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3 June 2019 – Israeli provocations and raids on Al-Haram Al-Sharif

03 June 2019 by

Excellency,

As we somberly approach the 52nd year since Israel’s occupation in June 1967 of Palestinian and Arab lands, we must draw the international community’s urgent attention to the escalating tensions and deteriorating situation on the ground in Occupied Palestine, including East Jerusalem, as a result of intensifying illegal Israeli policies and practices, including rising provocations, incitement and aggression by the Israeli occupying forces and extremist Israeli settlers against Palestinian civilians.

In recent days, such provocations have once again involved raids and aggression against holy sites and Palestinian worshippers in Occupied East Jerusalem, in violation of the historic status quo at Al-Haram Al-Sharif, which houses the holy Al-Aqsa and Dome of the Rock Mosques. Such actions further inflaming religious sensitivities and dangerous destabilization of an already volatile and fragile situation.

Israel, the occupying Power, must be demanded to cease forthwith all such illegal and destabilizing actions and to respect its legal obligations, in accordance with international law and the relevant United Nations resolutions and to respect the decades-long historic legal and religious status quo at Al-Haram Al-Sharif, including the custodianship of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan over the Muslim and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem.

Yesterday, 2 June, witnessed raids by the Israeli occupying forces on the compound, as well as by more than one thousand extremist Israeli settlers, who marched to the compound in an aggressive manner, blatantly inciting against Palestinians, to mark what Israelis call “Jerusalem Day”, which coincides with the anniversary of Israel’s seizure and occupation of East Jerusalem in the June 1967 war. More than 45 Palestinian civilians were injured as the Israeli occupying forces violently assaulted and forcibly dispersed Muslim worshippers, detained several worshippers, and even locked the doors to the mosques preventing the faithful from entering for prayer. [Read more…]

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Statement by H.E. Dr. Riyad Mansour, Minister, Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine to the United Nations, before the United Nations Security Council, Quarterly Open Debate “The Situation in the Middle East, including the Palestine Question”, 29 April 2019

29 April 2019 by

Mr. President,

I thank the German and French Presidencies of the Security Council for their skillful joint leadership over these past two months.

I also thank Under-Secretary-General for Political and Peacebuilding Affairs Rosemary DiCarlo, for her briefing and able guidance of the Department. We also recognize the ongoing efforts of UN Special Coordinator Nikolay Mladenov and his team, as well as the vital role and support of UNRWA and the efforts of OCHA, UNICEF, UNDP and all UN Agencies on the ground, at this critical time.

Mr. President,

We meet at a moment of great uncertainty and volatility. The situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, is rapidly declining, despair is rising and a peace horizon is being nullified by an occupying Power that insists on imposing its illegal agenda at any cost.

The outlook has become even grimmer after an Israeli election further entrenching the extreme right that has come to rule Israel as a racist, apartheid State under Prime Minister Netanyahu. The absolute support given to Israel by a Permanent Member of this Council has only emboldened its flouting of the law, further fueling its human rights violations against our people and colonization of our land. [Read more…]

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1 April 2019 – Israeli Crimes against the Palestinian People in Gaza

02 April 2019 by

Excellency,

It is with deep regret that I must write to you again following the tragic loss of life among Palestinians as a result of the indiscriminate, unlawful force that continues to be used by Israel, the occupying Power, against the Palestinian civilian population being held captive under its illegal occupation and blockade.

Despite repeated warnings about Israel’s escalating aggression and threats, regrettably no meaningful action has been taken by the international community to avert the loss of life. Despite repeated appeals for protection of the Palestinian people, in accordance with international law, including humanitarian and human rights law, and relevant United Nations resolutions, Palestinian families are again mourning the dead and tending with their meager resources to hundreds more wounded by the Israeli occupying forces, which have once again unleashed lethal force against peaceful civilian demonstrators.

