Excellency,

Israeli occupying forces (IOF), including armed settler militias, continue to kill and injure Palestinian civilians, to damage and destroy civilian properties, and to violate the sanctity of holy sites, particularly Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif in ongoing attacks, which are deliberate and systematic in their nature.

While the Security Council’s negligence of the Palestinian plight under Israel’s illegal colonial occupation and apartheid regime continues, the occupying Power’s impunity is emboldened in full confidence that there will be no consequences for its barbaric violence and crimes and the situation becomes ever more volatile. Palestinian civilians, including children, are paying with their lives for this negligence.

In yet another large-scale Israeli military raid on the Jenin refugee camp today, four Palestinians were killed and 44 other Palestinians were injured, many in critical condition after being shot by live ammunition. The four young men murdered by the IOF were Abed Fathi Hazem, whose brother of Raad was killed by IOF in April, Mohammad Mahmoud Elwaneh, Ahmad Nathmi Alawneh, and Mohammad Abu Naaseh.

These casualties follow Israeli raids that have killed several other Palestinians in the recent period, including, inter alia, the killing of another young Palestinian man, Sa’ed al-Kuni, by IOF on 25 September; the killing on 24 September of Mohammed Ali Abu Kafia, a schoolteacher and father of 3 children, when IOF opened fire on him when he lost control of his vehicle near the village of Jit west of Nablus; the killing of Hamada Mustafa Abu Jelda, who died on 11 September of wounds sustained from an earlier Israeli raid on the Jenin camp; and the shooting and killing of a Palestinian child, Haitham Mubakar, age 17, near the village of Beitin, east of Ramallah.

The lives of their families have been shattered, as has happened to so many families before them; and life in the Jenin refugee camp – as in Nablus, Jerusalem, Al-Khalil (Hebron) and other Palestinian cities and camps at a time that should be an optimistic and tranquil start of the school year for children – is in turmoil, marred by deep grief at these killings and outrage at constant Israeli military assaults and settler terror against Palestinian civilians.

The shoot-to-kill policy underlying all of these killings expose Israel’s cruel disregard for Palestinian life in specific and the sanctity of human life in particular. Provoking the situation further, IOF continued the aggression after the Jenin raid today, attacking Palestinian protesters in various areas in the occupied West Bank with bullets, tear gas and stun grenades, conveying a loud message that Israel will violently crackdown any resistance to its vicious occupation. This has simultaneously emboldened extremist settler militias to carry on with their rampages, with at least 21 Palestinians injured just today by settler attacks in the village of Madama near Nablus.

What is apparent across the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, is that, while on the world stage, the Israeli Prime Minister offers platitudes about peace, in reality the occupying Power has not for one minute ceased its persecution of the Palestinian people or its colonization of their land. On the contrary, Israel is intensifying its subjugation of our people, including rabid violence and incitement by its settlers, and is entrenching its occupation, including via nonstop construction of settlements, in grave breach of international law and contempt of the international community’s standing demand for a halt to such illegal policies and practices, as repeatedly legislated by the General Assembly and Security Council, including in resolution 2334 (2016).

Israel is violating every single resolution and every single one of its obligations as an occupying Power under the Fourth Geneva Convention, fully confident that the ongoing international paralysis on the Palestine question, especially in the Security Council, guarantees its continued evasion of accountability. In fact, as recently reported, the number of Palestinian casualties in the occupied West Bank this year caused by IOF and settlers is at the highest level since the UN began recording fatalities in 2005, with no accountability for a single killing. This violent impunity, and the dangerous destabilization it is causing, require immediate attention and action.

Moreover, we must draw attention to the escalating attacks by Israeli settlers, accompanied by IOF, on Al-Haram Al-Sharif. Extremist Jewish settlers continue to break into Al-Aqsa Mosque and to violate the historic and legal status quo at this holy site as a place solely for Muslim worship. These extremist groups are exploiting the Jewish holy days to provoke and incite in a most violent, reckless manner that risks an uncontrollable conflagration.

Such actions should be condemned and action taken to immediately halt them. Israel, the occupying Power, must be demanded to unequivocally respect the historic and legal status quo at the holy sites, Jordan’s custodianship of the holy sites in Jerusalem and the authority of the Islamic Waqf, and the numerous relevant UN resolutions concerning Jerusalem and the Occupied Palestinian Territory as a whole. International law strictly prohibits the occupying Power from altering the demography, character, status and identity of the occupied territory and Israel must be held accountable for all its deviations and violations.

In light of all the above, we are forced to reiterate: What is being done to the Palestinian people is inhumane and unlawful, amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity, including the crime of apartheid, as our people are being hunted down and killed by the Israeli occupying forces (IOF), arbitrarily detained and jailed, dispossessed of their homes and lands, denied every human right simply because of who they are – Palestinians, not Jews – and for refusing to submit to Israel’s foreign colonial occupation and demanding their freedom like every other human being on earth is entitled to.

Faced with this appalling reality and dangerous deterioration of the situation, upholding international law and ensuring accountability must be a priority for the international community for it is the linchpin to stopping this downward spiral, saving human lives and charting a viable course for justice and a lasting peace that ensures the realization of the rights of the Palestinian people, including foremost to self-determination, and brings to fruition the two-State solution on the pre-1967 lines long enshrined in UN resolutions.

The Security Council in particular has clear responsibilities and cannot continue to shirk them while innocent civilians are being killed and terrorized and an entire nation is being deprived of its independence and peace and security. We thus call once again on the Council to act forthwith to implement its resolutions towards bringing an end to this illegal colonial occupation and apartheid regime and an end to this historic injustice.

This letter is in follow-up to our 765 letters regarding the ongoing crisis in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, which constitutes the territory of the State of Palestine. These letters, dated from 29 September 2000 (A/55/432-S/2000/921) to 31 August 2022 (A/ES-10/912–S/2022/662) constitute a basic record of the crimes being committed by Israel, the occupying Power, against the Palestinian people since September 2000. For all of these war crimes, acts of State terrorism and systematic human rights violations being committed against the Palestinian people, Israel, the occupying Power, must be held accountable and the perpetrators must be brought to justice.

I should be grateful if you would arrange to have this letter distributed as an official document of the 10^th emergency special session of the General Assembly, under agenda item 5, and of the Security Council.

Please accept, Excellency, the assurances of my highest consideration.

Dr. Riyad Mansour

Minister, Permanent Observer

Excellency,

I regret that I must once again draw your attention to the deteriorating situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, due to the escalating illegal policies and practices of Israel, the occupying Power. Coupled with systematic human rights violations, the intensity of violent and racist attacks by Israeli occupying forces and mobs of extremists against Palestinian civilians continue to cause widespread human suffering and to aggravate an extremely volatile situation.

Since the beginning of the year, we have repeatedly cautioned the international community about intensifying Israeli attacks and human rights violations against the Palestinian people and urged action in line with legal obligations under international law, including humanitarian and human rights law. Yet, halfway through the year, even as the scope and scale of crimes and violations escalate Israel’s impunity rages unabated, inaction and unaccountability remain the regrettable norm.

Whether conveyed by the State of Palestine or other responsible entities, the level of warnings in this year alone underscores the urgency of serious action to bring a halt to Israel’s systematic breaches, including its rabid settlement colonization of our land. It is through such colonization that Israel has entrenched its illegal occupation and perpetuated its inhumane subjugation of our people, amounting to a regime of apartheid and exposing that it has no intention whatsoever of ending this illegal situation, but rather clearly preparing for full-fledged annexation of the Palestinian land and continued domination of the Palestinian people.

In this regard, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967, Michael Lynk, has stressed in a statement issued today, 9 July, that the Israeli settlements are “the engine of Israel’s 54-year-old occupation, the longest in the modern world”. Underscoring the deleterious effect of the lack of accountability, he moreover stated: “It is a tragic paradox that, while the Israeli settlements are clearly prohibited by international law, the international community has been remarkably reluctant to enforce its own laws”. But beyond lamenting this unjust situation, the Special Rapporteur, as so many others, continues to rightly call for action to uphold international law and implement the relevant United Nations resolutions, including Security Council resolution 2334 (2016), in order to immediately address the critical situation on the ground and to also chart a path forward for a political horizon in which it will be possible to pursue a just and peaceful solution.

