Polio in Gaza: the necropolitics of genocide and a looming public health crisis

go through Pat Sharma

No area in the Gaza Strip is safe, no one in the Gaza Strip is safe; this is genocidal death politics.

Since October 7, 2023, most of Gaza’s thirty-six hospitals and health systems have been bombed or besieged by apartheid Israel, and the Gaza Strip faces impending mass casualties and an imminent public health crisis.

On July 16, 2024, the Gaza Ministry of Health announced the terrible news that poliovirus had been detected in six wastewater samples in Khan Yunis and Deir al-Balah in late June. On July 23, 2024, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced that the risk of poliovirus spreading within and outside the Gaza Strip was high due to extremely poor water sanitation in the area. Although no human cases of infection with the virus have been found, it is clear that almost all of Gaza’s functioning health systems have been destroyed, leaving existing medical staff helpless in the face of the impending threat of a public health crisis.

The resurgence of poliovirus is directly linked to the genocidal campaign of the State of Israel. Since October 7, more than 70% of Gaza’s water and sanitation facilities have been severely damaged, and the United Nations Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Department estimates that approximately 340,000 tons of solid waste has accumulated in or near densely populated areas.

Notably, poliovirus is transmitted through the “fecal-oral” route, i.e. direct contact with the feces of an infected child, or consumption of water or food contaminated with feces. Nearly 2 million Palestinians, most of them children and adolescents, have been forcibly displaced and live in cramped and unsanitary refugee camps in the Gaza Strip, with limited access to clean water and sanitation. In June, Oxfam estimated that in a so-called “safe zone” in Al-Mawasi (located west of Khan Younis, which was recently attacked by Israel), there was only one toilet for every 4,000 people.

Israeli soldiers in the occupied Gaza Strip are about to receive a polio vaccination, the message is crystal clear, the state of Israel anticipates this as a direct consequence of their genocidal campaign in the region, this is a health crisis. The weaponization of health as a variable is nothing new for colonial states, in fact, the targeting of healthcare systems goes beyond simple human rights violations, revealing deeper colonial power structures that are interconnected with the concept of necropolitics, where outside groups are considered inferior in all social statuses and therefore easy to kill – because some lives are less important than others.

The blockage of aid to Gaza has further weakened the health system, and the ongoing attacks have further exacerbated the risk of disease. In November 2023, WHO reported a sharp increase in diarrhoea cases in the region and noted severe signs of acute icteric syndrome. In November 2023, the risk of disease particularly affected infants and children, and this continued to be the case in July 2024.

When the government operates through this lens of managing and policing institutions within the state, it creates a premeditated necropolitical war strategy that determines who lives and who gets killed. With the targeted dismantling of the health care system in Gaza, control of clean water, and increased sewage – the effects of this necropolitical paradigm will continue long after the genocide ends. Displaced Palestinians no longer have adequate treatment spaces, hospitals lack the capacity to conduct testing, and are at increasing risk of both communicable and non-communicable diseases.

In addition to direct physical harm, malnutrition, forced starvation and displacement, the attack has created what I can only describe as a “mental health emergency”, a public health crisis where all Palestinians face the imminent threat of developing psychosocial disabilities. Trauma stems from the grief of losing homes and livelihoods while witnessing the effects of displacement, family members having their limbs torn off, children’s skulls opened, and being forced to starve in refugee camps with poor sanitation. Psychosocial disabilities will persist for generations, reinforcing the belief that there is no post-traumatic period in Gaza.

While Benjamin Netanyahu’s efforts to establish a “post-war deradicalized Gaza” have been praised by the U.S. Congress, wastewater is predicted to flood the roads of Deir el-Balah, and the fate of nearly a million Palestinians who survived the genocide and moved to safe locations will also be changed, and now face a harsh medical reality and a premeditated public health crisis.

No area in the Gaza Strip is safe, no one in the Gaza Strip is safe; this is genocidal death politics.

– Parth Sharma is an anti-colonial writer, social justice researcher, and trauma therapist from India. He wrote this article for The Palestine Chronicle.