Israel's use of starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza echoes the history of the United States and Canada, where settler colonialists destroyed the ability of Indigenous communities in North America to access food.
اضافة اعلان
There is growing evidence that "widespread famine, malnutrition, and disease" are driving an increase in hunger-related deaths in Gaza, as repeatedly warned by a group of United Nations agencies and international relief organizations.
In a warning dated July 29 by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC)—a global initiative to improve food security and nutrition—it was stated that "the worst-case famine scenario is currently occurring in the Gaza Strip," where access to food and other basic necessities has dropped to an "unprecedented level."
The UN reported that more than 500,000 Palestinians—about a quarter of Gaza's population—are experiencing famine conditions. Furthermore, all 320,000 children under the age of five in the territory are "at risk of acute malnutrition, with serious and lasting consequences for physical and mental health."
UN experts accused Israel of using starvation as a “brutal weapon of war,” which constitutes a crime under international law. They are urgently calling on Israel to restore the UN humanitarian system in Gaza.
Israel is Not the Only Government in History to Use Starvation as a Weapon
As an Indigenous researcher studying Indigenous history, I know that countries—including the United States and Canada—have used starvation to invade, conquer, and seize Indigenous lands.
And as a descendant of ancestors who suffered forced starvation at the hands of the U.S. government, I also know its lasting consequences.
Dismantling Indigenous Food Systems
From the founding of the United States and Canada up through the 20th century, settlers frequently attempted to destroy Indigenous communities' access to food—by raiding their farms, killing their livestock, or preventing access to lands where wild game lived—all with the ultimate goal of forcing Indigenous people off their land.
In 1791, President George Washington ordered his Secretary of War, Henry Knox, to destroy the Wea tribe's farms and livestock, which were located along the Ohio River Valley—a fertile region with a long history of cultivating corn, beans, squash, and other fruits and vegetables.
As historian Susan Sleeper-Smith wrote in her 2018 book, Indigenous Prosperity and American Conquest, Knox "burned their cornfields, uprooted their vegetable gardens, cut down their apple orchards, turned every one of their homes to ash, and [killed] the Indians who tried to escape."
Women and children were taken hostage. The goal was to destroy the villages and farms so that Indigenous people would leave and never return.
Later Campaigns of Destruction
Then, seventy-two years later, General Kit Carson led a scorched-earth campaign to remove the Navajo Nation from what is now Arizona and New Mexico. Like Knox, Carson destroyed Indigenous villages, crops, water sources, killed livestock, and cut down more than 4,000 peach trees. The U.S. Army forced over 10,000 Navajo to leave their homeland.
Famine Among Indigenous Peoples
By the late 19th century, multiple famines hit Indigenous communities in both the U.S. and Canada due to the "deliberate, rapid, and comprehensive destruction" of bison herds by settlers, according to historian Dan Flores.
This was also part of an effort to seize more Indigenous lands. A U.S. Army colonel at the time said:
“Kill every buffalo you can! Every dead buffalo means one less Indian.”
Before American and Canadian settlement, there were an estimated 60 million bison. By the 1890s, fewer than 1,000 remained. Thus, Indigenous communities in the Northern Great Plains of the U.S. and Canada—who viewed bison as sacred and relied on them for food, clothing, and other daily needs—were left with nothing to eat.
In his 2013 book, Clearing the Plains: Disease, Politics of Starvation, and the Loss of Aboriginal Life, historian James Daschuk revealed that between 1878 and 1880, Canadian Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald did nothing substantial to stop a famine that lasted several years across the Canadian plains—what are now Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta.
Macdonald did not hide his intentions—just as Israeli leaders do not hide theirs today. He and his government said:
"We are doing all we can, by refusing to provide food, so that the Indians are on the verge of starvation."
At the time, Indigenous people in the Canadian plains were forced to eat their dogs and horses, poisoned wolf carcasses, and even their moccasins (animal-hide shoes).
Every Indigenous person in the region—around 26,500 people—suffered from famine. Hundreds died from hunger and disease.
Malcolm C. Cameron, then a member of the House of Commons, accused his government of implementing a “starvation-based policy of subjugation” against Indigenous peoples.
But his condemnation did little to change governmental policies.
What My Ancestors Experienced Under Colonization
Many Indigenous families in the U.S. and Canada preserve stories of surviving forced starvation by the government. My family has its stories too.
In the winter of 1883–1884, my great-grandparents experienced what is now remembered as the “Winter of Starvation” at the Blackfeet Reservation in what is now Montana.
Similar to what happened in Canada, the near-extinction of bison by American settlers caused a famine on the Blackfeet Reservation.
In an attempt to slow the starvation, Blackfeet leaders used their own money to purchase food, but the U.S. government’s supply system delayed its arrival—creating a desperate and catastrophic situation.
Blackfeet leaders documented 600 starvation deaths during that winter, while U.S. officials recorded only half that number.
As historian John Ewers noted, "well-fed and well-off settlers nearby" did nothing to help and offered no effective aid to the Blackfeet people.
My family survived that famine because a few men and women were able to ride horses far outside the reservation to hunt and gather local foods.
I have heard the story of the “Winter of Starvation” my entire life—as have most Blackfeet people. And now, I tell these stories to my children.
A Weapon of War
Now, thousands of children in Gaza are suffering from malnutrition and dying due to hunger.
Due to increasing international pressure, Israel now pauses its attacks in some areas of Gaza for a few hours a day to allow some aid in—but experts say this is not enough.
Bushra Khalidi, an official at Oxfam, told The New York Times:
“We’re talking about 2 million people. A hundred trucks or a few hours of calm will not meet the needs of a people starved for several months.”
Ramesh Rajasingham, Director of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said on August 10:
“This is no longer a looming hunger crisis—this is a famine underway, plain and simple.”
Many may assume that the use of starvation as a weapon of war is something that happened only in the past.
But in places like Gaza, it is happening right now.