The dangers of this situation are illustrated in so many instances, including in the town of Beita, near Nablus, in the occupied West Bank, which highlights the daily Palestinian struggle and resiliency against a criminal colonization enterprise that has no regard for their presence or rights. In Beita, extremist Israeli settler groups established in May an illegal outpost on the town’s mountaintop of Jabal Sbeih. Under the protection of Israeli occupation forces (IOF), settler extremist groups such as “Lehava”, “La Familia”, “Price Tag”, and “Hilltop Youth” have intensified attacks on Beita’s lands and residents in a coordinated campaign to expand illegal settlements through continued expropriation of Palestinian land and facilitation of the establishment of settler-only roads, bypasses, tunnels, and other essential infrastructure, cutting of Palestinian areas and further privileging the Israeli settlers illegally transferred to our land.

Most of the settler extremists in Beita have come from nearby settlements and outposts, mainly from the so-called “Yitzhar” settlement, whose settler population is notoriously known for incitement and violence. IOF also persist with lethal use of force against civilians protesting the expropriation of Beita’s lands, with two teenagers being the latest victims: 16-year-old Mohammed Hamayel, and 17-year-old Ahmed Bani-Shamsa. Since the start of anti-settlement protests in Beita in May, IOF has killed six Palestinians and injured more than 700 Palestinians as Israel blatantly prepares seeks to further colonize the Palestinian land and destroy its contiguity and diminish the Palestinian presence, as being done in the Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan neighborhoods of occupied East Jerusalem and elsewhere throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

Yet, the villagers in Beita and surrounding area, like the rest of the Palestinian people, will not capitulate to the terror and oppression of the IOF and state-sponsored settler groups and remain steadfast, protecting their land and demanding their rights. Settlers “temporarily” evacuated the illegal outpost as Beita’s residents have been determined, using nonviolent means, to defend their lands and homes from ever-expanding and encroaching settlements. As settler groups “negotiate” with the Israeli government on their unlawful return to Beita, the brave residents of Beita are entitled to and will continue to resist the settlement colonization of their lands, even if the Israeli army attempts to illegally seize the land under the pretext of establishing a so-called military “firing zone”. We thus reiterate our longstanding call on the international community to act to bring an end to Israel’s colonial settlement drive, for which Israel must be fully held accountable.

In this regard, we draw attention to the 7 July letter signed by 130 European parliamentarians, warning about Israel’s illegal settlement activities in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and urging support for the UN database of businesses involved in “activities facilitating a range of violations, including the appropriation of land, destruction of property, the unlawful exploitation of natural resources, and the construction of settlement units and associated infrastructure, all contributing to the maintenance and growth of Israel’s settlement enterprise”. Moreover, the parliamentarians stress that “through the settlement enterprise and Separation Wall, in which the contribution of business enterprises is vivid, Israel has established a situation of de facto annexation in the occupied West Bank, besides the annexation of occupied East Jerusalem.” It is time to stop making excuses for such criminal behavior. Accountability is imperative; the international community has the tools to do so and it must act without delay.

In this connection, we must also draw attention to Israel’s aggression yet again on Palestinian Bedouin families in Humsa Al-Bqai’a, also known as Khirbet Humsa. On 7 July, IOF again dismantled and demolished homes  and property in the community, insisting on its forced displacement in direct violation of the obligations of the occupying Power under international humanitarian law. This is the seventh time since November 2020 that IOF, equipped with heavy militarized machinery, destroyed the community, and the international community has yet to save it once from demolition or hold Israel accountable. As stressed by the Norwegian Refugee Council, “The international community must resolutely condemn this dispossession and show that it will not tolerate these brazen breaches of international law. The Israeli authorities must immediately grant humanitarian access to the community to meet their urgent needs.”

As a result, 30 structures were demolished, mostly provided by the EU as a humanitarian response following a previous mass demolition in February. According to NGO West Bank Protection Consortium, 65 people, including 35 children, were again displaced and left with nowhere to go in 102°F (39 Celsius) heat. As in so many other instances, Israel attempts to justify destruction of Humsa Al-Bqai’a based on empty pretexts, including its unilateral designation of such areas as so-called “firing zones”, all aimed at one objective: entrenching its control and occupation of the land.

Such repeated destruction of an entire community is explicitly intended to create an ever more coercive environment, facilitating greater control over Palestinian land, but without Palestinians, further acceleration the realization of Israel’s illegal annexation schemes. As reported by OCHA, “So far in 2021, Israeli authorities have demolished, seized or forced people to demolish at least 421 Palestinian-owned structures, including 130 donor-funded, displacing 592 people, including some 320 children across the West Bank.” This has happened in just the span of the first six months of the year, before the eyes of the world and in the middle of a global pandemic, and yet there is no accountability.

At the same time, Palestinian families in the neighborhoods of occupied East Jerusalem remain at imminent risk of forced displacement and mass dispossession due to the same illegal Israeli policies aimed at forcibly removing Palestinians from their homes and land and replacing them with Jewish settlers. This has been known Israeli policy for decades and has been especially virulent in and around Jerusalem.

On 6 July, IOF destroyed a school in Shufat refugee camp in occupied East Jerusalem under the pretext it lacked an occupation-issued building permit. According to the Israeli NGO Breaking the Silence, Israel has rejected nearly 99 percent of Palestinian building permit applications over the years, making it impossible for Palestinians to build and develop their communities in their own land. The following day, IOF issued demolition orders against residential buildings in Shufat refugee camp. If the demolitions are not halted, 10 Palestinian families comprising 55 people, including 25 children, will be displaced.

On 6 July, a Palestinian family in al-Tur neighborhood of East Jerusalem was forced to self-demolish their home to avoid the heavy demolition fees punitively imposed by the occupation. This is the second time the Abu Ghannam’s home has been demolished; the first time was in 1994. On 8 July, IOF stormed Turmus Ayya, near Ramallah, and rigged the two-story family home of Muntaser Shalabi, a Palestinian detainee in Israel, with explosives before blowing it up into rubble in a punitive measure that amounts to collective punishment. Here we echo the call of the US embassy: “the home of an entire family should not be demolished for the actions of one individual.” The international community must explicitly demand that Israel, the occupying Power, cease such criminal action and abide by its legal obligations under international humanitarian law, particularly Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits an occupying Power from imposing collective punishment on protected persons and their property.

In this connection, we must also draw attention to the ongoing and worsening humanitarian crisis in the besieged Gaza Strip. According to a joint UN, EU, World Bank assessment, the extent of physical damage caused by Israel’s latest aggression on Gaza ranges between US$290 to US$380 million, exacerbating the already dire socio-economic conditions being suffered by Gaza’s two million people as a result of repeated military aggressions by Israel and its illegal 15-year blockade. As underlined in the recent report of UN Special Rapporteur Lynk to the Human Rights Council, “The Israeli-imposed blockade on Gaza contravenes international law, specifically Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, and amounts to the collective punishment of the entire civilian population in Gaza.” We reiterate our calls for the full lifting of the land, air and sea blockade imposed on the Palestinian civilian population in Gaza and the imperative of unimpeded access to humanitarian needs and relief.

In this regard, we highlight UNRWA’s humanitarian recovery appeal calling for the provision of immediate assistance to meet the immense needs of the many Palestine refugee children, women and men in Gaza devastated by the Israeli military aggression, and reiterate our deep gratitude for the critical and tireless efforts of the many UN personnel and agencies assisting the Palestinian people.

Year after year, the international community issues statements and condemnations on cycles of Israeli crimes and violations, yet falls short of translating words into action. Year after year, the United Nations as a whole adopts countless of resolutions highlighting the gravity and many dangers of the continuation of this historic injustice, but falls short on implementation and accountability. Clearly, such cycles of inaction only fuel Israel’s impunity while undermining the credibility of international law and the United Nations system as a whole. People across the world are watching, and history is keeping account.

