Global war crimes debate descends on key gateway into Gaza

The family of Eitan Mor, held hostage by Hamas in the Gaza Strip for nearly 240 days, marked his 24th birthday by protesting the delivery of humanitarian aid for Palestinians suffering amid the war between Israel and Hamas.

“If the Arabs get the humanitarian aid, we want our son to get [aid],” Tzvika Mor, Eitan’s father, said to reporters at the Kerem Shalom crossing last week, holding a symbolic box of goods for his son.

Tzvika was joined by about two dozen members of his community, Kiryat Arba, representing a hardline segment of Israeli society that wants the Israeli government to focus all efforts on the military campaign, regardless of blowback from international courts warning of genocide and accusing Israeli leaders of war crimes.

“We should not talk to the terrorists, we have to kill them, we have to crush Hamas,” Mor said.

A number of Israeli politicians have called for — and implemented for short stretches — policies to cut off the delivery of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, especially in the first fraught weeks following Hamas’s shocking Oct. 7 terrorist attack against Israel. Eitan Mor was among more than 250 people taken hostage by Hamas, and is one of 124 yet to be released.

Far-right Israeli protesters have sought to block aid trucks from reaching Israeli checkpoints, presenting just one of many challenges complicating aid delivery to the estimated two million Palestinians under siege amid Israel’s campaign to rout Hamas.

The actions and rhetoric of Israeli officials at key gateways into Gaza feed into allegations that they are using starvation as a weapon of war, along with other violations against international humanitarian law.