Flour Massacre: Israel Guns Down Hundreds of Starving Palestinians Trying to Access Food
Israel carried out one of the bloodiest massacres in modern times Feb. 29, when its military opened fire on starving Palestinians on Al-Rashid street in the Gaza Strip who had been awaiting trucks with desperately needed humanitarian aid, including bags of flour. The misnamed Israel Defense Forces (IDF) killed at least 112 Palestinians and injured at least 760 more. Israeli soldiers and tanks fired on crowds already weakened by famine and disease, the deliberate result of Israel’s genocidal policies. This latest atrocity will not stop Western imperialist powers from continuing to provide full support to Israel’s attack on Gaza.
As unimaginably evil as any act Israel has committed in this genocide, the “Flour Massacre”, as it quickly became known, has a special degree of cruelty to it. Israel had allowed a drop-off of humanitarian aid during the night, then murdered starving civilians as they gathered at the aid drop. Survivors correctly called it a “trap”. The massacre also facilitates Israel’s genocidal goals by making Palestinians fearful of accepting the very aid they need to survive.
So confident is Israel in its impunity—which extends to rank-and-file IDF soldiers, who have flooded social media with videos of themselves committing war crimes—that the IDF itself tweeted video of the massacre. The video is taken from an elevated height, in night vision, with no sound. As journalist Séamus Malekafzali said, “There is one purpose to release this video, high-up where you can see no faces, without sound so you can hear no gunshots. Israel is demanding that you look at these Palestinians like insects, swarming these trucks like beasts, and the Israeli troops were forced to open fire.” Dehumanization of the targeted group is a key aspect of any genocide and Israel supporters are no different, regularly comparing Palestinians to insects and vermin.
Right on cue, the capitalist media moved into action to obscure the truth of what happened. As usual, headlines used the passive voice to avoid ascribing any responsibility to Israel, describing people “killed” with no mention of who killed them. Leading media outlets all used the word “chaotic”—rather than, say, “massacre”—to describe the events: from CNN (“chaotic incident”) to The New York Times (“chaotic Gaza scene”). BBC News managed to avoid naming Israel as the killer while working Hamas into the headline of their report on a war crime. Does anyone think if the Russian military had fired on Ukrainian civilians awaiting humanitarian aid, Western media would not condemn the event as a massacre and explicitly note in headlines who had done the killing?
The IDF naturally blamed Palestinians for their own deaths. They claimed the crowds had rushed to aid trucks, that those who died were killed in a stampede. Israeli officials and media used words like “mob”, which is the word you use for a crowd when you want to attack their motives and intent. But video and eyewitness accounts quickly proved Israel lied about its involvement in the massacre, with the IDF’s edited footage concealing the sound of gunfire. Dr. Mohammed Salha, head of Al-Awda Hospital in Gaza City, said gunfire accounted for more than 80% of the wounds his hospital treated for Palestinians emerging from the bloodshed.
No matter how you look at it, Israel is responsible for these deaths. But for the sake of argument, even if you were to take Israel at its word—which would be foolish, since Israel was founded on lies and its officials constantly lie—that IDF soldiers fired “warning shots” to disperse the crowd: could you blame people for panicking? The IDF has killed 30,000 Palestinians in just a few months. Israeli soldiers gunning down and killing Palestinians, including children, without any consequences has always been a regular event, similar to how U.S. police constantly murder unarmed civilians. Could you blame people dying of hunger from rushing toward aid trucks? Palestinians in Gaza are literally starving to death in an intentional man-made famine, caused by Israel’s genocidal blockade and their imperialist allies’ freezing relief funds to Gaza. Bottom line: Israel has committed yet another barbaric massacre, one that in its incomprehensible cruelty matches any of history’s worst atrocities, including those committed by the Nazis.
The imperialist war criminals that have funded and armed Israel throughout this genocide naturally refused to condemn the Flour Massacre. U.S. President “Genocide Joe” Biden said his administration was investigating two different versions of the event, and claimed it would complicate supposed ceasefire talks. The idea that Biden was discussing a ceasefire is a barefaced lie, one he cynically put forward right before the Democrat primary in Michigan (a key swing state with a large Arab American population) and immediately backed out of afterward.
In Canada, Prime Minister “Genocide Justin” Trudeau, Foreign Affairs Ministry Mélanie Joly, and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre have all been silent about Israel’s massacre. All found time, however, to hypocritically condemn Russian war crimes in Ukraine, and to pay tribute to former prime minister Brian Mulroney after his death the same day as the massacre. For once, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh dared to criticize Israel: “New Democrats are horrified by and condemn the massacre by Israeli troops of over 100 Palestinians seeking life-saving aid,” Singh said. “Canada must take action to save lives.” But again Singh is talking from both sides of his mouth. For all Singh’s bluster, the NDP continues to prop up the Liberal government that arms and supports Israel as it commits genocide. Singh also joined every other political leader in Canada to falsely smear pro-Palestine demonstrators as antisemitic.
The Flour Massacre and ongoing support for Israel’s genocide by the capitalist class shows how revealing it was when every member of Canada’s Parliament gave a standing ovation to a Nazi and Waffen-SS veteran. Despite efforts to spin this as a mere “gaffe”, with former speaker Anthony Rota taking the blame and falling on his sword, Parliament’s support for a Nazi was really a case of the mask coming off. This is the true, ugly face of capitalism and bourgeois “democracy”, which has always been prepared to commit the worst atrocities, to support the most reactionary forces and oppressive regimes, in order to maintain its class rule.
The cruelty and hypocrisy of our rulers and their system stands ever more exposed. Millions are drawing revolutionary conclusions as a result, while bourgeois politicians ignore them and any expression of dissent. The self-immolation of active-duty U.S. Air Force member Aaron Bushnell in protest against U.S. imperialism’s support for the genocide in Gaza has echoed the anger and frustration of the masses. The Pentagon’s press secretary could respond only with the usual thought-terminating cliché: “Our support for Israel's inherent right to defend itself is ironclad.”
Mass anger is growing at the inhumanity of our ruling class, embodied in their support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza. The need to channel this energy into a revolutionary communist party that can overthrow the capitalist system responsible for such atrocities has never been more pressing.