As the longest belligerent occupation in modern history has entered its 54^th year, it is incumbent on the international community, particularly the Security Council, using the means and measures afforded by international law to finally hold Israel, the occupying Power, accountable for its violations and crimes against the Palestinian people. Despite the Security Council’s regrettable ongoing paralysis, States must uphold their obligations and commitments. In this regard, accountability is central both for ending this historic injustice and reasserting the applicability of international law in the face of violations and breaches. As affirmed in Article 24 of the UN Charter, “Members of the United Nations agree to accept and carry out the decisions of the Security Council in accordance with the present Charter.”

Like all occupiers of the past, Israel will come to realize that it cannot occupy and subjugate the Palestinian people indefinitely. Just like olive trees, our roots are deep and grow under harsh conditions. Just like Al-Ghadanfar Abu Atwan, the 28-year-old Palestinian man who went on hunger strike for 65 days in protest of his unlawful imprisonment without charge or trial by Israel, the Palestinian people will persist in their just and dignified struggle for self-determination, freedom and justice, as prominently enshrined in the UN Charter. Ghadanfar, meaning lion in Arabic, amplifies the strength of the resilience of the Palestinian people in their quest to live in freedom, independence and dignity in their homeland, an inalienable right we will never forsake. We call upon the international community to uphold its obligations in respect of this inalienable right to help usher the more just, peaceful and secure future we seek and deserve.

This letter is in follow-up to our 725 letters regarding the ongoing crisis in the Occupied Palestinian

Territory, including East Jerusalem, which constitutes the territory of the State of Palestine. These letters, dated from 29 September 2000 (A/55/432-S/2000/921) to 28 June 2021 (A/ES-10/xxx-S/2021/xxx) constitute a basic record of the crimes being committed by Israel, the occupying Power, against the Palestinian people since September 2000. For all of these war crimes, acts of State terrorism and systematic human rights violations being committed against the Palestinian people, Israel, the occupying Power, must be held accountable and the perpetrators must be brought to justice.

I should be grateful if you would arrange to have this letter distributed as an official document of the 10^th emergency special session of the General Assembly, under agenda item 5, and of the Security Council.

Please accept, Excellency, the assurances of my highest consideration.

Dr. Riyad Mansour

Minister, Permanent Observer

Excellency,

The situation in Occupied Palestine continues to worsen as Israel intensifies its human rights violations and war crimes against the Palestinian people. In particular, the occupying Power has escalated its confiscation of Palestinian homes, lands and properties seeking to accelerate the forced transfer of Palestinian civilians and its settlement colonization schemes, especially areas in and around occupied East Jerusalem. It is beyond apparent by now that this is all part of a systematic, deliberate plan to remove Palestinians – i.e. ethnically cleanse these areas – in preparation for annexation.

Numerous letters have been sent to the Security Council in recent months drawing attention to these violations, including the plight of Palestinian families in the Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan neighborhoods of occupied East Jerusalem who face the constant threat of eviction from their homes and mass dispossession, like so many before them in the City, amid Israel’s unlawful measures to replace them with Israeli settlers. As of today in Sheikh Jarrah, 169 Palestinians – including 46 children – have nowhere to go as Israel intensifies its judiciary intimidation and attacks on Palestinian families in and around Jerusalem with the sole intent of consolidating Israeli control of the City by illegally altering its demographic composition, character and status.

We once again draw urgent attention to this crisis, appealing to the international community to act to bring a halt to Israel’s illegal actions and to protect Palestinian civilians from the crimes of the occupying Power, a protection they are entitled to under international humanitarian law. Accountability measures are the only recourse for upholding the law, deterring further crimes, including the uprooting of hundreds more Palestinian families, and salvaging the dimming prospects for a just peace.

The fact is that Israel’s coercive dispossession campaigns in Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan and elsewhere throughout Occupied Palestine are no aberration. Uprooting Palestinians and replacing them with Israeli settlers is part of the ongoing Nakba faced by countless of Palestinian families, those who are being presently being forcibly displaced, some for the second or third time, and those who continue to be denied their inalienable right of return to their homes and lands. Absent accountability, Israel has just pressed on with its illegal plans without consequence.

The occupying Power is blatantly using unlawful measures to carry out its widespread and systemic policy of forced displacement, including by use of its judiciary and applying settler-backed laws to occupied territory. These illegal actions are being carried out in countless ways every single day in grave breach of international humanitarian and criminal law and in violation of Security Council and General Assembly resolutions, including resolution 2334 (2016), including the specific prohibitions on policies and measures aimed at altering the character, demographic composition and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem. The

Fourth Geneva Convention, which applies to belligerent occupation, prohibits the transfer of an occupying Power’s civilian population to an occupied territory, as well as individual or mass forcible transfers, including deportations of protected persons from occupied territory. The July 2004 ruling of the International Court of Justice in this regard was also patently clear and continues to be disregarded and disrespected by Israel.

In addition to losing their homes, Palestinians Jerusalemites are unable to challenge the occupation’s unlawful decisions and measures, as the draconian legal process is deliberately made to be exhausting and unaffordable for Palestinians. Settler groups driving the current eviction plans, “Ateret Cohanim” and “Nahalat Shimon”, are infamously known for successfully expelling Palestinian families from Jerusalem in the past, with the complete backing of the Israeli government.

Today, over 1,500 Palestinians in Jerusalem face the threat of forced displacement and home demolitions to make way for an illegal settlement called “Shimon Hatzadik”, along with a park for settlers under the name “King David Park.” While these settler groups enjoy the backing and service of Israeli courts and legislation for their unlawful plans, Palestinian families face relentless attacks designed to amass as much Palestinian land as possible, with as few Palestinian civilians as possible and to keep the occupation standing, highlighting the degree to which one group is heavily prioritized over another through a two-tier system built on discrimination and oppression.

In January 2021, Special Rapporteur Michael Lynk warned the international community of the impact and agenda behind Israel’s forced displacement campaign in Jerusalem. Mr. Lynk stressed, inter alia, “The eviction orders are not random but appear to be strategically focused on an area in East Jerusalem known as the Historic Basin. They seem to be aimed at clearing the way for the establishment of more illegal Israeli settlements in the area and physically segregating and fragmenting East Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank.”

Mohammed El-Kurd, whose family is among those set to be forcefully evicted in May said “What we are witnessing in Sheikh Jarrah is Israel’s attempt to erase the Palestinian presence from our native city in real time. This fate of dispossession looms over much of my neighborhood. Our lives are consumed by the anxiety of living on the brink of homelessness.”

On 27 April, Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a lengthy and detailed report concluding that the crimes of apartheid and persecution are being committed by Israel, the occupying Power, in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. HRW concluded, inter alia, that “the Israeli government has demonstrated an intent to maintain the domination of Jewish Israelis over Palestinians across Israel and the OPT. In the OPT, including East Jerusalem, that intent has been coupled with systematic oppression of Palestinians and inhumane acts committed against them. When these three elements occur together, they amount to the crime of apartheid.”

Although the Palestinian people reached this conclusion decades ago as they endured the occupation’s systemic oppression, mass dispossession, land expropriation, settlement encroachment, endless collective punishment and other grave breaches of international law, such conclusions are part of a growing international consensus asserting that Israel is an apartheid state due to a “threshold has already been crossed in certain of the areas where Israeli authorities exercise control,” as stressed by the HRW report, “A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution.”

The report follows similar findings by Palestinian, Israeli, and international NGOs, which address and flag the horrific reality of ethnic supremacy being practiced by Israel over Palestinians. In January, Israeli NGO B’tselem released a report that contradicted Israel’s portrayal of a so-called thriving democracy, asserting that Israel is an apartheid regime. As stressed by B’tselem, “One organizing principle lies at the base of a wide array of Israeli policies: advancing and perpetuating the supremacy of one group – Jews – over another – Palestinians.”

