Kaleidoscope 2023: Hamas War - Israel Breaks, Middle East Problems Rise

Black smoke rose from a building in Beit Hanoun, the northeastern Gaza Strip as a result of being shot by missiles from the city of Sderot in southern Israel on October 19, 2023. (Sergey Ponomarev / The New York Times)

JAKARTA Hamas launched an unexpected attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. An attack that the Palestinian militant group said was in response to Israel's atrocities against their country in recent years.

As reported by Al Jazeera, Hamas claimed to have launched 5,000 rockets in their initial attack that hit a number of major Israeli cities, while the Israeli camp claimed only half of the rockets were fired.

"We announced the start of Operation Hurricane Al-Aqsa and we announce that the first attack, which targets enemy positions, airports and military strongholds, exceeds 5,000 missiles and bullets," said Qassam Brigade Chief, Al-Aqsa Hamas military wing, Mohammed Deif.

The attack was launched while Israelis were celebrating the Sukkot festival which lasted seven days.

The next day, Israel reported 700 people died as a result of the Hamas attack. Israel's Ministry of Health renewed the number of Israelis injured in the ongoing violence, and said 2,382 of its citizens were hospitalized.

On the other hand, the Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip said at least 423 people died, including 78 children, and more than 2,300 people were injured.

Hamas' sudden attack on Saturday morning has been called the deadliest attack on Israel in decades. The Hamas attack then came 50 years and one day after Egyptian and Syrian forces launched attacks during the Jewish holiday, Yom Kippur, in an attempt to retake territory Israel took in 1967.

Since the October 7 attacks, the Israeli military has repeatedly launched a reply to the Gaza Strip. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stressed that his party would not stop the attack until the Hamas troops disappeared completely.

Actually, what has happened in Palestine now has also happened decades ago. Palestine and Israel are one land with two names. Harmonious relations have never been owned by Palestinians and Israelis since the two claimed the same territory.

The Palestinian-Israeli dispute can be said to be motivated by the Balfour Declaration, an open statement issued by the British Government in 1917 during the First World War.

Balfour himself was taken from the name of British Foreign Minister (1916-1919), Lord Arthur Balfour, who wrote the open letter to Lord Rothschild, who is the leader of the British Jewish community.

The content of the Balfour Declaration, which contains only three paragraphs with 76 words, is a form of support from the United Kingdom for the ideology of Zionism to establish a national homeland for Jews in Palestine.

The Balfour declaration was made because Britain expects political and financial support from the Jewish community to fight the Central Block in the First World War.

In short, it was the Balfour Declaration that legitimized the massive migration of Jews to Palestinian soil. This declaration also paved the way for Zionists to annex Palestinian territories into Israeli soil for Jews.

Since Hamas' first attack on Israel on October 7, it means that the Hamas-Israeli conflict has now been going on for nearly three months.

Casualties continue to fall, damage occurs in almost all areas of Gaza and the West Bank. Residents' homes, educational facilities, places of worship, and other buildings are razed to the ground.

According to a number of sources as of October 28, 2023 morning local time, as many as 21,110 Palestinians, including 8,200 children and 6,200 women, lost their lives as a result of the Israeli military force attack. While more than 55,243 were injured, including 8,663 children and 6,327 women.

Israel continues to carry out attacks on the Gaza Strip, with increasingly intensive ground operations. Even hospitals do not escape attacks. Of the 35 existing hospitals, only nine are still functioning to accommodate patients and refugees.

Among the hospitals destroyed by the Israeli attack were Indonesian hospitals, which were built from donations from Indonesian citizens in 2011.

Israeli soldiers attacked Indonesian hospitals because they were accused of being hiding places for Hamas troops. But this claim was strongly denied by the Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Now, after nearly three months of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, hunger and disease outbreaks overshadow Palestinian refugees. The UN agency for Palestinian refugee affairs (UNRWA) warned that aid entering the Gaza Strip was insufficient, causing 40 percent of its population to risk starvation amid restrictions on access to aid by Israel.

UNRWA also continues to call for a humanitarian ceasefire amid intense Israeli airstrikes in Gaza for more than 83 days.

"Every day is a struggle for life, looking for food and water," said UNRWA's director of affairs at Gaza Thomas White on social mediaX.

"The reality is, we need more help. The only hope that remains is a humanitarian ceasefire," he said.

The humanitarian ceasefire call was also revealed by the Director of Operations at the Ministry of Health and the Coordinator of the Field Hospital in Gaza, dr. Hani Hamada. To Al Jazeera Hani talks about the collapse of the health system in the Gaza Strip.

"The situation is very dangerous and requires swift and urgent intervention, and we urge all international institutions as well as Arab and foreign countries to save the Gaza Strip population from this fierce Israeli attack," Hani stressed.