14,000 sheep & 2,500 cattle: out of the war zone, off to slaughter
Merritt Clifton posted: " And still aboard a livestock transport ship after almost a month at sea FREMANTLE, Australia; NUSEIRAT, Gaza; RAMAT GAN, Israel––Fourteen thousand sheep and 2,500 cattle aboard the livestock carrier MV Bahijah have, so far, escaped becoming casual" Animals 24-7Read on blog or Reader
And still aboard a livestock transport ship after almost a month at sea
FREMANTLE, Australia; NUSEIRAT, Gaza; RAMAT GAN, Israel––Fourteen thousand sheep and 2,500 cattle aboard the livestock carrier MV Bahijah have, so far, escaped becoming casualties of the Israel/Hamas war.
The animals, however, may yet become casualties of the ongoing Australian live animal export trade, and almost certainly will be casualties of the meat industry.
Loaded for shipment to Israel via the Red Sea, the MV Bahijah left Fremantle on January 5, 2024, but became stranded in the Gulf of Aden by rocket attacks on ships entering the Red Sea, directed by the Yemen-based Houthi militia in support of Hamas.
Like Hamas, the Houthi militia are Islamists backed by the Iranian government.
(Beth Clifton collage)
Prime target for Houthi rockets
Built in 2010, the MV Bahijah currently sails under the flag of the Marshall Islands, a U.S. Trust Territory from 1947 to 1979. The dual association with Israel and the U.S., and the high superstructure of any livestock carrier, would have made the MV Bahijah a prime target for the Houthi.
After about ten days of awaiting a ceasefire that might have allowed the MV Bahijah safe passage, the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry on January 20, 2024 ordered the ship to return to Fremantle.
Alternatives included sailing around Africa to reach the Mediterranean Sea, which would have approximately doubled the distance and travel time needed to reach Israel, and finding a destination to accept the animals in Africa or Southeast Asia.
(Beth Clifton collage)
Africa & Southeast Asia not delivery options
African and Southeast Asian nations have historically been reluctant to allow animals turned away from the Middle East after delays in transport, lest they bring livestock diseases with them, and lest a sudden influx of imported animals drive down the prices paid to farmers by slaughterhouses.
The rushed, haphazard government-ordered slaughter of 22,000 Australian sheep in Pakistan in October 2012, after Bahrain refused them entry two months earlier, remains among the most gruesome incidents in the entire grim history of livestock exports.
The MV Bahijah arrived back in Fremantle in late afternoon on January 31 2024.
"Two veterinarians engaged by [the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry] boarded the vessel to provide additional assurance on the health and welfare of the livestock on board," the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry announced in a public prepared statement.
"The report from those veterinarians indicates no signs of significant health, welfare or environmental condition concerns with the livestock on board, consistent with all reports received to date," the prepared statement said. "The exporter's registered veterinarian also remains on board the vessel and continues to report back to the department daily.
(Beth Clifton collage)
No animals to be off-loaded
"Contrary to some public reports, no livestock are required to be offloaded for health reasons," the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry declared.
"The MV Bahijah is currently being replenished with supplies to ensure the ongoing health and welfare of the livestock is upheld. No animals are currently being unloaded.
"The department continues to assess the application to re-export the livestock provided by the exporter as a matter of priority," the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry statement added.
Earlier, Royal SPCA of Western Australia chief executive Ben Cave "said all livestock aboard the vessel needed to be offloaded as soon as possible, describing any other outcome as cruel and barbaric," reported Hamish Hastie for Western Australia Today.
(Beth Clifton collage)
"Heatwave conditions"
"Heatwave conditions are forecast for the rest of the week," Cave explained. "These animals have already spent nearly a month on rolling seas in cramped conditions, standing in their own waste. There really is no other humane choice but to get them off the ship now."
Agreed Josh Wilson, a Labor Party representive for Fremantle in the Australian Parliament, "Really, that process can't come soon enough.
"We should have learned by now," Wilson added, "that the live sheep trade involves unacceptable risks to animal welfare, and sheep can't be long-distance freight to one of the hottest and most unstable parts of the world."
Wilson's statement predictably brought vigorous objection from Australian Livestock Exporters Council chief executive Mark Harvey-Sutton.