Another Israeli NGO, Yesh Din, has concluded that “For years, Israel has used the state of occupation as mere temporary suspension of sovereignty and civil rights as an alibi when confronted with accusations that the crime of apartheid was being committed in the West Bank. Its manifest, deliberate policy of dispossession, settlement and creeping annexation, both on the ground and in the legal realm, gives away its intent to cement its control and perpetuate the suspension of sovereignty and Palestinians’ rights – and with that, shatters its alibi.”

Evictions and home demolitions are an integral part of this illegal Israeli policy. The trajectory of demolitions indicates that such policies will only intensify as Israel seeks to further clear Palestinian land of its inhabitants for seizure to implement its illegal settlement plans. According to OCHA, at least a third of all Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem lack occupation-issued building permits, placing over 90,000 Palestinian residents at risk of displacement. As repeatedly stated by UN Special Coordinator Tor Wennesland, Israeli-issued permits are almost impossible for Palestinians to obtain. This has been attested in Human Rights Watch’s latest report, which stressed the following:

“[Israeli] authorities approved less than 1.5 percent of applications by Palestinians to build between 2016 and 2018—21 in total—a figure 100 times smaller than the number of demolition orders it issued in the same period, according to official data. Israeli authorities have razed thousands of Palestinian properties in these areas for lacking a permit, leaving thousands of families displaced. By contrast, according to Peace Now, Israeli authorities began construction on more than 23,696 housing units between 2009 and 2020 in Israeli settlements in Area C. Transfer of an occupying power’s civilian population to an occupied territory violates the Fourth Geneva Convention.”

Further exposing Israel’s intent to maintain its illegal occupation – in flagrant disregard of the international community’s calls to bring it to an end – is its deprivation of fundamental rights that many across the world take for granted. Just this week, the decision was taken to postpone Palestinian elections due to Israel’s repression of Palestinian participation in occupied East Jerusalem. From arresting candidates to suppressing election-related events, Israel continues to breach previous agreements by cherry-picking what it likes and dislikes, according to what serves the entrenchment of the occupation at the expense of the Palestinian people’s rights, including right to self-determination.

In this regard, we reiterate our calls on the international community to exert the necessary pressure to end Israel’s disruptions of Palestine’s elections, particularly in occupied East Jerusalem, and demand an end to all other of its illegal actions aimed at undermining and impeding Palestinian presence and life in the City, including their freedom of worship, as witnessed in recent obstructions of the worship of Palestinian Muslims at Al-Aqsa Mosque in the month of Ramadan and Palestinian Christians in their recent Easter celebrations.

As OCHA put it: “Other Israeli policies have negatively affected Palestinians’ ability to plan and develop their communities and enjoy the services they are entitled to, further undermining their presence in the city. In addition, Israeli measures have increasingly cut off East Jerusalem, once the focus of political, commercial, religious and cultural life for the entire Palestinian population of the occupied Palestinian territory, from the rest of the West Bank and from the Gaza Strip.”

Faced with these realities, the international community must reject Israel’s attempts to taint legitimate criticism of Israel’s crimes by delegitimizing human rights groups and even delegitimizing the real accounts of human suffering on the ground. International law is clear as to the gravity of the violations being perpetrated by the occupying Power. The international community must equally condemn the weaponization of antisemitism just as we collectively condemn all forms of antisemitism, which has culminated in one of the greatest tragedies of our time. This has become a systematic policy that has even targeted Security Council members, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, as well as international figures, who – in upholding their moral, legal, political and/or humanitarian obligations – dare to denounce Israel’s violations of the Palestinian people’s rights and its colonization of their land. We all need to fight antisemitism while rejecting the instrumentalization of the accusation of antisemitism to shield illegal actions from criticism and accountability.

For decades, the international community has been persistently warned about the magnitude of Israel’s grave crimes and violations across the years of its 54-year foreign occupation. Today, Israel’s institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination has resulted in the devastating reality that prevails: apartheid. Standing alone in deliberately misinterpreting international law, Israel remains unmoved due to the lack of action to ensure accountability and justice. The international community, particularly the Security Council, can – and must – make it clear to Israel this situation it has deliberately created will have serious consequences if not rectified in accordance with its clear obligations under international law.

letter is in follow-up to our 712 letters regarding the ongoing crisis in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, which constitutes the territory of the State of Palestine.  These letters, dated from 29 September 2000 (A/55/432-S/2000/921) to 26 April 2021 (A/ES-10/xxx-S/2021/xxx) constitute a basic record of the crimes being committed by Israel, the occupying Power, against the Palestinian people since September 2000. For all of these war crimes, acts of State terrorism and systematic human rights violations being committed against the Palestinian people, Israel, the occupying Power, must be held accountable and the perpetrators must be brought to justice. 

I should be grateful if you would arrange to have the text of the present letter made available to the members of the Security Council for their immediate, valuable consideration and also distributed as an official document of the Security Council.

Please accept, Excellency, the assurances of my highest consideration.

Dr. Riyad Mansour

Minister, Permanent Observer

Excellency,

I am compelled to write again, mere days since my letter of 18 March, in light of the ongoing escalation of tensions and deterioration of conditions due to the illegal policies and practices of Israel, the occupying Power, which continues causing immense harm to the Palestinian civilian population in its rabid pursuit of the colonization and annexation of our land, all in grave breach of international law.

Israeli occupying forces continue to kill, injure and maim Palestinian civilians. On Friday, 19 March, a Palestinian man, Atef Yousef Hanaysha, age 45 was shot in the head and killed by live fire from Israeli soldiers, who attacked the anti-settlement protesters in near the village of Beit Dajan, east of Nablus in the occupied West Bank. Atef leaves behind a wife and three children, in addition to his extended family, who lives have been devastated by his loss.

Like many other Palestinian villagers, the residents of Beit Dajan – civilians and unarmed – have been holding weekly protests in an attempt to defend their lands from the occupation and its unrelenting settlement expansion. Yet, the occupying forces persist in responding to any rightful opposition to Israel’s theft of Palestinian land and dispossession of Palestinian families with lethal and criminal force, unconcerned with the possibility of accountability as a culture of impunity reigns.

Similar incidents also occurred on Friday in other areas of Occupied Palestine. In Ayn al-Bayda, near Yatta in the southern West Bank, Israeli soldiers physically assaulted civilians who had gathered for a weekly demonstration in solidarity with villagers whose lands are at risk of confiscation for settlement expansion. Three weeks ago, Israeli settler bulldozers leveled large tracts of farmland belonging to four families from Ayn al-Bayda. Several Palestinians were also beaten and injured by tear gas fired by occupation forces, who accompanied Israeli settlers that raided Khan al-Laban, an Ottoman-era archeological site in the village of al-Lubban ash-Sharqiya, south of Nablus, on Friday.

These attacks were preceded on 18 March by an assault on an entire family in a so-called ‘search-and-arrest operation’ by occupying forces in the town of Beit Ummar in the southern West Bank. Israeli soldiers raided the home of the Abu Mariah family and assaulted the father, his 50-year-old wife and two daughters, ages 27 and 21. Two sons of the same family are being held captive in Israeli prisons, one age 17 and detained in April of last year and sentenced to two years, and the other age 26, held in administrative detention without charge or trial since last May. Like so many other Palestinians, this family’s entire life has been dictated and devastated by the Israeli occupation. One must ask: what would their lives have looked like if this illegal, cruel occupation did not exist?

Simultaneous with these acts of aggression – which are directly linked to and the direct product of Israel’s illegal colonial settlement and annexation campaign – has been the continued demolition of Palestinian homes and threat of further demolitions and evictions of Palestinian families in and around occupied East Jerusalem, a grave concern we have raised in successive letters. As reported by OCHA, in the month of February 2021 alone, the occupying Power demolished, forced people to demolish or seized 153 Palestinian properties, displacing 305 people, including 172 children and affecting the livelihoods of 435 other people. Such escalation has included the deliberate targeting by Israel of EU-donated humanitarian aid, which tripled compared to the monthly average documented in 2020. Here we recall the repeated – on 5 separate occasions – demolitions and confiscations of aid at Humsa al-Baqa’ia,including the destruction of shelters, water and sanitation facilities and livelihood structures, which displaced at least 60 people, among them 35 children.

