The White House said Sunday that “it’s the right time” for Israel to scale back its military offensive in the Gaza Strip, as Israeli leaders again vowed to press ahead with their operation against the territory’s ruling Hamas militant group.
The comments exposed the growing differences between the close allies on the 100th day of the war.
“Refugee camps” is something of a misleading term when it comes to Gaza. While there are several settlements that did begin decades ago as camps of tents, which is the image the term conjures, at this point they are essentially cities like any other. Due to some unique legal circumstances, a huge chunk of the population of Gaza are legally considered refugees by the UN, but this is a unique status that’s even inheritable by the descendents of the people who originally fled during the establishment of Israel.
This isn’t to defend bombing civilians, to be clear. It’s just that, frankly, it’s difficult to throw a dart at Gaza without hitting what is legally considered a refugee camp.
The valid response to that is not “Oh well, guess lots of civilians are gonna die”, it’s “Shit, guess we can’t bomb the place then.”
My point is that, in this context, “bombing a refugee camp” is not meaningfully different than bombing any other urban environment.
Which is to say, very deadly and terrible and generally a bad idea unless there are literally no other options, which I would say isn’t really the case here.