(Beth Clifton photo)
African & Asian students keep kibbutz dairy farms going
Little information has percolated through war coverage about the animal survivors either in Gaza or in the extensive evacuated parts of Israel surrounding Gaza and along the Lebanese border. Both areas are subject to frequent rocket attacks from Hamas and Hezbollah, another Iranian-armed militia occupying much of southern Lebanon.
As many as half a million Israelis were internally displaced after the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2021, according to the Israeli Defense Force. About 200,000 remain displaced, chiefly from the kibbutz collective farms that formed much of the Israeli farm belt, raising both crops and livestock.
Updated Times of Israel reporter Bernard Dichek on January 13, 2024, "Dairy farms along Israel's Gaza border have been supplying milk uninterruptedly since the outbreak of the war, owing to a small cadre of staff who remained behind," including about 250 university students from Africa and Asia, "while most residents evacuated to the center of the country."
(Beth Clifton collage)
Students "insisted on remaining"
Interns from Ghana and Tanzania were offered the opportunity to relocate, Kibbutz Zikim dairy farm manager Gabo Altmark told Dichek, "but unlike Zikim's foreign workers who were quick to leave, the students insisted on remaining," Dichek wrote.
Kibbutz Zikim is barely a mile from Gaza.
"On October 7, I had finished the early morning milking and gone back to bed when I heard tzeva adom, tzeva adom [red alert] over the loudspeaker," Ghanian student Kwabena Frimpong, 28, said.
"Unknown to Frimpong," wrote Dichek, "Altmark sent some of those messages after hurrying to the kibbutz fence where he and seven other members of Zikim's civilian anti-terror first responders were confronting Hamas terrorists who had reached the kibbutz perimeter.
(Karen Davis photo)
Cows & calves lose no matter who wins the war
"Altmark and his fellow civil guards managed to hold off the terrorists until soldiers arrived from a nearby army base. Together with the soldiers, they eliminated the terrorists before any were able to enter the kibbutz grounds.
"By midday, Altmark was able to return to the cowshed where he joined Frimpong and the rest of the staff in carrying out the noontime milking" of a 500-cow herd who must be milked three times a day."
Kibbutz Zikim is also bottle-feeding those 500 cows' calves with milk replacer, Dichek indicated.
Saeed Al Err. (Sulala Animal Rescue photo)
Sulala Animal Rescue
More "information" about animals alleged to be inside Gaza has come from online scammers in recent weeks than from Sulala Animal Rescue, the one established Gazan animal aid organization, founded in 2016 by Saeed Al-Err and family, financially assisted by Animals Australia and the Austrian-based international animal charity Four Paws (Vier Pfoten).
Throughout the war, Sulala Animal Rescue volunteer Annelies Keuleers has maintained contact with Saeed Al-Err and his son Sa'ed from Belgium, but updates have become less frequent due to internet outages.
Not helping is that Sulala Animal Rescue, early in the fighting, relocated in compliance with Israeli Defense Force instructions from north of Gaza City, to Nuiserat, about halfway between Gaza City and Khan Younis.
Saeed Al Err's young son feeds a hungry dog. (Sulala Animal Rescue photo)
"We are feeding the dogs human food now"
Gaza City was at the time believed to be above the major Hamas tunnel fortresses, chiefly located beneath hospitals, schools, and mosques.
But as many or more Hamas tunnel fortifications turned out to be beneath hospitals, schools, and mosques in Khan Younis, now the primary war theatre.
Amid increasingly severe food scarcity, widely attributed to the ongoing Israeli Defense Force blockade of any materials that might be commandeered and used by Hamas, while Hamas continues to hoard food enough to keep thousands of soldiers fighting, Sulala Animal Rescue in early January 2024 ran out of cat and dog food stockpiled during the first days of the war.
"We are feeding the dogs human food now––a combination of canned chicken and beef and also beans," Saeed Al-Err relayed through Annelies Keuleers on February 25, 2024.
(Sulala Animal Rescue photo)
Cat & dog food stuck at Rafah crossing
Several pallets of cat and dog food sent from Egypt to Sulala Animal Rescue have been aboard trucks stalled at the Rafah entrance to Gaza from Egypt for at least two weeks.
"Good news!" Keuleers forwarded from Saeed Al-Err on January 17, 2024. "The food has been approved on the Israeli side and it should reach us within a week! Until then we will feed the animals fish food and scraps of bread. They will survive until then."
