gaza population, either killed or injured. A great number of families have reported the loss of more than 25 members. One instance is the Abu Eida family from Jabalia who lost more than 100 members in one airstrike (Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, 2024b). Al-Shawwa, one of Gaza’s oldest Hamulas, has lost hundreds of its members. The family tree of Al-Shawwa hails more than 16 grandparents, rendering it one of Gaza’s key clans that has lived in Gaza for over a 1000 years (Filiu, 2014: 31). These victims should be thought of as parents, children, teachers, mayors, doctors, actors, imams, professors, and active group members who occupy social roles in the Gazan society. The Hamula should be viewed as an intrinsic social unit or figuration that has maintained a certain cultural heritage for many generations. By wiping out an entire Hamula, you eliminate part of the collective Palestinian memory and heritage that would normally be passed down to future generations (Moses, 2010). Israel employed both mass killing and the erasure of essential foundations to inflict the utmost harm on Gazans as a social group.

Take religion for instance. Israel obliterated almost 700 mosques and three churches (Abdo, 2024). Besides their historical and cultural value, these places constituted key figurations within the Gaza community where members spent a great deal of time interacting with one another and maintaining social networks. Mosques are not mere buildings, but spiritual centers that maintain specific values, religious and national consciousness, and ethics through preaches and various social and learning activities. The mosque is a key social hub for Gazans of different age groups where people sign their marriage contracts and pray on the dead. It plays a key role in maintaining the social cohesion among Gazans and destroying it disrupts this dynamic process. Similarly, the destruction of healthcare facilities including the few imaging devices in the Strip, the deliberate murder of physicians and specialists, and the arrest of medical personnel including heads of hospitals, are all acts that aim at fully undermining the healthcare system, which represents a key figuration, especially for a society that lives under genocide (Abu Sittah, 2024). According to the Lancet, the destruction of the healthcare system in Gaza will become more evident once Israel ends its genocide. Thousands of people who are either injured or sick will likely die as a result of the near absence of medical services. The spread of diseases such as polio, hepatitis, meningitis, and respiratory problems indicates the biological aspect of this genocide. People who need urgent hospitalization such as cancer and dialysis patients end up dying. Pregnant women as well as newborn babies are at imminent risk because the first cannot have a normal delivery and the latter is not receiving vaccinations. Let alone the enormous and lifelong psychological scars the genocide has caused for the whole Gaza population. The medical crisis in Gaza is compounded by the continuous closure of the Rafah border by Israel, banning patients from seeking treatment abroad. By the same token, the obliteration of schools, universities, and colleges, all of which represent primary social networks with regular interactions among various actors including students, teachers, social workers, and principals, constitute the destruction of the education figuration, a crime often referred to as scholasticide (Abdo, 2024). Since the inception of this genocide, students from kindergarten to university level have not attended schools and they will not be able to in the foreseeable future due to the magnitude of destruction and the deliberate killing of professors, deans, university presidents, teachers, and students. Schools and universities are indispensable figurations that prepare future leaders, experts, and professionals to take the lead of a society and a nation. Simultaneously, they are places where cultural values, national principles, and ethics are taught and preserved. The total destruction of these figurations represents a profound loss for a nation. Similar conclusions can be drawn from the destruction of other figurations including government institutions including the legislative council, the court system, and police stations. These institutions are crucial to maintaining order and security as they are in charge of issuing laws and legislation, enforcing laws, and ensuring the wellbeing of the community. What we see today in the absence of these institutions is a state of anomie where law and order are nonexistent. The crime rates, particularly thefts have risen sharply, especially with the prevailing famine. It should be noted that Israel destroyed other life-supporting systems while destroying these figurations. This includes road infrastructure, communication, and food supplies. The disruption of the food system has caused an unprecedented famine in Gaza as access to food has become extremely difficult. Israel has systematically killed security officers in charge of aid distribution, an instance of that is the flour massacre (Whyte, 2024). This instance and others indicate that Israel is pushing for a state of chaos, disorder, and anomie in Gaza. This situation engendered harsh conditions of life that led to the collapse of social solidarities. In conversation with my family in Gaza, they report that people no longer look after one another because of the rarity of commodities and food. Before this genocide, people would share whatever food they had, but now people can barely find food for their children. Reports indicate that individuals stranded in the north have resorted to consuming animal fodder, grass, and rotten food found in garbage (Salih, 2014). Other institutions that were obliterated include the central archives building in Gaza City which houses thousands of historical documents, reports, and evidence. The archive building has served as a source of Gaza’s history, memory, and identity (Abdo, 2024). These figurations are what make up Gaza and its society, and the systematic and deliberate destruction of such figurations, especially during the current genocide, constitutes the peak of Gazacide. These institutions and their collective subjects are targeted because of their Palestinian identity.

Given that figuration is a process of change and transformation, it can be argued that the current genocide has halted this social transformation in various figurations across Gaza including education, healthcare, and religion. These institutions along with their key constituents no longer exist or function due to the ongoing genocide. The enormity of damage caused will become most evident once Israel ends its genocidal campaign in Gaza. It will become clear that not only rebuilding these figurations is not viable but also bringing new capacities including professors, medical specialists, community and religious leaders, nurses, teachers, clan chiefs, and mayors, will prove extremely difficult. These should be viewed as social, cultural, and scientific investments that took so many years to build. In addition, Palestinians have founded doubts that Israel will allow the recovery or construction of new figurations given Israel’s punitive conduct in past wars. Figurational sociology is critical in gaining a full understanding of genocide because it enables us to provide a holistic analysis that compasses subjects and objects and the dynamic interaction between them. It informs us that the functionality of figurations without social actors or the other way around is impossible. It enables us to ask questions such as ‘How would life be ever possible without these figurations?’ The sheer thought of what the post-genocide period and life would look like in Gaza is horrifying in itself. Israel’s genocide has destroyed Gaza’s life systems along with virtually all figurations or essential foundations, using Lemkin’s words. It is important to note that the disruption of social change in Gaza is not a new phenomenon as that can be easily noted in Israel’s siege on Gaza in 2007 as well as Israel’s military administration in 1967. The siege and military administration have both restricted the social interaction among members of the same group and minimized that with others abroad, such as neighboring Arab countries. For decades, Gazans have not been able to interact properly with other societies and nations beyond the borders of Gaza, allowing little to no social transformation. This restriction of social change by Israel can be described as a form of social engineering that Feierstein refers to. That is one reason why I referred to the situation in Gaza in general as a slow-motion genocide (Nijim, 2022), while the current one that started in October 2023 constitutes an accelerated and ever-brutal form of genocide.

Intent and Culpability

Based on the theoretical basis provided in the previous section, one can argue that genocide may happen with or without a clear intent. As we view the victim as a collectivity, the perpetrators in the context of Gaza should be seen as a collectivity because genocide is not committed by singular actors. The state-sponsored genocide in Gaza and the destruction of numerous figurations require a group of social actors who work in concert with different social facts. In international criminal law, trials of genocide have focused mainly on the specific intent of individuals involved in the full or partial destruction of the target group (Woolford, 2015: 20), which represents only one face of justice or a subjectivist understanding that overlooks relationality and the implication of other institutions and actors. Like genos, intention cannot be fully understood without a critical engagement of social theory. Figurational sociology is crucial because it transcends subjectivist and objectivist perspectives and rather stresses the dynamic and ongoing interactions between social actors and social facts, which in turn produces social transformation (Elias, 1984: 13–18). There are social actions that soldiers carry out with full consciousness/intention and others they do unconsciously because they interact with social facts or act as cogs in a bureaucratic machine that has laws, rules, and expectations. Take, for instance, the video that shows the Israeli soldier Eyal Meir Berkowitz detonating a residential building in Gaza and gifting it to his 2-year-old daughter on her birthday (Middle East Monitor, 2023). Another recent instance is a video of Israeli soldiers unleashing a military dog on an old Palestinian woman causing her severe injuries. Or the recurring shooting of Palestinians raising white flags while trying to cross to the north of Gaza through Al-Rashid Street. Or other videos showing how Israeli soldiers are hunting Palestinian civilians with their drones, fragmenting their bodies into pieces. These are instances that show subjectivist instances of genocide but also crimes that are committed by collective actors who represent a killing machine.