This escalation reflects a 65% increase from the monthly average of demolitions in 2020. The pattern and intent is clear: acquisition of more Palestinian territory, and, again, the line is very direct between demolitions and evictions and Israel’s colonization plans. Settlement expansion drives demolitions and displacement of Palestinians as the occupation seeks to seize and annex as much Palestinian land with as few Palestinians as possible. This is known worldwide as ethnic cleansing.

In this regard, I highlight the urgent appeal issued on 19 March by the Jerusalem Governate for international action to stop Israel’s plans to forcibly evict more Palestinian families and demolish more Palestinian homes in the City. In addition to the threat looming over 37 Palestinian families in the Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan neighborhoods referenced in our 18 March letter, the Jerusalem Governate cautions that 8 more Palestinian families in Silwan and Isawiyya face imminent threat of home demolition under the pretext of construction without a permit, having been ordered by the occupation to empty their homes of furniture and persons in preparation for demolition. Moreover, Israeli occupying authorities are moving ahead with plans to demolish more than 100 homes in the al-Bustan section of Silwan. If committed, this war crime would result in the forced displacement of at least 1,550 Palestinians, more than 60% of them children.

Is this how peace is made? By destroying people’s homes, throwing them out into the streets, and forcibly displacing them?

None of this is coincidental, but rather all part of a deliberate plan by Israel to force Palestinians – Muslims and Christians – out of occupied East Jerusalem and replace them with Israeli-Jewish settlers. It is also aimed to fragment the natural connection between Palestinian neighborhoods in the City and sever its natural connection with the rest of the Palestinian territory in attempts dating back to 1967 to assert Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem, in flagrant violation of international law and UN resolutions. Regrettably, the international community’s appeasement has allowed for the gradual and constant implementation of these illegal schemes as Israel carries on without fear of any consequences.

We must therefore appeal once again to the international community to act with urgency to assume its responsibilities in line with international law, including humanitarian and human rights law and the relevant UN resolutions, including resolution 2334 (2016). We await the quarterly report to the Security Council on the implementation of resolution 2334, and we stress the need not only for articulation of the obligations of the occupying Power and States, but for clear calls for respect and recommendations for action to be undertaken forthwith.

It is time to stop this blatant impunity that is causing so much harm and despair to the Palestinian people, destroying the prospects for a just solution and fueling hate and conflict.It is time to work collectively to redress this injustice in a manner that ensures full respect for the rights of the Palestinian people, including to self-determination and return, guarantees their equality and human dignity, and achieves Palestinian-Israeli peace and security in accordance with the international consensus on two-States on the pre-1967 borders, as long-enshrined in UN resolutions.

letter is in follow-up to our 708 letters regarding the ongoing crisis in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, which constitutes the territory of the State of Palestine.  These letters, dated from 29 September 2000 (A/55/432-S/2000/921) to 18 March 2021 (A/ES-10/xxx-S/2021/xxx) constitute a basic record of the crimes being committed by Israel, the occupying Power, against the Palestinian people since September 2000. For all of these war crimes, acts of State terrorism and systematic human rights violations being committed against the Palestinian people, Israel, the occupying Power, must be held accountable and the perpetrators must be brought to justice. 

I should be grateful if you would arrange to have this letter distributed as an official document of the 10^th emergency special session of the General Assembly, under agenda item 5, and of the Security Council.

Please accept, Excellency, the assurances of my highest consideration.

Dr. Riyad Mansour

Minister, Permanent Observer

Excellency,

The situation in Occupied Palestine continues to worsen due to Israel’s human rights violations and war crimes. In particular, the occupying Power has escalated its appropriation of Palestinian homes, lands and properties aimed at accelerating the forced transfer of Palestinian civilians, especially areas in and around occupied East Jerusalem, and entrenching its settlement colonization and annexation schemes.

Numerous Palestinian families in Silwan and Sheikh Jarrah neighborhoods of occupied East Jerusalem are threatened with homelessness and forcible transfer from the City like so many before them.  At this moment, at least 37 families comprising 195 persons, most of them refugees, are at risk of eviction as settler groups, with the full support of the occupation’s government and judiciary, persist with campaigns to dispossess and displace these families, yet again, and replace them with Israeli-Jewish settlers.

These illegal actions are being carried out in countless ways every single day in Occupied Palestine in grave breach of the of international humanitarian and criminal law and violation of Security Council and General Assembly resolutions, including the specific prohibitions on policies and measures aimed at altering the character, demographic composition and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem.

As explained by Palestinian and partnering human rights organizations in an urgent joint appeal on 10 March 2021 to UN Special Rapporteurs, “Israeli settlement activities in Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan are part of a much larger scheme aimed at forcing the transformation of Jerusalem’s demographic composition and cultural character to entrench exclusive Israeli-Jewish ownership over Jerusalem at the expense of its Palestinian protected population”. 

Moreover, they stress that, “through intensified settler-colonial policies and activities in East Jerusalem,  which includes the neighbourhoods of Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan, the Old City, Wadi Al-Joz, At-Tur (Mount of Olives), Israel aims to consolidate its domination from West Jerusalem, extending to the E1 area surrounding the illegal Ma’ale Adumim settlement in the eastern periphery of the city.” All Israeli actions to date point to this unlawful and destructive scheme.

As so many families live under the constant threat of being forcibly displaced in the coming months – with the recent court decisions ordering families in Sheikh Jarrah to abandon their homes by 2 May 2021, and families in Silwan by August 2021 – we must remind that in just a little over a year’s time, form the start of 2020 to March 2021, Israeli courts approved the evictions of 33 Palestinian families with 165 members, including dozens of children, as documented by the Israeli NGO Peace Now. In fact, OCHA estimates that around 90,000 Palestinians are at risk of evictions/demolitions in occupied East Jerusalem.

Indeed, Palestinian NGOS are being joined by Israeli and international NGOs in sending repeated warnings to the UN and the global community on the ongoing and impending forced displacements of Palestinian civilians from their homes and lands.

According to OCHA, in just the period between 16 February and 1 March alone, 35 Palestinian-owned structures have been demolished or seized by Israel, displacing 98 people, including 53 children. Hundreds of Palestinian families are living in fear awaiting decisions by Israeli courts regarding the fate of their homes. In addition to the above cases in occupied East Jerusalem, I must bring your attention to the imminent demolition of hundreds more Palestinian homes in Silwan after an Israeli court abandoned previous legal agreements and ruling instead in favor of establishing a biblical national park called “The King’s Garden”. If Israel continues with this massive demolition campaign, more than 1,500 Palestinians will be immediately displaced, most of whom are women and children.

As stressed in the above-mentioned joint appeal, “At a time when people around the world are trying to survive the global pandemic, Palestinians in East Jerusalem continue to endure an ongoing Nakba, as they continue to be denied their inalienable right of return to their homes, properties, and lands, and to be under threat of further displacement and dispossession. They undergo a lengthy, exhausting, and unaffordable legal struggle to challenge the eviction lawsuits filed against them by settler organizations before Israeli courts. Given the discriminatory and untransparent nature of the Israeli legal system, they are effectively denied access to the rule of law.”

The institutionalized nature of such discriminatory practices has emboldened and made more extreme Israel’s settlers in Occupied Palestine, as they are not only backed by the state but certain that their impunity will not be challenged, even by the judiciary. Against this backdrop, settler attacks against Palestinians and their properties have reached dangerous heights in recent months, reinforcing Israeli settlement expansion and annexation schemes. Similarly, the trends illustrate how such constant, unchecked settler violence is used as a tool to create an ever more coercive environment, facilitating greater control over Palestinian land, but without Palestinians, further proving Israel’s annexation aims.