(Beth Clifton collage)
Mirage
But that proved to be a mirage.
"No news from the truck yet," Keuleers posted on January 25, 2024, "and to be honest the situation is looking more uncertain every day, since it seems the entire Gaza Strip has evacuated to Rafah. Saeed hasn't, because he hasn't found a place he can take the animals. He is in a part of the central area that hasn't received an evacuation order yet.
"But because Khan Younes is now besieged," Keuleers continued, "it is becoming increasingly unclear if he will be able to go to the south at all to pick up the food if it ever arrives. Because the road might be cut off. Saeed says he has it under control and will find a way," Keuleers finished.
(Beth Clifton collage)
UNWRA discredited
Truckloads of relief aid, already delayed, were further held up during the last 10 days of January 2024 by Israeli protesters objecting that the convoys have only been prolonging the war by resupplying Hamas––an allegation gaining credence with the revelation by U.S. and Israeli intelligence that at least 12 employees of UNWRA, the United Nations agency established 1948 to assist Palestinian refugees, were active participants in the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel.
Altogether, about 10% of the UNWRA staff of 12,000 are believed to be active Hamas sympathizers, and about half are believed to have close relatives involved with Hamas.
The U.S., Canada, Australia, Britain, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Finland, Estonia, Japan, Austria, and Romania have now cut off funding to UNWRA entirely; Sweden has suspended funding for UNWRA.
United Nations agencies and personnel were already suspect for having vocally denied that Hamas was operating beneath U.N.-operated hospitals and schools where Hamas fortifications, supplies, and munitions were subsequently discovered.
Vitali Troptanov. (Facebook photo)
The Troptanov family
The Israeli animal charity Let The Animals Live, meanwhile, which formerly provided animal aid to Gaza, continues to remind the world of volunteers and animal adopters who remain prisoners of Hamas.
Recounted one recent Let The Animals Live post to Facebook, "All his life, dear Vitali Troptanov surrounded himself with dogs and cats. On October 7, 2023, this compassionate man was murdered by Hamas terrorists.
"Yelena, Vitali's wife, who was released from Hamas captivity after 54 days of hell, anxiously awaits the return of her beloved son Sasha, who is still held hostage."
Yelena Troptanov, 50, and her mother Irena Tati, 73, "who hold dual Israeli and Russian citizenship, were kidnapped from Kibbutz Nir Oz during the Hamas-led onslaught in southern Israel on October 7, 2023, the Times of Israel explained on November 29, 2023, but "were released by Hamas in what the terror group called a 'gesture' to Russian President Vladimir Putin."
Sapir Cohen. (Facebook photo)
Sapir Cohen
Sasha Trupanov's girlfriend Sapir Cohen was released from Gaza on November 30, 2023.
While most released hostages have been silent about how they were treated in captivity to avoid jeopardizing those still in Hamas' custody, Sapir Cohen described how "residents of Gaza stood with sticks, screamed, and threw cigarettes at me," as she was taken through the streets on a motorcycle.
"During the captivity, there were days when I didn't know if I would be able to survive," Sapir Cohen said. "I can't expand too much, but the tunnels there are crazy things."
Let The Animals Live also remembered Na'ama Levy, whose dog "sleeps in her bed every night," and Omer Neutra, "born and raised in the Jewish community in Long Island," whose "family and friends and cats Ronnie and Lizzy are all waiting for Omer to come home.
Hamas hostage Amit, with her cats cats Gingis, Hatool, and Ktana. (Let the Animals Live photos.)
Amit found two of her three cats
"Carmel Gat, 39, an occupational therapist from Tel Aviv, was visiting her parents in Kibbutz Be'eri on October 7, 2023 when Hamas terrorists attacked, killing her mother, Kinneret.
"Carmel was taken captive," Let The Animals Live continued.
"With the release of dozens of hostages, the family received word that Carmel was seen by other hostages. They reported she had been kept captive with some children and did yoga once a day with them."
Beth & Merritt Clifton
Amit, a former hostage from Kibbutz Kfar Aza, whose release and search for her cats Jinges, Ktana and Hatul ANIMALS 24-7 summarized in Animal rescuers try to stay alive in Gaza & in Hamas terrorists' hands, was finally reunited with Kinges and Ktana, Let The Animals Live reported, but Hatul is believed to have been killed when the terrorists razed the kibbutz.
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