This past weekend, 30 March, marked the one-year anniversary of the Great March of Return, and the 43rd commemoration of Land Day by the Palestinian people. For the 52nd consecutive week, tens of thousands of Palestinians marched along the eastern border of Gaza persisting in their calls for an end to the inhumane Israeli blockade of Gaza, an end to the illegal Israeli occupation and dispossession of our people, realization of the right of the Palestine refugees to return, and freedom for the Palestinian people. Regrettably, their pleas for an end to this cruel injustice have been to no avail. [Read more…]

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25 March 2019 – Palestinian Civilian Casualties

26 March 2019 by

Excellency,

I write to you with urgency, warning of the dangerous escalation of the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, especially at this moment in the besieged Gaza Strip. We appeal to the international community to act with responsibility to de-escalate the situation and to ensure the protection of innocent civilian lives. The Security Council in particular is duty-bound to act to avert another deadly cycle of violence and maintain international peace and security.

As I write to you, 2 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip – children, women and men – are once again enduring the terror of Israeli airstrikes and bombings, bracing themselves for the destruction and grief that will surely follow for our civilians who have nowhere to shelter from such aggression and cruel collective punishment of the entire population. Over the past few hours, hundreds of missiles have been fired from Israeli warplanes at areas throughout the densely-populated Gaza Strip and Israeli tanks and soldiers are amassing at the borders of cause, causing fear and panic to spread among the population of yet another war.

The intensification of inflammatory rhetoric and threats by Israel, the occupying Power, should be cause for extreme worry for the international community, which has too many times stood by and witnessed the slaughter of innocent, defenseless Palestinian civilians. We urge that the early warnings be heeded and that action be undertaken, including immediate mediation efforts, with a view to preventing such brutality and devastation once again. [Read more…]

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15 March 2019 – Israeli Airstrikes on the Gaza Strip

15 March 2019 by

Excellency,

I write once again in the span of days to draw the international community’s urgent attention to the continually rising tensions and deterioration of the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, as Israel, the occupying Power, persists with its aggressions, provocations and illegal policies and practices against the Palestinian people.

In the predawn (Palestine time) hours of today, Israeli warplanes carried out approximately 100 airstrikes against the Gaza Strip, terrorizing the besieged Palestinian civilian population and causing injury to at least four Palestinians. The Palestinian leadership condemns this Israeli military aggression in the strongest terms. [Read more…]

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12 March 2019 – Escalation in Occupied East Jerusalem

12 March 2019 by

Excellency,

I write to draw the international community’s urgent attention to destabilizing developments in Occupied East Jerusalem. Acts of aggression and incitement against both civilian worshippers and holy sites continue to be perpetrated by Israel, the occupying Power, in a reckless manner.

Amidst already-heightened tensions, such illegal and provocative actions threaten to spiral out of control with dangerous consequences. Immediate efforts are required to de-escalate the situation in order to protect civilian lives and the sanctity of holy sites in Occupied East Jerusalem, including Al-Haram Al-Sharif, which houses the holy Al-Aqsa Mosque and Dome of the Rock.

Israel’s decision today to seal all gates to the compound, as well as to the entirety of the Old City of Jerusalem itself, has seriously inflamed tensions that have already been exacerbated by the occupying Power’s earlier attempts to force the closure of the Bab al-Rahma gate and prayer area, which had been recently reopened by the Waqf. Prior to sealing off Al-Aqsa Mosque Compound, Israeli occupying forces attacked Palestinian worshippers, including men and women who had been praying inside the Dome of the Rock, and also assaulted several Waqf personnel, before forcibly removing all worshippers from the compound. The Palestine Red Crescent has reported that at least four civilians have been taken to the hospital due to injuries sustained. [Read more…]

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27 February 2019 – Israeli Crimes and Provocations against the Palestinian People

27 February 2019 by

Excellency,

I write once again to urgently draw attention to the deteriorating situation in Occupied Palestine, including East Jerusalem, as Israel, the occupying Power, persists with its aggressions against the Palestinian people in breach of international law, United Nations resolutions and bilateral agreements. While Israeli officials continue spewing hateful and inflammatory rhetoric against our people and leadership in the run up to the Israeli elections, the Israeli Government is intensifying its illegal, repressive measures aimed at proving its brutality against our people in the race for right-wing votes.