Just to share one example: A Palestinian landowner has reported that Israeli settlers made no less 15 attempts to take over his farm in al-Baqa’a, east of Al-Khalil (Hebron), the last attack occurring on 16 March. Settlers have tried to destroy his crops, run him over, and raze his land. Denied the protections of international humanitarian law, he has been able to remain in his land only with the protection of human rights activists who have repeatedly intervened and forced the settlers to leave the area. Yet, the threat remains and such systematic harassment, intimidation and attacks are committed every day against Palestinians across Occupied Palestine as the occupying Power and its settler militias persist in the attempts to drive Palestinians from their lands through a combination of military orders and violence.

On 6 March, occupation authorities issued a military order to expropriate 658 dunams of Palestinian land in the village of Al-Ubeidiya, near Bethlehem, for a water project exclusively for illegal settlements and outposts in the area. The same day, also in Bethlehem, Israeli settlers from the “Gush Etzion” settlement chopped off and burnt dozens of olive trees and attacked farmers who were forced to leave at gun point.

On 9 March, a mob of 80 settlers forced their way into Wadi Qana nature reserve, near Salfit, indiscriminately attacking several Palestinian farmers and livestock herders. For decades Israel has violated international law with regards to Wadi Qana, imposing de facto annexation by placing it under the authority of Israeli Nature and Parks Authority. As of today, Palestinians who have lived in Wadi Qana for generations cannot access their lands, while settlers from the nearby “Karnei Shomron” settlement enjoy unlimited access to the nature reserve and its natural resources.

For the second time in March, occupation forces stormed Kifl Haris, near Salfit, and blocked the town’s entry and exit roads to escort a religious march of extremist settlers, who proceeded to desecrate the town’s shrines and attack homes. On 13 March, settlers from the illegal settlement of “Givat Ronin” attacked Palestinian residents and properties in the village of Burin, near Nablus, with settlers demolishing a Palestinian home under construction. Occupation forces intervened to protect the invading settlers, which resulted in the shooting a Palestinian youth during the settler attack. On the same day, a mob of settlers launched a pre-dawn attack against Palestinian residents of Huwwara, near Nablus, hurling stones at homes and vehicles. On 15 March, Israeli settlers attacked the village of Qaryout, preventing Palestinians from accessing their lands. The settlers went on to damage the village’s farmlands and destroyed fences that had been put up to protect the residents from settler attacks.

On 8 March, Israeli forces stormed the village of Bani Naim, near Al-Khalil and demolished a Palestinian home under construction and water well. On 9 March, Israeli occupation forces issued demolition orders to several Palestinian homes in Al-Jib, near Jerusalem, under the pretext that they were built without permits. According to Israeli NGO Breaking the Silence, Israel has rejected nearly 99% of Palestinian building permit applications over the years, making it impossible for Palestinians to build and develop their communities in their own land. The following day, residents of Al-Walajeh, also near Jerusalem, learned that an occupation court injunction on the demolition of 38 homes could be lifted next month, subjecting Palestinians to another wide-scale displacement campaign. Israeli NGOs Ir Amim and Bimkom issued a joint report last week, alerting the international community, stating, inter alia:

“Israel has been gradually confiscating al-Walajeh lands and detaching it from the Palestinian space around it. While its northern segment is situated within the Jerusalem municipal borders, the construction of the Separation Barrier between 2010 and 2017 around three sides of the village turned it into a nearly isolated enclave. The barrier severed it from the rest of the city, while likewise separating it from some 1200 dunams of the village’s agricultural lands… these lands were declared by the Israeli Authorities as the Nahal Refaim National Park, a form of “touristic settlement,” which would serve to create Israeli territorial contiguity between Jerusalem and the Har Gilo settlement (part of the Gush Etzion bloc), constituting another link in the de facto annexation of ‘Greater Jerusalem’.”

At the same time, Israel persists with all of its repressive measures against Palestinian civilians, including massive arrest campaigns and raids. Israeli NGO B’tselem released shocking footage showing Israeli soldiers arresting five Palestinian children, ranging from 8 to 13 years old, for picking vegetables near the illegal outpost of “Havat Maon”, which continues to expand on Palestinian land. “This is another example of the absolute disregard on the part of Israeli authorities and forces on the ground to the well-being and rights of Palestinians, no matter how young or vulnerable,” a B’Tselem spokesperson said.

In the early hours of 8 March, Israeli occupation forces arrested 32 Palestinians in occupied East Jerusalem, and conducted numerous predawn raids across the occupied West Bank. On the same day, Israeli forces raided the offices of the Palestinian Health Work Committees in Ramallah, ransacking the building and confiscating computer equipment and documents.  On 10 March, Israeli forces conducted several raids in various parts of the West Bank, arresting nine Palestinians, including the preacher of Al-Aqsa Mosque. According to OCHA, Israeli forces conducted 184 search-and-arrest operations across the West Bank between 16 February and 1 March, arresting 158 Palestinians, with East Jerusalem being the prime target.

As the global community observed International Women’s Day last week, Israeli occupation forces raided a women’s center in East Jerusalem, arresting two women involved in organizing an International Women’s Day event aimed to celebrate the role of women in Palestinian culture and heritage. The fact that the event was shut down illustrates the routine violence faced by Palestinian women under Israeli occupation. According to the Palestinian Prisoner Society, Israeli authorities are currently incarcerating 35 female Palestinian prisoners, 11 of whom are mothers.

Regrettably, accountability remains absent for these violations and the countless other crimes perpetrated throughout the course of Israel’s nearly 54-year military occupation, resulting in endless oppression for the Palestinian people and devastating consequences for the goal of a just peace. Year after year, the international community condemns Israeli violations and crimes, but falls short of measures aimed at actually implementing international law, and holding Israel accountable. Yet, it remains the international community’s responsibility to oppose these violations of fundamental principles of international law, and to act collectively bring a halt to such impunity, rather than green lighting it with lack of tangible action or, worse, complicity such as that we are regrettably witnessing with the decisions by certain States vis-à-vis Occupied East Jerusalem, in violation of international law, including the Charter of the United Nations, and Security Council resolutions 478 (1980) and 2334 (2016).

Arguments that any action to seek accountability for Israel’s crimes and violations is “anti-Semitic” and/or undermines the peace process are unconvincing and detached from reality. Just this week, the Israeli Prime Minister, in yet another election frenzy, vowed yet again to legalize settler outposts if re-elected. This compels us to ask: which is a bigger threat to the two-State solution and the peace process? The pursuit of accountability under international law or the pursuit of creeping annexation?

It is time to effectively end the Security Council’s paralysis which has allowed Israel’s occupation and de facto annexation to continue with impunity. Doing so would re-establish the framework of international law as the principled path to ending this historic injustice and would reassert the applicability of international law in the face of violations and breaches in any circumstance. With the aforementioned in mind, implementation of Security Council resolution 2334 (2016) in all of its provisions becomes more imperative than ever, and we urge all States to uphold their obligations in this regard to ensure accountability for Israel’s internationally unlawful acts, to protect the Palestinian civilian population under occupation, and to salvage the prospects for a just and peaceful solution.

To conclude, we must recall that this week marks the 18^th anniversary of the death of Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old American who was crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer while undertaking nonviolent action to protect the home of a Palestinian family from demolition. Rachel’s sacrifice and courage are unforgotten and her memory will always be honored. In one of the last messages shared with her family, Rachel wrote: “I should at least mention that I am also discovering a degree of strength and of basic ability for humans to remain human in the direst of circumstances – which I also haven’t seen before. I think the word is dignity.” We, the international community, must discover the degree of our collective strength in the face of such grave injustice through dignity.

I should be grateful if you would arrange to have the text of the present letter made available to the members of the Security Council for their immediate, valuable consideration and also distributed as an official document of the Security Council.

Please accept, Excellency, the assurances of my highest consideration.

Dr. Riyad Mansour

Minister, Permanent Observer

Excellency,

I must again draw attention to the critical situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, due to escalating violations by Israel, the occupying Power, against the Palestinian people.

Just over a week has passed since our last letter, and not a day has gone by where Israel has not exploited the COVID-19 crisis to intensify its violations as the world remains consumed by the pandemic. These manifestations of belligerent occupation are designed to inflict severe suffering through acts of violence, dispossession, displacement, dehumanization, and other forms of calibrated oppression, part and parcel of a blatant colonization and annexation drive in grave breach of the law.

