* Israel, Gaza, and the Starvation Weapon

* Thai-Cambodian Border Conflict

By Shashi P.B.B. Malla

Gaza: The Most Egregious Starvation Crisis in 40 Years

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Israel is to let more aid trucks into Gaza, under intense international pressure over the raging hunger crisis (TheWashington Post, July 27).

Israel said it would carry out “tactical pauses” in three areas of the enclave to facilitate increased aid and restarted power to a critical water treatment plant.    

As Palestinians in Gaza suffer hunger and malnourishment, drawing international warnings of man-made “mass starvation,” supporters of Israel’s war effort maintain that the humanitarian catastrophe is collateral damage in a just war of retaliation against Hamas (CNN/Fareed’s Global Briefing/Fareed Zakaria & Chris Good, July 25).

However, since Israel launched its campaign after the gruesome Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023, comments by ultranationalist Israeli politicians have added weight to accusations of the crime of genocide.

At The New York Times, Patrick Kingsley and Jonathan Reiss point to yet another accusation: namely that Israel has again turned to a tactic it had used earlier in the war in Gaza – using starvation as a weapon of war.

“Amichay Eliyahu, a far-right lawmaker who leads Israel’s Heritage Ministry, said in a radio interview that ‘there is no nation that feeds its enemies,’ adding that ‘the British didn’t feed the Nazis, nor did the Americans feed the Japanese, nor do the Russians feed the Ukrainians now.’

He concluded that the government was ‘rushing toward Gaza being wiped out,’ while also ‘driving out the population that educated its people on the ideas of ‘Mein Kampf’’ (‘My Struggle’), the infamous antisemitic book written by Adolf Hitler.

In part because of comments like that, but largely driven by chilling images of emaciated children in Gaza, international condemnation of Israel’s war effort “is becoming more collective and targeted,” as CNN’s Paula Hancocks writes.

“More than two dozen European foreign ministers jointly criticized Israel’s ‘dip feeding of aid and the inhumane killing of civilians,’ a statement Israel’s foreign ministry rejected as ‘disconnected from reality.’

The Israeli government accuses Hamas of diverting food aid and says Israel is not causing a famine in Gaza.

An internal USAID analysis found no evidence of systematic food-aid diversion by Hamas, Reuters reports.

Last Friday, Israel said it would allow a resumption of aid airdrops by Jordan and the United Arab Emirates.

Alex de Waal – a famine researcher, humanitarian worker and executive director of the World Peace Foundation – has argued that in the 40 years he has worked on the issue, there has been no other case “of such minutely engineered .  .  . mass starvation of a population as is happening in Gaza today.”

On the Carnegie Middle East Center’s Diwan blog, de Waal tells senior editor Michael Young why he believes that:

“Let’s look at the recent history of famines. Mass starvation in Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia (Tigray), Syria and Yemen – all of them man-made, all of them in which hunger has been used as a weapon of war --- have been larger in magnitude, that is, in terms of the number of people affected or who have perished, than Gaza .  .  .

“Some of these have had a similar severity of starvation --- for example the starvation in and around Al-Fasher in Sudan [ Darfur ] today .  .  .

“The humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza today is unique, however, in that the situation can be remedied overnight if Israel chooses to do so .  .  .

“Within an hour’s drive of the stricken communities there are the United Nations and other aid organizations, with the resources, skills, plans, networks, and so on, to stand up a comprehensive humanitarian operation.”

France Will Recognize a Palestinian State.

What Will That Change?

Citing the heavy humanitarian toll of the Gaza war and the Palestinian Authority’s recent condemnation of Hamas’ October 7, 2023 brutal and barbarous attacks in southern Israel, French President Emmanuel Macron announced France will recognize Palestine as a state.

The move follows similar announcements last year by Ireland, Norway and Spain.

Macron posted letters to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas – whose organization governs parts of the West Bank – and to ‘X’ in French, English, Arabic.

Practically, it could mean little.

In a recent Foreign Affairs essay, Marc Lynch and Shibley Telhami wrote that if more countries recognize a Palestinian state, that could be “a powerful symbol of growing international frustration with Israel’s obliteration of Gaza and apartheid-like domination of the West Bank.”

But recognition of statehood is not an end in itself, they warned: without building up that state, and enshrining it in international institutions, statements of recognition may not change the “one-state reality” currently in place --  and could even distract from efforts to change it.

How does Macron’s announcement fit in?

Telhami, who is the Anwar Sadat professor for peace and development at the University of Maryland and a fellow at the Brooking’s Institution, told Zakaria’s Global Briefing that Macron’s move can be viewed partly, in the context of French and European public opinion that has mobilized against Israel’s war effort and for Palestinian rights.

At the same time, France and Saudi Arabia plan to host a conference on Palestinian statehood in September.

Telhami suggested Macron’s announcement relates to that pending discussion of what will happen to the devastated territory of Gaza after the war.

If Europe and the Gulf states are expected to fund reconstruction, they’re “not going to be able to rationalize it or explain it unless it’s part of an outcome” for the territory “they can live with,” Telhami noted.

Still, without more robust movement toward actually establishing a Palestinian state, Telhami said: “the mere recognition itself could be just a fig leaf .  .  . a smoke screen” for inaction.

Thai-Cambodian Conflict

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The leaders of Thailand and Cambodia have agreed to an “immediate and unconditional ceasefire” following peace talks in Malaysia on Monday (The Strait Times, July 28).

