"No humanitarian crisis in Gaza - it's much worse!"

I've mentioned previously how, in the wake of blogs and (belatedly) news organizations finally covering the phenomena of malls and water parks and fancy restaurants and luxury hotels in Gaza, the fake "humanitarian crisis" meme has morphed into something else - a crisis of hopelessness, or despair, or some other non-specific formulation that is a reframing of the entire situation.

Those who pushed the convenient but lying meme of starvation and genocide - people like Jimmy Carter - are now forced to figure out how to keep the pressure on Israel but without the lazy shorthand of "humanitarian crisis."

The latest people who are scrambling to redefine Gaza are "The Elders," the "four confused geriatrics who are wandering the Middle East trying to help terrorists" as Noah Pollak writes.

Mary Robinson, one of these busybodies who just met with terrorists in Gaza (unfortunately, not in front of the cameras this time,) said "This is not a humanitarian crisis - it is a political crisis and it can be solved politically."

The Elders' blog gave space to John Ging, whose job at UNRWA gives him more than a passing interest in prolonging Palestinian Arab suffering for the next few generations. He was more expansive in his attempts to tap-dance around the topic:

Instead of dealing with the obvious facts on the ground, the truth is either denied or ignored and instead a debate rages around whether there is a humanitarian crisis or not and whether adjusting or easing an illegality is the appropriate response. Let me say unequivocally that there is a crisis that is far larger than a “humanitarian crisis”; there is a crisis that affects every aspect of public and private life in Gaza.

As the Elders will see, the water and sanitation infrastructure is a state of collapse with 80 million cubic litres of untreated sewage pumped into the Mediterranean every day; 90% of the water unsafe to drink by World Health Organization standards. They will also see the poverty and staggering levels of aid dependency, where 80% of the population are dependent on handouts of food from the United Nations. Yes the shops are full of consumer goods, now from Israel rather than the tunnels, but very few can afford to buy them. Unemployment is at record levels with 95% of the private sector businesses closed and the ban on commercial imports and exports still firmly in place.

The result of this and much more is that 100% of the innocent civilians despair at the mismatch between the political rhetoric of the international community and their refusal to take effective action to uphold international law,

See? 100% of Gazans are suffering from acute despair! This is worse than starvation!

These old fogies, who fully support spending hundreds of millions to maintain Hamas' hold on power, know that Hamas is a better investment than merely buying food for millions of kids who have flies buzzing around their distended stomachs.