Words Matter: Stop Calling Gaza a "War" or "Humanitarian Situation"

Words matter. They shape what we see, what we feel, what we excuse, and what we allow governments to get away with. And that's why we need to stop casually calling what is happening in Gaza a “war”.

A war implies two sides fighting each other with at least some degree of comparable military capacity. It suggests armies, fronts, battles, advances and retreats. It suggests mutual destruction. It suggests tragedy, but also a degree of symmetry. Like what's happening in Ukraine.

But let's be honest. Gaza is not symmetric. Israel is a nuclear-armed state with one of the most powerful militaries in the world, backed diplomatically, militarily and financially by the United States and many of its allies - including Australia. Palestinians in Gaza are a besieged, stateless, occupied people trapped in a strip of land about 40 kilometres long and 9 kilometres wide. They can't leave. They don't control their airspace, their borders, their sea access, their electricity, their water, or their food supply.

So it's not a "war" in any ordinary moral sense. It's domination. It's collective punishment. It's the systematic destruction of a people’s homes, livelihoods, institutions, farms, schools, hospitals, mosques, churches, universities, energy systems and future.

It's genocide, and the language we use either clarifies that reality or hides it.

This is also why the phrases that Foreign Minister Penny Wong uses like “the humanitarian situation” are so inadequate and offensive. They sound neutral and administrative. Like a UN briefing note about a drought, a cyclone or an earthquake. It makes starvation sound like a weather event. It makes mass displacement sound like logistics. It makes destroyed hospitals sound like infrastructure pressure.

But Palestinians are not starving because the rains failed. They're starving because food is being blocked, restricted, controlled, politicised and weaponised. They're not homeless because of a natural disaster. Their homes have been bombed. Their towns have been flattened. Their farmland has been razed. Their greenhouses, wells and agricultural systems have been destroyed. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization has reported that more than 80 per cent of Gaza’s cropland has been damaged, less than five per cent is left. Even solar panels have been smashed and damaged, in a place where electricity is already scarce and survival depends on any independent source of power.

So when Australian politicians speak of “humanitarian suffering” or “the humanitarian situation”, they might be saying something technically true. But they're also politically weak. They're stripping the sentence of agency. And intentionally they're avoid naming who is doing what to whom.

A “situation” does not bomb a hospital.

A “crisis” does not bulldoze farmland.

A “conflict” does not starve children.

People do those things. Governments do those things. Armies like the IDF do those things. And other governments like Australia's enable them when they refuse to speak plainly.

This matters because soft language is a form of political cover. It allows leaders to sound concerned while avoiding moral clarity. It lets them avoid decisive action and pressure. It lets them send aid with one hand while refusing to confront the military and political machinery that makes aid necessary in the first place.

Australia’s language has shifted selectively at times. Penny Wong has condemned specific Israeli actions, like the “shocking and unacceptable” treatment of detained flotilla activists. That says a lot, because when Australians are harmed, humiliated or abused by Israel, the Foreign Minister suddenly finds clear language and moral courage. But when Palestinians, Lebanese people and other brown-skinned people in the Middle East are bombed, starved, displaced or killed, the language becomes cautious, passive and apologetic. That double standard isn't just weak. It is hypocritical. And it's racist.

So if we call Gaza a war, we normalise the idea that two sides are simply fighting. If we call it a humanitarian situation, soften it even further and we hide the political and military choices creating the suffering. If we call starvation a crisis, we obscure the fact that starvation can be imposed.

We need more honest words. We need to call occupation occupation. We need to call siege siege. We need to call forced displacement forced displacement. We need to call collective punishment collective punishment. We need to call the destruction of farms, water, hospitals and homes what it is: the destruction of the conditions necessary for life. And yes, genocide!

When we describe Gaza accurately, the moral question changes. It's no longer: when will this war end? It's: when will the world stop allowing this to happen? And for Australia, the question is even sharper. When will our government stop hiding behind weasel words and start using the language that justice requires?

Words matter, and calling what's happening in Gaza a "war" discounts what's really happening.