The bureaucratic machine can coerce soldiers to take actions that may go against their will. Soldiers usually receive orders from commanders who report to their superiors including state officials and ministers. The importance of figurational sociology is that it provides theoretical tools to account for crimes committed by individuals however and others that soldiers commit in interaction with social facts such as the army. It considers crimes committed with a clear intention and others that happen without an intent. The latter type often happens because soldiers act as a collective actor or part of a larger machine that makes them unconscious of their actions or the magnitude of crimes committed. Eichmann was partly right when he replied that he only carried out orders passed down to him during the Holocaust (Arendt, 2006). He was a cog in the machine, but by implication, he agreed to suppress his will that might conform with or differ from the Nazi program. In the case of Israel, the perpetrator should be thought of as a collective actor starting from Israel’s prime minister who is waging a genocidal war to low-rank soldiers who are actualizing it. Based on Bauman’s (1989) analysis of the Holocaust, culpability encompasses the whole bureaucratic Israeli system that is implicated in the mass killing and destruction of Palestinians either directly or indirectly. This includes different levels of Israeli governments who constantly issue political statements inciting more violence against Palestinians and justifying the enormous destruction and mass killing in Gaza. Soldiers who also committed individual crimes and bragged about that on social media should be held accountable. Other actors who are involved indirectly include Israeli companies and organizations that provide the military with the latest technology and munitions required to proceed with genocide. Take for instance universities and research centers in Israel and around the world, cooperating with the Israeli army to produce top-notch drones or bombs that are actively used now to inflict destruction upon Palestinians. The culpability extends to countries such as Germany, the United States, India, and other European countries that continue to supply Israel with its military needs to destroy Gaza. Israel’s ability to proceed with this genocide is contingent upon the continuity of this support, which makes these countries complicit.

The intent should also be explained in relation to the grand settler-colonial Zionist ideology which pushes for the complete elimination of Palestinians from the land. To achieve that Israeli society has been subject to a great deal of indoctrination since the establishment of Israel in 1948. Elie Podeh, who studied the subject of history in Israeli school books from 1948 to 2000, argues that the historical narrative toward Palestinians, especially during the first decades following the Nakba, was replete with bias, errors, prejudice, omissions, and misrepresentations. Although these images in school curricula changed especially in the 1980s and 1990s, the portrait of the Palestinian remains largely negative and not derived from a critical engagement with the past or history in general (Podeh, 2000). School books in Israel, according to Nurit Peled, do not serve as agents of history but as agents for a collective memory for Jews. Elements taught as part of the collective memory are often unquestionable and are taken for granted, contrary to the discipline of history which must engage in critical inquiry. These books go through constant change to serve the various colonial objectives of different Israeli governments. Peled who studied numerous Israeli school books found some shared assumptions regarding Palestinian Arabs in these books. First, these books emphasize Jewish historical rights to the land of Israel. Second, Arabs are constantly portrayed as hateful people who pose a threat to Jews and Israel. Third, books inform Jewish students that Arabs have 21 countries and that Jews have one only. Fourth, Palestinians represent a demographic problem that can turn into an imminent threat to Jewish existence. Fifth, Palestinians being a threat must be controlled or otherwise they will slaughter the Jews (Nurit, 20–21). These are the common themes that researchers found in the books she studied in Israeli school curricula. These assumptions align with the colonial objectives of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and serve as a pretext for any actions or assaults against Palestinians. Peled notes that the word ‘Palestinian’, when rarely mentioned in these books, is frequently associated with terrorism and other negative connotations. Even Palestinian citizens of Israel are referred to as Israel’s Arabs, or the fifth column that shall not be trusted. These books portray the hatred of Arabs as central to the Jewish identity. Key events such as the Intifada are either omitted or discussed fleetingly in school books. Issues such as the segregation wall, checkpoints, military rule, and daily Israeli invasions of Palestinian areas are not given any attention. The misery in Gaza and the West Bank is the sole responsibility of incorrigible murderous Palestinians. Palestinians are compared to Nazis or devils and Arafat is compared to Hitler (Peled, 69). Given the history of the Holocaust, the impact of these Nazi fashionings upon Jewish students is massive. The connection with the Holocaust was also made after 7th October when Israeli officials made analogies with the Holocaust (Samudzi, 2024). Israeli officials constantly repeat that this event is the worst that happened to the Jewish people since the Holocaust. Although, it should be noted that what Hamas did on 7th October is no different from what Israel has done to the Palestinians for decades. The only difference is that Palestinians are the victims and the owners of the land, and Israel is the aggressor and usurper of land. The image of the Palestinian following 7th October as a terrorist has been enormously bolstered in the Israel discourse, militants and civilians alike, are portrayed as absolute evil. These dehumanizing portraits reflect upon the genocidal conduct of the soldiers in Gaza.