We must recall that today marks the 27^th anniversary of the massacre perpetrated by a terrorist Israeli settler at the Ibrahimi Mosque in Al-Khalil (Hebron), who killed 29 Palestinians worshipping at dawn prayers, among them children and elderly, and wounded dozens of others. That terrorist settlers’ presence and lawlessness was aided and abetted by the occupying Power, as it continues to do to this day with the hundreds of thousands of settlers it continues to transfer to Occupied Palestine in grave breach of the 4^th Geneva Convention and in violation of obligations under Security Council resolutions, including resolution 904 (1994), which called, inter alia, for the disarming of Israeli settlers and militias and for measures to be taken to guarantee the safety and protection of Palestinian civilians.

The Ibrahimi Mosque massacre was a turning point fully exploited by Israel to close off parts of the Old City of Al-Khalil to Palestinians, including Al-Shuhada Street, where hundreds of shops were closed by military order and remain so to this day, choking socio-economic life and movement in the city; to divide the city and to divide the Mosque itself, all for the protection and privilege of the extremist group of fanatical Jewish settlers illegally transferred there. Such methodical and brutal colonization continues to this day all over the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, as Israel further entrenches its nearly 54-year, illegal occupation.

For decades now, Israel has tried to normalize its illegal policies of home demolitions and forced displacement and its construction of colonial settlements in Palestine under countless pretexts ranging from “security concerns”, to settler “claims” to properties, to the absence of construction permits, to Biblical claims as justifications for these crimes. Yet nothing can be considered normal about such abnormal, immoral and illegal acts and the grave impact on the people targeted, children, women and men alike.

In this regard, we must draw attention to the situation in occupied East Jerusalem, where countless Palestinian families face forced eviction from their homes to make way for Israeli settlers. These illegal actions are proceeding apace with the support of Israeli occupation courts, who continue to render “judicial” decisions reinforcing such crimes against Palestinian families, claiming that the evictions are necessary to enable Jews to “recover” properties since Israel’s establishment. However, the same law does not apply to Palestinians who were and remain uprooted and dispossessed from their homes.

Israeli courts rejected appeals by Palestinian families in Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan neighborhoods against forced eviction from their homes in favor of the state-backed Nahalat Shimon and Ateret Cohanim settler groups. The families, who have lived in Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan long before Israel’s establishment and the start of the occupation, are facing decades-old campaigns by settler groups that enjoy automatic support of the occupation’s so-called legal system.

The impending mass displacement campaigns in occupied East Jerusalem order that Palestinian families in Sheikh Jarrah must abandon their homes by 2 May 2021, and families in Silwan by August 2021. According to the Israeli NGO Ir Amim, if the evictions are not halted, over a thousand of Palestinians from Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan could be uprooted from their homes and communities, and supplanted by settlers, amounting to a form of forcible transfer. These illegal campaigns aim to replicate the situation in Al-Khalil, where settler enclaves are encroaching on Palestinians inside the city itself, imposing an unbearable reality of oppression, segregation, and discrimination and facilitating annexation plans.

Such practices, which promote and perpetuate the supremacy and privilege of one group over another, a blatantly discriminatory and apartheid practice, constitute grave breaches of the 4^th Geneva Convention, and serious violations of Security Council and General Assembly resolutions which prohibit any attempts to alter the character, demographic composition and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem. We recall Security Council resolution 2334 (2016), which, inter alia, condemned “all measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, including, inter alia, the construction and expansion of settlements, transfer of Israeli settlers, confiscation of land, demolition of homes and displacement of Palestinian civilians, in violation of international humanitarian law and relevant resolutions”.

In addition to the ongoing and repeated displacement and trauma inflicted on Palestinian families in Humsa Al-Baqia in the Jordan Valley and the destruction of humanitarian to these families, the occupying Power persists with home demolitions and evictions in other parts of Palestine. On 15 February, another two Palestinian families in Jerusalem were forced to self-demolish their homes to avoid the heavy demolition fees imposed by the occupation. This includes the Awadallah family, who had to self-demolish their two-story home built in Shufat over 20 years ago after numerous unsuccessful attempts to obtain an occupation-issued permit. On the same day, Israeli authorities issued demolition orders against more Palestinian homes in Jerusalem, and ordered a construction halt for three homes in Al-Khader, south of Bethlehem, again under the pretext that they were built without permits, preparing to demolish those homes yet again. According to the Israeli NGO Breaking the Silence, Israel has rejected nearly 99 percent of Palestinian building permit applications over the years, making it impossible for Palestinians to build and develop their communities in their own land.

These systematic violations are clearly part of Israel’s land grab and settlement expansion schemes, which continue unabated, accompanied by the transfer of more settlers and their increasing violence and extremism against the Palestinian population. These crimes are officially supported by the Israeli government and numerous organizations, including those claiming to be “charities”, such as the Jewish National Fund (JNF), which recently decided to “officially authorize” the purchase of occupied Palestinian land to accelerate settlement expansion. As stated by the US-based Foundation for Middle East Peace, “Notwithstanding the significant controversy this “new” policy has provoked, the reality is that the JNF has long worked in support of settlements. What is different now is that, where in the past the JNF preferred to leave its settlement-related activities deliberately obscured, under the new policy the JNF would openly claim and promote its support for settlements.”

Israel’s annexation agenda is further exposed by its construction of hundreds of roads, tunnels, and overpasses designed to serve settlers across the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem. For instance, one of Israel’s ongoing annexation projects includes the construction of the segregated and so-called “Sovereignty Road”, which aims to connect the illegal “Ma’ale Adumim” settlement to nearby settlement blocs and outposts. Another aim of this scheme is clearly to advance the construction of settlements in the so-called “E-1” area, where Israel seeks to entrench settler presence in order to cause irreversible damage the contiguity of the Palestinian State. As cautioned by the Israeli NGO Peace Now in regard to this illegal move: “The Israeli government is de facto annexing the West Bank by investing billions of shekels into roads designed to double the number of settlers to a million and even more.”

We recall once again Security Council resolution 2334, by which the Council, inter alia:

• Reiterated “its demand that Israel immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and that it fully respect all of its legal obligations in this regard”;

• Underlined “that it will not recognize any changes to the 4 June 1967 lines, including with regard to Jerusalem, other than those agreed by the parties through negotiations”;
• Called upon States “to distinguish, in their relevant dealings, between the territory of the State of Israel and the territories occupied since 1967”.

Yet, Israel persists in defying the Security Council, carrying on with all of these illegal measures, which have also been accompanied by a sharp uptick in settler violence against Palestinians, with Israeli soldiers either joining in settler-related attacks or refusing to intervene. In an urgent appeal to several UN Special Rapporteurs on the escalation of settler violence, Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq has urgently requested the UN’s “immediate intervention to protect the Palestinian protected population from systematic and ongoing settler attacks, which are conducted with institutionalized impunity.”

It is undeniable that such settler violence and aggression is directly incited by Israeli government, military and religious officials and the culture of hate that continues to be fueled extremist rhetoric. According to a recent study by the Hebrew University, dubbed the ‘Map of Hatred’, Palestinians are the group most feared and hated by Israeli Jews, with polls suggesting the high rates of hatred and rejection indicate that anti-Palestinian incitement is tolerated and acceptable. As Israel enters yet another round of elections, the cynical connection between anti-Palestinian rhetoric and incitement continues at fever-pitch.

This dehumanization of the Palestinian people also continues to be manifested in Israel’s ongoing arrest and detention of civilians and its abuse of the nearly 5,000 held captive in its jails. In recent weeks, dozens of Palestinians, including children, have been rounded-up and detained. This shockingly included two young boys, ages 8 and 6, in the town of Hizma. Also, on 16 February, a Palestinian woman, Rahmeh Abu Ahour, 67, suffered a fatal heart attack after Israeli soldiers ransacked her home during a raid in Abu Njeim, east of Bethlehem. Israeli occupation forces routinely carry out such violent arrest raids with utter disregard for the state of emergency declared in the West Bank due to the pandemic and for the well-being of the Palestinian civilian population, in grave violation of international humanitarian law.

