Archives for 2018

Excellency,

The situation in the Occupied State of Palestine, including East Jerusalem, remains extremely volatile as Israel, the occupying Power, persists with its violations of international law, including humanitarian and human rights law, causing the continued deterioration of the situation in all aspects, including the continued suffering of the Palestinian people under its occupation, and further deepening despair and inflaming tensions.

Last week, Israel, the occupying Power, continued with its vicious killing of unarmed, defenseless Palestinian civilians participating in the “Great March of Return” to protest the systematic violation of their human rights, to demand an end to Israeli occupation, siege and dispossession, and to call for independence, freedom and return to their ancestral lands. The total number of Palestinians killed since the March began on 30 March has reached 164, including 23 children.

Moreover, on 10 August, Israeli forces fatally wounded three Palestinian protesters, including Palestinian volunteer medic Abdallah al-Qatati, age 22, as he was treating an injured protester, Ali Said al-Aloul, age 55, who was also shot and killed. Abdallah, like the two other Palestinian medics killed by Israel since the beginning of the Great March of Return protests, was wearing clothes clearly identifying him as medical personnel. [Read more…]

Excellency,

As conditions continue to dangerously deteriorate, I am compelled to write to you once again to draw your attention to the ongoing critical situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and more specifically, to the grave reality faced by Palestinian civilians as a direct result of the Israeli military occupation.

On 8 August, all throughout the night, Israeli occupying forces carried out indiscriminate airstrikes across the besieged Gaza Strip, killing three Palestinians, including a 23-year-old pregnant woman, Inas Khammash, and her 18-month-old toddler, Bayan Khammash, as they were in their home in Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip. Heavy shelling by Israeli warplanes in various areas in Gaza also resulted in the injury of at least 9 other Palestinians. We condemn in the strongest terms these Israeli military attacks on the densely-populated Gaza Strip, further endangering civilian lives and causing damage and destruction to civilian property, including, inter alia, a cultural center home to the second largest theatre in Gaza. [Read more…]

Excellency,

I write to urgently draw your attention to the critical situation in the Occupied State of Palestine, including East Jerusalem, due to Israel’s endless provocations and illegal actions against the Palestinian people and their holy sites in the Occupied East Jerusalem, particularly Al-Haram Al-Sharif, which houses Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Again, we are witnessing the same provocative actions against the holy sites in Occupied East Jerusalem, by Israel, the occupying Power, which are further fueling already-high tensions and continuing to destabilize the fragile situation on the ground. In this regard, today, Israeli occupying forces violently stormed al-Aqsa Mosque Compound, firing tear gas and stun grenades at Muslim worshipers gathered for Friday prayers, injuring nearly 40 Palestinians, including two of Al-Waqf guards.  In addition, Israeli occupying forces arrested six Palestinians. Moreover, Israel took yet an additional dangerous and condemnable action in which they sealed off Al-Aqsa Mosque with iron chains, preventing Palestinian worshippers from entering to worship, which led to confrontations between Israeli occupying forces and Muslim worshipers. [Read more…]

Excellency,

I am compelled to write to you once again to draw your attention to the ongoing critical situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and more specifically, to the grave reality faced by Palestinian civilians as a direct result of the Israeli military occupation.

Israeli occupying forces carried out airstrikes across the Gaza Strip on 13 July, and continued overnight, culminating on 14 July in Israel’s largest daytime airstrike campaign in the besieged enclave since its 2014 aggression on the territory that killed more than 2,200 Palestinians.

Two Palestinian children, Amir al-Nimra, age 15, and Louay Kaheil, age 16, were killed by an Israeli missile as they were playing on the roof of the Al-Katiba building, a large unoccupied and unfinished concrete structure in the heart of Gaza City located next to a park often visited by Palestinian families during the summertime. Amir and Louay were best friends, described to be “like twin brothers” who grew up in the same street in central Gaza. Louay was killed by a hit to the head and in the back, and Amir died as a result of shrapnel puncturing his entire body. [Read more…]

Excellency,

I write to you in follow up to previous letters to draw urgent attention to the imminent threat of forcible transfer facing the Palestinian Bedouin communities of Khan al Ahmar-Abu al Helu and Abu-Nwar in the sensitive “E-1 area” of the West Bank northeast of Occupied East Jerusalem.

In recent days, Israel, the occupying Power, has begun implementation of its plans to forcibly remove both the inhabitants and civilian and livelihood structures in this area to clear the way for its plans for the illegal construction and expansion of settlements in the area. These cruel and destructive measures are not only in grave breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention, thus constituting war crimes, but also threaten to completely sever East Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank, destroying whatever remains of the physical viability of the two-State solution.

For years, Israel has been advancing its plans to forcibly transfer and ethnically cleanse the Bedouin population of Khan al Ahmar, 53% of whom are children and 95% of whom are Palestine refugees registered with UNRWA. The known purpose of such plans is to facilitate the expansion of illegal Israeli settlements in the area, in grave breach of international law and numerous UN resolutions, including Security Council resolution 2334 (2016). Yesterday, the Israeli occupying forces, using bulldozers and other military machinery, began destroying all access routes in Khan al Ahmar-Abu al Helu, which is home to more than 180 civilians. At least 35 Palestinians were injured due to use of force by Israeli soldiers against the defenseless civilians protesting this illegal and provocative action that is traumatizing the entire community. [Read more…]

Excellency,

I am compelled to write to you once again, for the eleventh week in a row, to draw your attention to the ongoing critical situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and more specifically, to the grave reality that continues to be faced by Palestinian civilians under Israel’s military occupation.

Civilian casualties continue to be directly caused by the illegal policies and practices of the occupying Power, further traumatizing the population. On 6 June, Israeli occupying forces shot and killed 21-year-old Izz al-Din Al-Tamimi, in the village of Nabi Saleh, northwest of Ramallah. The youth was shot at close range with three bullets, one of them to the neck, even as he posed no direct or immediate threat to the soldiers. When Palestinian medics attempted to rescue him, Israeli forces prevented them from doing so and left Izz al-Din to bleed to death for over thirty minutes before an ambulance was allowed to arrive to carry his corpse.

What makes the killing of Izz al-Din Al-Tamimi even more atrocious is that it was clearly premeditated. According to his mother, two days prior to the incident, soldiers had come to her house and told her “we will kill your son and leave you crying”. Like all Palestinians living under occupation, Izz al-Din’s entire life was marked by daily violence, humiliation and oppression. [Read more…]

Excellency,

On this somber 51^st anniversary of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian and Arab territories in 1967, I am compelled to write to you once again to draw the international community’s attention to the violent crimes and human rights violations that continue to be endured by the Palestinian people as a result of this illegal and belligerent Israeli military occupation.

It is astounding and deeply tragic that – despite the passage of more than a half-century of Israel’s occupation and the passage of seventy years of the dispossession, displacement and oppression of the Palestinian people in an ongoing and cruel Nakba – not only has the international community failed to mobilize to redress this unlawful situation – from its root causes to the crises we witness today – but it has allowed the situation to further deteriorate, with regression of both the conditions on the ground and the prospects for achieving a just and peaceful solution.

As the suffering of our people has intensified in recent weeks and months, their faith in the international community and international law to protect them and preserve their rights from Israel’s relentless onslaught has been even more severely diminished. Yet again, despite their appeals and hopes, the United Nations Security Council failed to act to address their worsening plight, particularly in the Gaza Strip, due to the veto cast by the United States on the draft resolution that was presented by Kuwait in its capacity as the Arab representative on the Council. [Read more…]