While it is true that for the most part soldiers are cogs in the machine, in Israel taking out Palestinian lives is a doctrine that Israeli settlers are often praised for. The manifestations of this ideology are evident in Gaza and the West Bank where soldiers and settlers boast about inflicting harm upon Palestinians. This colonial ideology engendered a great deal of harmony between the far-right government in Israel which has called for the obliteration of Gaza or the Amaleks and the actions of Israeli soldiers who do not think twice about wiping out Palestinians. Israeli soldiers involved in genocide have proudly captured moments of torture, killing, and humiliating Palestinians and detonating their houses or burning them. Soldiers often post these videos on social media platforms, knowing that there will be zero consequences or accountability from their government. This includes footage of an Israeli soldier raping a Palestinian from Gaza in the Sde Tieman detention camp in the Negev. While the soldier was stopped, Israelis gathered around his detention center, demanding his immediate release. The soldier was celebrated widely in Israel and many channels held interviews with him (Valdez, 2024). The normalization of such actions in Israel raises serious questions about the broader social acceptance and subscription to genocide. These are only some instances and videos that were leaked. Such actions suggest the line between civilians and militants has become blurry and that soldiers target Palestinians, not in their individual capacity, but as a collectivity. Intent in the context of Palestine, therefore, should be further studied from this perspective. It should be seen as a wider historical discourse that continues to reconfigure itself through different narratives inciting the dispossession and obliteration of everything identifies as Palestinian.

Conclusion

This study sought to situate genocide in Gaza in a larger historical framework of settler colonialism. This is critical to counter narratives and discourses that attempt to reduce the century-long struggle to the events of 7th October. I argued that Gaza was socially engineered and designed by Israel following the 1948 Nakba. Zionist terror groups pushed hundreds of thousands into the Gaza Strip, rendering the latter a refugee containment site. This was an issue for Israel because these refugees were sharing the border with the new colonial state. Israel employed different plans in Gaza and the West Bank to finish the business that had not been completed in 1948. To that end, Israel committed a slow-motion genocide in Gaza, at least until 7th October 2023. This approach failed in achieving the desired outcomes. Israel used Hamas’ attacks on 7th October as a pretext to make up for these failures and committed the most brutal atrocities in the history of the Palestinians’ struggle. This genocide sought immediate results of dispossession and annexation. Thus far, it looks like even the accelerated form of genocide failed in pushing Palestinians out. This article provided a new theorization of genocide in Gaza that examines Israel’s approach in Gaza with a new conceptual framework, namely Gazacide. Israel’s approach has caused irreversible and unprecedented damage that became most visible during the current genocide. Relational sociology proved crucial because it provides theoretical tools that enable us to gain a better understanding of intent and hold everybody involved accountable. In the context of Palestine, intent should be understood in relation to the colonial ideology that seeks total dispossession and annexation. Scholars should also account for the indoctrination of a whole society that seems to normalize killing, raping, and genociding the Palestinians. I noted that the systematic subjugation of the Palestinians continues to happen mainly because of their identity which is grounded in resistance, return, and relationship with the land.