IT is shameful that in this day and age, the world is looking on while horror and brutality is unleashed on Palestinians in Gaza. Without doubt, the callous and indiscriminate killing of Palestinians in Gaza during the past weeks is a crime against humanity.

Israel should be put in the dock for orchestrating and executing massacres of innocent Palestinians and so too should the United States, which to all intents and purposes has sanctioned the Jewish state's actions.

It is an open secret that Israel's actions are backed and fully supported by the US, which has blocked two resolutions at the United Nations that sought to end the carnage in Gaza.

The stench of death over Gaza would spoil what would have otherwise started off as a good year for the United States with the inauguration of its first African American president on January 20.

Amid claims by Israel that the massive air bombing and ground offensive in Gaza is meant to stop Islamic militants from firing rockets into the Jewish state, it is abundantly clear that Israel's strategy is much more than just destroying the rockets and their infrastructure.

The war in Gaza has provided Israel with the perfect cover to overthrow and possibly destroy its long time nemesis - the Hamas movement that controls Gaza. That is its ultimate goal.

In pursuit of this strategy, Israel is engaged in total war with the whole Palestinian population and wants to inflict maximum collateral damage on Gaza and the Palestinians. It is destroying lives and buildings by shooting at anything and everything like a blind mad man and using all the firepower at its disposal short of nukes. Pictures of dead bodies of small children in the hands of their weeping parents were on the screens of Aljazeera all day long on Wednesday and are a reminder of the Jewish state's callous behaviour.

Still nursing a grudge against Hizbola for the heavy casualties and failed objective of its military adventure in Lebanon in 2006, Israel is determined that this time round, it does not incur a bloody nose at the hands of an Islamic militant group.

The war in Gaza is therefore partly meant to prove the point that Israel is still the dominant force in the region and thus send a message to would-be enemies about its military capability. It is about restoring pride at home and beyond.

Israel is also looking at the long-term objective of a future settlement with Palestinians. By going after Hamas, it hopes to bolster its negotiating position while weakening future peace negotiating partners.

Consequently, the objectives of the Israeli incursion in Gaza are manifold and that is why it wants more time to achieve not one but more than one of its many objectives in Gaza and much so because it is unsure about how the situation in the middle east will play out under the new Obama administration.

Today, Palestinians are left to drown in their own blood while an indifferent international community watches without shame, the massacres of an enslaved people whose freedom has long been denied by the apartheid type Jewish state. Equally indifferent are Arab nations whose moral conscience and voice are conspicuous for their absence. Battered Palestinians on the streets of Gaza are asking about the whereabouts of their Arab brothers while they wine and dine in the corridors of power in Cairo, Riyadh and Amman.

The only country that has taken a significant stand against Israel is Venezuela by expelling the Israeli ambassador to that country. Venezuela's foreign minister has likened the killing of Palestinians in Gaza to the holocaust against Jews.

The world's inaction on Gaza could lead to the spread of the conflict. With rockets raining in on Israel from Lebanon and volunteers of fighters from countries such as Indonesia, the conflict in the Middle East could widen.

The United Nations on the other hand has proven to be ineffective in the event of a conflict where the world's remaining super power has a vested interest. Thirteen days after the outbreak of the war in Gaza, the UN Security Council is still wrangling over the correct wording on a resolution to the conflict while Palestinians are being killed like flies in their land.

Gaza is the shame of the world.