Psychological Warfare And Genocide: Inside Israel’s New Gaza Offensive.

Author:

Kamran Faqir

August 23, 2025

Press Release: Veritas Press C.I.C. Author: Kamran Faqir Article Date Published: 23 Aug 2025 at 12:17 GMT Category: Middle East | Palestine-Gaza | US-Israel At War Source(s): Veritas Press C.I.C. | Multi News Agencies

Israel’s latest military campaign, Operation Gideon’s Chariots II, is being sold to the public as a decisive strike to seize Gaza City and “finish Hamas.” In reality, this is not a war against an armed faction; it is a war on a people, executed through a combination of physical annihilation and psychological terror.

From carefully leaked plans to the weaponisation of famine, to the execution of journalists, this operation exposes the Israeli state’s true objective: to terrorise, starve, and displace Palestinians until Gaza becomes uninhabitable.

Stage One: The Fear Offensive.

The first shots of this “offensive” were fired through headlines, not guns. On August 4, Israeli broadcasters Channel 12 and Channel 14 broke a bombshell leak: Netanyahu was considering a full-scale occupation of the Gaza Strip. Within hours, the narrative shifted, first to seizing only Gaza City, then to a “phased plan.”

This whiplash was not confusion; it was calculated psychological warfare. In a society already under siege, this narrative game amplified dread: Would they face total annexation? Another bloodbath? Mass expulsion?

Analysts familiar with Israel’s military censorship regime note the obvious: nothing about Gaza strategy leaks without state approval. When foreign outlets like NBC were suddenly handed satellite imagery of troop buildups, this too was deliberate, a staged glimpse of “what’s coming.”

Why leak? To keep 2.3 million people in permanent uncertainty. Terror works best when paired with doubt.

Targeting the Storytellers: Killing Anas al-Sharif.

On August 10, one of Gaza’s most beloved journalists, Anas al-Sharif, was assassinated. Israel knew his death would echo across the enclave. It wasn’t about silencing coverage; thousands of phones still document every bombing. It was about broadcasting a threat: “No one is safe. Speak and you die.”

This mirrors March, when Al Jazeera journalist Hossam Shabat was killed just before the first “Gideon’s Chariots” push. Israel kills storytellers as part of a strategic terror doctrine, not collateral damage.

The “Operation” Begins, And The Genocide Deepens.

On August 20, Israel greenlit its Gaza City push. Reports confirm 130,000 troops, including 60,000 reservists, are now positioned for the assault. Evacuation orders target nearly 850,000 civilians in northern Gaza, a move framed as “humanitarian” but in reality constitutes forced displacement on a massive scale.

Israel insists this is about dismantling Hamas. But the numbers tell a different story:

As of May 2025, leaked IDF data shows over 53,000 Palestinians killed, and only 8,900 were fighters
That’s 83% civilian deaths, the overwhelming majority being women and children.

This isn’t counterinsurgency. This is demographic erasure.

Starvation As A Weapon Of War:

The humanitarian catastrophe is not incidental; it is by design. Last week, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC)declared an official famine in Gaza City, the first recognised famine in Middle East history. Over 500,000 people are in famine conditions.

Amnesty International reports “compelling evidence” that Israel’s starvation policy is deliberate, a strategy to exterminate by hunger.

This is a textbook violation of Article II of the Genocide Convention, inflicting conditions of life calculated to destroy, in whole or in part, a national group.

The Occupation Illusion:

Netanyahu’s rhetoric promises a “full conquest.” Military planners know that is a fantasy:

Occupying Gaza City alone would require 200,000 troops, 2–10 years, and a willingness to absorb catastrophic casualties.
The IDF is already crumbling under its own weight: 80,000 soldiers injured, 25,000 diagnosed with severe psychological disorders, and rising refusal rates.

Even Israeli think tanks like WINEP acknowledge the futility: evacuating 800,000 civilians only helps Hamas fighters blend with displaced populations, making any “clean sweep” impossible.

What’s Really Happening?

Every pattern repeats: before each operation, Israel promises a “decisive blow” against Hamas. Every time, it avoids real ground battles, preferring to:

Level entire neighbourhoods from the air
Target hospitals and shelters
Block food, water, and medicine
Execute symbolic raids for propaganda footage
Erect settlements in OPT

If Israel truly wanted to eliminate Hamas, we would see tunnel-clearing operations and infantry-led assaults, the kind of operations that cost soldiers’ lives. Instead, we see TikTok videos of soldiers raising flags on rubble while starving civilians die in silence.

Because the real war is not against Hamas, it is against the people of Gaza.

Genocide With Media As A Force Multiplier:

This strategy is not confined to bombs and bulldozers. It runs through newsrooms. By amplifying leaks, hyping “major offensives,” and framing every massacre as “anti-terror,” the corporate press becomes an accessory to mass killing.

Israel’s military censorship makes selective disclosure a weapon. When leaks surface, they are never slips; they are psychological payloads aimed as much at New York and London as at Gaza City: to normalise the extermination of Palestinians as security policy.

The Bottom Line:

After 23 months of war, Israel still hasn’t dismantled Hamas. Instead, it has dismantled Gaza itself: its homes, schools, hospitals, and food systems. It hasn’t fought Hamas head-on because that was never the goal.

The goal is annihilation by starvation, displacement, and despair, genocide in plain sight, dressed in the language of “security” and “operations.” And every staged leak, every journalist executed, every famine denied is part of that war.

The question now is not whether Israel will succeed in occupying Gaza City. It won’t. The question is: How many more Palestinians must die before the world admits what is happening is not war, it is extermination?