The conflict pits a well-equipped US ally against a weaker adversary with strong China links (CNN/Brad Lendon, July 26).

The leaders of the two countries had agreed to meet in Malaysia in an attempt to negotiate an end to the conflict, according to a social media post by US President Donald Trump on Saturday.

Trump, who said he held separate calls with the Prime Minister of Cambodia, Hun Manet and acting Prime Minister of Thailand, Phumtham Wechayachai claimed that both countries, “have agreed to immediately meet and quickly work out a Ceasefire and, ultimately, PEACE!”

The news came shortly after Trump called publicly on both parties to negotiate peace amid escalating violence on the disputed border between Thailand and Cambodia.

Bangkok and Phnom Penh have been fighting over disputed territory since the South-East Asian colonial power France drew the border unilaterally between them more than a century ago.

The renewed deadly conflict pits longtime US ally Thailand, with decades of experience, against Cambodia’s relatively young armed force with close ties to China.

Since fighting broke out last week on Thursday, more than a dozen people have been reported killed, dozens wounded, and more than 150,000 civilians evacuated.

Clashes had continued into Saturday, according to officials on both sides.

Histories & Capabilities of the Two Sides

Thailand’s military dwarfs that of neighbouring Cambodia, both in personnel and weaponry.

Thailand’s total of 361,000 active-duty personnel spread across all branches of the kingdom’s military is three times Cambodia’s.

And those troops have at their disposal weaponry their Cambodian counterparts could only dream of.

“Thailand has a large, well-funded military and its air force is one of the best equipped and trained in South-East Asia,” the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS, London) wrote in “Military Balance 2025” look at the world’s armed forces.

Meanwhile, a 2024 ranking of the military capabilities of 27 regional Asian nations by the Lowy Institute, Sydney places Thailand at 14th, to Cambodia’s 23rd.

Thailand has strong US ties, global outlook

Thailand’s military has long been a major player in the kingdom’s politics.

The country has for years been dominated by a conservative royalist establishment comprising the military, the monarchy and influential elites.

Strong ties between Washington and Bangkok have endured.

Thailand is classified as a major non-NATO ally by the U.S., giving it special benefits that have enabled it to enjoy access to decades of US support for its weapons programmes.

Cambodia’s Chinese support

Cambodia’s military is young in comparison to Thailand’s, established in 1993 after forces of the Communist government were merged with two non-Communist resistance armies, according to the IISS.

“Cambodia’s most important international defence links are with China and Vietnam. Despite a traditional reliance on Russia for defence equipment, China has emerged as a key supplier,” the IISS says.

Beijing has even developed a naval base in Cambodia. The Ream Naval Base, on the Gulf of Thailand, would be able to host Chinese aircraft carriers, according to international analysts.

What comes next

Hawaii-based military analyst Carl Schuster, a former director of operations at the US Pacific Command’s Joint Intelligence Center, said that while Thailand has the numerical and qualitative military advantage, Cambodia has at least one thing in its favour – the actual land along the disputed border.

“Terrain favours access from Cambodian territory to the disputed area,” Schuster told CNN.

And with Cambodian forces allegedly laying landmines and booby traps in the disputed area, Thailand can be expected to rely on longer-range weaponry, he said.

“The Royal Thai Air Force is superior and their special forces are superior,” Schuster said. “I think the Thais will prefer to emphasize air power and long-range firepower in the conflict” (CNN).

Role of ASEAN

The sharp bilateral escalation underscores ASEAN’s limitations in handling intra-regional disputes, and raises fresh questions about its relevance in managing crises among its own members.

The regional grouping has a narrow window in which to act, said Ms Joanne Lin, a senior fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore arguing that neutral members could potentially step in to broker talks or quietly facilitate de-escalation.

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said on late July 24 that he had spoken to Cambodia Prime Minister Hun Manet and Thailand’s Acting Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachuri.

Anwar Ibrahim said he appealed, in Malaysia’s capacity as the current ASEAN chair, to both leaders for an immediate ceasefire to prevent further hostilities and to create space for peaceful dialogue and diplomatic resolution (The Strait Times, Singapore, July 26).

UN Role?

ASEAN’s credibility has taken a hit as Cambodia seems to have bypassed the grouping by appealing directly to the United Nations.

The 15-member UN Security Council is expected to convene in the coming days, but observers say any outcome will likely mirror that of 2011, which had included calls for maximum restraint and for ASEAN to play a more active role in dispute resolution.

Still, the referral itself is telling.

If countries in the region feel compelled to turn to the United Nations to manage tensions with their neighbours, it reflects a worrying lack of trust in ASEAN, or in any regional third party, to help defuse a conflict in its own backyard.

“The gap between ASEAN’s aspirational vision and its operational readiness has raely been this exposed; and I am worried that the current geopolitical contour will make it more frequently exposed,” said Andrew Mantong, a researcher at Indonesia’s Centre for Strategic and International Studies.

Joanne Lin of ISEAS notes that the ASEAN Secretariat does not have the mandate to lead politically, and decisions must come from member states.

The problem is structural, not personal.

Back in 2011, eventually the case went to the International Court of Justice, which ruled in 2013 that Cambodia has sovereignty over the Preah Vihear temple and ordered Thai troops to withdraw.

That verdict helped ease tensions, but more than a decade on, diplomatic relations between the two neighbours are at their lowest in years.

The writer can be reached at:

shashimalla125@gmail.com