TEHRAN- Weeks of graphic footage reaching the international community showing the Israeli mass murder of civilians in the Gaza Strip has forced the West to speak out. 

But speaking out is one thing and punishing the regime is another, especially when the West has a legal obligation to do so under international law. 

The minimum requirement by the West is to impose sanctions on the Israeli regime, its political and military leadership, as well as other officials responsible for the Gaza bloodbath.

Yet the West practices double standards, which has been on full display.  

The irony is that Western officials have begun to acknowledge the Israeli massacres, but the United States and the United Kingdom, in particular, have gone to the extreme to protect their major destabilizing proxy in West Asia. 

The West has acknowledged Israeli indiscriminate use of force, yet it is shielding the regime from any prosecution and is complicit in the Israeli aggression.

Critics say any statements of compassion and crocodile tears are an attempt by the West to please an international community stunned at the Israeli bombing campaign. 

"Israel must stop bombing Gaza," French President Emmanuel Macron told the BBC.

He said, "De facto - today, civilians are bombed - de facto. These babies, these ladies, these old people are bombed and killed. So there is no reason for that and no legitimacy. So we do urge Israel to stop."

A British MP wiped back tears as she spoke in Parliament about life for children in Gaza.

Naz Shah called on the government to "ramp up its effort to end the bloodshed".

Shah, a shadow Home Office minister, said, "Every day we see footage of heartbreaking stories of children in Gaza."

She went on to describe footage of children caught up in the conflict, some believing they had died and others preparing for death, and some holding a press conference "to call on the world to let them live".

"When will the UK ramp up its effort to end the bloodshed and ensure Palestinian children just have the right to live?" she asked.

According to the Gaza health ministry, around 5,000 children have been killed by Israeli strikes on the territory since October 7.

On Saturday, a Palestinian health minister said 39 babies have died in Al Shifa Hospital.

The minister said the babies died as electricity was cut off at the hospital, and it also faced a lack of oxygen and medicine.

Belgium's deputy prime minister called on the Brussels government to adopt sanctions against the Israeli regime and investigate the bombings of hospitals and refugee camps in Gaza.

“It is time for sanctions against Israel. The rain of bombs is inhumane," Deputy Prime Minister Petra De Sutter told the Nieuwsblad newspaper. 

“It is clear that Israel does not care about the international demands for a ceasefire,” she said.

She also called for an import ban on products from occupied Palestinian territories and banning violent settlers, politicians, and soldiers responsible for war crimes from entering the EU.
At the same time, she said, Belgium should increase funding for the International Criminal Court in The Hague to investigate the Israeli bombings.

The calls have fallen on deaf ears. 

In late October, U.S. President Joe Biden regularly cast doubt on the casualty figures provided by the Gaza health ministry, in what critics said was a clear effort to justify Israeli war crimes. 

Biden's remarks, that he has "no confidence in the number that the Palestinians are using", sparked outrage from UN humanitarian agencies and rights groups who said the Gaza health ministry figures were accurate and historically reliable.

Under heavy pressure and scrutiny, the Biden administration has changed its narrative. 

A senior White House official has now said the number of Palestinians killed is "very possibly" higher than the number being reported by the territory's health ministry.

Barbara Leaf, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, said that it was difficult to assess the number of casualties amid conditions of war.
"We think they’re very high, frankly, and it could be that they're even higher than are being cited,” she stated.

At an international level, the UN Secretary-General told the Reuters NEXT conference that "when one looks at the number of civilians that were killed with the military operations, there is something that is clearly wrong." 

Antonio Guterres also compared the number of children being killed in Gaza with the toll in conflicts around the world that he reports on annually to the UN Security Council. 

He said Gaza was becoming "a graveyard for children."

"Every year, the highest number of killings of children by any of the actors in all the conflicts that we witness is the maximum in the hundreds," Guterres said.

"We have in a few days in Gaza thousands and thousands of children killed, which means there is also something clearly wrong in the way military operations are being done," he added.

The number of Palestinians killed in Gaza by Israeli bombs has surpassed 11,000, according to Gaza's health ministry.

Among those killed by the Israeli strikes are around 5,000 children. The rest are women and other civilians, with a small fraction of the fatalities being Hamas fighters.

UN staff around the world will observe a minute of silence and flags will fly at half mast on Monday, the global body has said, to mark the deaths of more than 100 UN employees in Gaza since October 7. 

UNRWA, the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees, described the war as the deadliest conflict ever for the UN in such a short period of time.

"They represent what is happening to the people of Gaza. They happen to work for the UN,” Juliette Touma, the director of communications at UNRWA, told Reuters. “They and every other civilian in the Gaza Strip... should never have been killed.”

Over 100 UN workers have been killed since October 7, the head of the UNRWA has said.

That is the highest number killed in a single conflict since the UN's inception in 1945.

Philippe Lazzarini said among them were "parents, teachers, nurses, doctors [and] support staff".

There are also complaints that the flow of aid into Gaza is too slow. Also, the number of trucks carrying urgent humanitarian needs, such as water, medicine, and hygiene, from the Rafah border crossing border from Egypt into Gaza doesn’t by no means meet the needs of the people. 

"We cannot drive to the north at the current point, which is, of course, deeply frustrating because we know there are several hundred thousand people who remain in the north," said Jens Laerke, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) spokesman.

"If there is a hell on earth today, its name is northern Gaza," he said. 

"It is a life of fear by day and darkness at night and what do you tell your children in such a situation, it's almost unimaginable - that the fire they see in the sky is out to kill them?" 

On Saturday, Mohammad Abu Selmeyah, director of Al Shifa Hospital, said the Israeli military is "now launching a war on Gaza City hospitals."  

He said later that at least 25 people were killed in Israeli strikes on al-Buraq school in Gaza City, where people whose homes had been destroyed were sheltering.

The evidence of mass Israeli violations of international law is very clear for all to see. But as always, Western double standards are also very clear for all to see.

While publicly acknowledging the mass murder of innocent civilians, Western governments are adamant about shielding the Israeli regime from any punitive measures.

Many observers can see through these double standards. 

Western governments are fully aware that statements and expressions of sympathy will not end the mass murder of civilians in Gaza.