Such extremism has heightened insecurity and resulted in the loss of more innocent Palestinian lives, including children. Yet another young boy has been killed by the Israeli occupying forces, which continue using live ammunition against unarmed civilian protesters. On 22 February, as Palestinians in Gaza demonstrated during the 48th week of the Great March of Return, Yousef Sa’id Al-Daya, age 14, was shot in the chest with live ammunition in another display of excessive and indiscriminate force by the Israeli military, which also caused injury to 115 people, including 16 children, 10 women, a journalist and a paramedic. We call for accountability for his murder and the murders of the hundreds of innocent civilians that have preceded him. The perpetrators of these ruthless crimes cannot go unpunished. [Read more…]

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19 February 2019 – Israeli Dispossession of the Palestinian People

20 February 2019 by

Excellency,

We continue to call on Member States of the United Nations to intensify their efforts, individually and collectively, in line with their obligations under international law, including humanitarian and human rights law, and consistent with the relevant UN resolutions, to hold Israel, the occupying Power, accountable for its violations in Occupied Palestine, including East Jerusalem. In this fifty-second year of the occupation and seventy-one years since the onset of the Al-Nakba, we will not relent in calling for international law to be upheld and for fulfillment of the Palestinian people’s inalienable rights and legitimate national aspirations.

While not possible in the context of these letters to document every single Israeli crime against our people, we will continue to alert the international community as to Israel’s illegal policies and practices in our determined pursuit of international action and measures of accountability to bring an end to this illegal and abhorrent situation.

Accordingly, I must draw attention to the risks of further destabilization of the fragile and tense situation on the ground as the occupying Power is intensifying its provocations, incitement and illegal measures against both the Palestinian people and their leadership. In this regard, the Israeli government has once again decided to seize and withhold Palestinian tax revenues, collected by Israel on behalf of Palestinians in accordance with an agreement between the two sides, in a blatant act of theft and piracy directly intended to undermine the Palestinian leadership and causing harm to Palestinian families. By Israel’s own admission, this illegal withholding of our tax revenues is aimed at among the most vulnerable segments of our society – the families of our thousands of political prisoners and our martyrs – in an attempt to collapse the social safety net provided to these families and to deepen their deprivation and want. [Read more…]

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12 February 2019 – Incitement and provocation by the occupying Power

12 February 2019 by

Excellency,

I write to you in follow-up to our numerous letters alerting the international community to the illegal policies and constant incitement by Israel, the occupying Power, against the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem. In the recent period, such illegal practices and reckless inflammatory rhetoric and provocations appear to have been deliberately escalated by the occupying Power, exacerbating the insecurity of the Palestinian civilian population, who are being targeted by more and more violence by Israeli military and settler forces, risking innocent lives and further destabilization of the fragile situation on the ground.

We condemn the Israeli occupying forces’ indiscriminate, lethal force against Palestinian civilians, including the latest murders, perpetrated on Friday, 7 February, of two Palestinian children, Hasan Eyad Shalbi, age 13, and Hamza Mohammed Rashdi Ishteiwi, age 17. Both were shot to death with live ammunition, one to the chest and one to the neck, during the Great March of Return protests in the besieged Gaza Strip, and dozens people were injured, adding to the thousands of casualties since these protest began on 30 March 2018.  At the same time, Israeli occupying forces and extremist settlers continue their violent rampages against Palestinian civilians in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, terrorizing the population and causing harm to civilians and destruction of their properties. [Read more…]

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30 January 2019 – Settler violence continues in the Occupied Palestinian Territory

01 February 2019 by

Excellency,

I am compelled to write once again as Israeli crimes against the Palestinian civilian population in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, persist and continue to cause casualties and destruction, including death and injury to innocent civilians. In particular, Israeli settler violence and terror against Palestinians has sharply escalated, heightening the insecurity of our civilian population and further underscoring the need for international protection for them as this illegal occupation becomes only more brutal and extreme with every passing day. [Read more…]

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