Riyadh, March 13, 2010 (Pal Telegraph; by Hussain Ali)- The Israeli blockade of Gaza is approaching its 1,000th day. With every passing day the situation in the Gaza Strip is becoming increasingly dire.

US senators, European national legislators, members of European Parliament, UN secretary-general, human rights defenders and media people from everywhere shed tears about children dying in hospitals, helpless starving elderly, and hundreds of entire families going without shelter and without food.

But this milk of human kindness does not reach the largest prison on earth - Gaza - because the prison was established by Israel to punish Palestinians who chose to elect Hamas as their government in an election certified as free and fair by a team of international observers led by former US President Jimmy Carter. In this 360 sq. kilometer area, more than 1.5 million human beings are leading a life without water, food, medicines, fuel, and electricity for homes, schools and hospitals. And all in the midst of the wreckage and debris of an atrocious war. Their ordeal started in June 2006.

Desperate calls for ending the Gaza siege have led nowhere. A September 2009 UN fact-finding mission established that the blockade of Gaza "amounted to collective punishment", was likely a "war crime" and a "crime against humanity", and recommended that the matter be referred to the International Criminal Court.