True populism is deeply moral—and we are witnessing the best version of it in the great and rising tide of disgust with Israel, as it continues its merciless genocide of the Palestinians. The ordinary citizens of the entire world are united in their condemnation of the now innumerable crimes that Israelis continue to carry out in Gaza and elsewhere.
But the politicians of these citizens hide the crimes under the phrase, “Israel has the right to defend itself,” which they repeat time and again. The citizens are outraged. The politicians are either paid off, badly compromised—or they are utter moral monsters who care little about the crimes of the Israelis authorities.
Recently, Yaakov Garb, a professor at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, authored a report published on the Harvard Dataverse that analyzes the impact of Israel’s actions in Gaza since October 2023. The report, entitled “The Israeli/American/GHF ‘aid distribution’ compounds in Gaza: Dataset and initial analysis of location, context and internal structure,” relies on data-driven and spatial analysis to examine population changes, aid distribution, and military control in Gaza.
The report notes that Gaza’s population has dropped from 2.227 million before the conflict to about 1.85 million in current estimates, leaving approximately 377,000 people unaccounted for—half of them children.
This figure far exceeds the official death toll of just under 60,000 reported by Gaza’s Health Ministry, suggesting a much larger humanitarian catastrophe, possibly due to displacement, deaths from starvation, dehydration, or lack of medical access.
The report critically assesses the role and design of US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) aid compounds, which are located in buffer zones and are largely inaccessible to most of Gaza’s population.
These sites lack basic facilities like shelter, water, and sanitation, and are designed with narrow entry/exit corridors, maximizing surveillance and control.
The compounds are staffed by private US security contractors under Israeli protection, and their structure is described as a “fatal funnel,” a military term for bottlenecks that increase vulnerability.
The report concludes that the aid compounds function more as military zones than humanitarian centers, raising serious questions about compliance with the Fourth Geneva Convention.
Civilians seeking aid must cross dangerous, militarized terrain, and the design of the sites is likely to generate continuous friction and harm.
Garb’s findings highlight a significant gap between official casualty figures and the scale of population loss in Gaza, and raise urgent concerns about the humanitarian and legal implications of Israel’s aid and military strategy in the region
So, we were officially told that Israel had killed 84,000 (and the number could be well over 186,000). Professor Garb now points us to what could be the real number—nearly half-a-million people dead and missing.
This is a crime unimaginable in our era—and yet our politicians continue to look away—and choose instead to lecture us about “antisemitism”—whatever this word even means now.
A major portion of the population of Gaza has disappeared—377,000 of them.
How can the reaction of people be anything other than outrage? Israel has been transformed into a vast and well-funded murderous organization.
But this blindness to genocide is cultivated by the greatest supporters of Israel—Christian Zionists in the United States of America. For example, here is the curious case of Yehuda Bechana, a “pastor” who served as a sniper in the IDF. One can only wonder how many Palestinians he shot, as a service to his “god.” Here he is in his own words:
A recent Haaretz report featured IDF soldiers’ testimonies reflecting profound moral distress. One soldier reportedly said, “I felt, like, like a… it felt as though we were the Nazis and they were the Jews.” This quote is described as a “profoundly disturbing observation” in the context of soldiers witnessing or participating in violent acts against Palestinian civilians. The soldiers’ statements suggest that the environment and leadership within certain units led them to act in ways that, in retrospect, they found morally indefensible.
Here is Professor Garb’s report:
