PATRICK LAWRENCE—In Gaza, 1.9 million people have been displaced and more or less everyone now lives in poverty, the bank reports. We already know about the hospital bombings and the murders of administrators, doctors and nurses; now we learn that 80 percent of primary care centers no longer function. Up to 70 percent of farmland has been damaged or destroyed, “pushing nearly 2 million people to the edge of widespread famine.” The education system has collapsed. “All 625,000 school-aged children of Gaza have been out of school since October 7, 2023,” the World Bank says.
As most Palestinians well and grimly understand, the Israelis intend to make the West Bank another Gaza and are simply attempting to attract less attention as they do so.