The occupying Power also persists with its use of administrative detention, holding Palestinians indefinitely, without charge or trial. Among the hundreds being held is Mohammad Al-Halabi, a Palestinian aid worker from the Gaza Strip, who has been administratively detained for four years. According to his lawyer, Al-Halabi has attended more than 140 military court hearings since his arrest. UN Human rights experts have called on Israel to release Al-Halabi or to immediately grant him a fair trial, stating: “The international rule of law requires that an individual who is arrested must only be detained if there are reasonable suspicions that she or he has committed a recognized crime, and the charges and the evidence must be clearly laid out so defendants know what they have to answer.” Another military court hearing is scheduled for Al-Halabi on 3 March 2021. We call for his release and the release of all Palestinian civilians illegally imprisoned by the occupying Power.

Israel also persists with its immoral policy of withholding bodies of dead Palestinians, collectively punishing and traumatizing their families, who are prohibited from burying their loved ones in accordance with religious and cultural rituals. On 20 February, Israel finally returned the body of Daoud Al-Khatib, who died in September of last year due to ill-treatment and medical negligence by the prison authorities. Yet at least 70 Palestinian bodies continue to be held by the occupying Power, in addition to the hundreds withheld and buried in secret in cemeteries controlled by the occupation. We call for an end to this cruel and illegal practice and the return of the bodies to their families for burial.

As we near 54 years since the onset occupation and observe numerous other tragic anniversaries once again this year, conventional wisdom holds that the only viable response to Israeli impunity is through preventive measures, including serious measures of accountability. Without consequence these crimes and this inhumanity will clearly not end.

The Security Council must uphold its Charter duty for the maintenance of international peace and security. Israel cannot continue to be the exception to every rule; this privileged treatment has only emboldened its impunity and undermined international law, with disastrous effect on our people and the rules-based system as a whole. It is high-time for accountability, for only halting violations and de-escalating the situation can create trust and open a credible horizon for making peace, a peace sought worldwide by all supporting the longstanding international consensus based on the relevant UN resolutions.

 As stated by Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh at the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee meeting earlier this week: “While we remain committed to peace based on the two-State solution to achieve the legitimate national rights of our people to live in their independent sovereign contiguous State of Palestine on 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital, and a just solution to the refugees’ question based on UN resolution 194, the reality on the ground after 30 years of peace process, is a systematic destruction of the Palestinian State and the two-State solution.” We urge the international community to act forthwith to uphold international law, to protect the Palestinian people, to stop the destruction of two-State solution, and to exert the needed efforts to advance the realization of a just peace, a Palestinian-Israeli peace that will not only transform the Middle East region but the prospects for global peace and security.

I should be grateful if you would arrange to have the text of the present letter made available to the members of the Security Council for their immediate, valuable consideration and also distributed as an official document of the Security Council.

Please accept, Excellency, the assurances of my highest consideration.

Dr. Riyad Mansour

Minister, Permanent Observer

Excellency,

The critical situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, continues to worsen due to the escalating illegal policies and practices of Israel, the occupying Power, against the Palestinian people.

The month of January witnessed grave Israeli violations of international law, with February regrettably following the same trajectory of unabated, systematic colonization and human rights abuses, entrenching the occupation and further damaging the prospects for a just solution. As illegal settlement and annexation activities escalate, so do the oppression and collective punishment of the Palestinian people, with at least 456 Palestinians, including at least 93 children and 8 women, arrested and detained in January alone.

Home demolitions have also continued to rise. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports that the year 2020 witnessed the highest number of demolitions of Palestinian homes and structures by Israeli occupation forces since the documentation of this inhumane practice began. Considering the levels of demolition and dispossession in January, it is clear that Israel is insistent on its path of impunity, portending a new violation’s record in 2021. Since the start of 2021, Israeli occupation forces have already demolished, seized or forced Palestinians to demolish at least 178 structures, displacing over 259 people, including at least 140 children.

As highlighted in previous letters, in two major demolition campaigns on 1 and 3 February, Israeli occupation forces demolished over 45 structures in Khirbet Humsa (also known as Humsa al-Bqai’a) in the Jordan Valley, repeatedly displacing and rendering homeless the 60 people, including 35 children, that comprise the nine families in that part of the community, who are now threatened with the risk of forcible transfer. This vulnerable Bedouin community has now been subject to four mass demolitions by Israeli occupation forces, including the destruction of homes, livestock shelters and water facilities, many of which had been funded by the European Union and the United Kingdom.

Despite Israeli movement restrictions, the Palestinian Government and international organizations mobilized to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to the displaced families. However, according to OCHA and the Norwegian Refugee Council, Israeli occupation forces have confiscated a significant proportion of the assistance, including tents, leaving the displaced families to the mercy of the harsh elements of winter and violating innumerable human rights, including the right to education, with over 50 schools indiscriminately targeted with demolition orders. We refer in this regard to the 5 February joint statement by UN agencies (OCHA, OHCHR, and UNICEF) drawing the international community’s attention to the Israeli demolition campaign against Humsa al-Bqai’a and deeming such actions by the occupying Power to constitute direct breaches of international law.

The impact of these illegal and immoral actions on children is especially severe. According to documentation by Save the Children, in 2020 over 840 structures were demolished by the occupation, displacing more than 500 children, leaving them and their families homeless, devastating their communities, and disrupting every aspect of their lives. As stressed by Jason Lee, Save the Children’s country director, “Children are paying the highest price. Tearing down a house, a school or other vital infrastructure, especially during a pandemic, destroys their right to an education, to have a home. It targets their future, their health, their safety and well-being”.

Simultaneous to the uprooting and traumatizing of our people, Israel also continues to raze and confiscate Palestinian land and uproot trees, thieving Palestinian property and destroying livelihoods. In the period between 19 January and 1 February, Israeli occupation forces uprooted thousands of trees near the city of Tubas that had been planted eight years ago as part of a project supervised by the Palestinian Ministry of Agriculture. In a separate assault, Israeli forces bulldozed nearly 1,000 trees in Bethlehem. Both incidents took place on the grounds that the land had been declared ‘state land,’ which is a baseless claim used to justify Israel’s annexationist intentions.

Israel’s demolition campaign is designed to uproot Palestinians from their land through state-sponsored dispossession. The objective is clear: maximal territory minus the presence of Palestinians, i.e. ethnic cleansing. The methodical implementation of this plan has been especially intense in and around areas critical to realization of the two-State solution and preservation of the contiguity of the State of Palestine, both of which the occupying Power seeks to destroy.

Although the international community has explicitly called for the cessation of home demolitions, forced evictions, land confiscation and all settlement activities, as reflected in relevant UN resolutions, and while governments, parliamentarians, human rights groups, and other international organizations have equally called for an end to these illegal actions, Israel continues to violate international law with absolute impunity. The consequences for the Palestinian people have been dire and the prospects for a just peace have been suffocated.

As of today, hundreds of Palestinian families in East Jerusalem are in danger of being dispossessed of their homes and properties following baseless legal battles waged by settler organizations closely linked to the Israeli government. Adding to the misery of the vulnerable families, who have lived in Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan long before Israel’s establishment and the start of the occupation, Israeli courts, where no justice can be found, actually aim to handover their homes and properties to settlers.

Given the urgency of the matter, over 80 British parliamentarians recently sent a letter to the Foreign Secretary, Mr. Raab, writing that Israel’s looming dispossession of Palestinian families in Jerusalem must be prevented, and that such dispossession and forcible transfer is a grave violation of the 4^th Geneva Convention. Moreover, the parliamentarians called for the necessary legal and political measures to address Israel’s mass dispossession of the Palestinian people and settlement campaign. They stressed that: “All measures should be on the table, including reducing diplomatic engagement and banning trade in settlement products in full conformity with international law obligations in order to challenge the settler economy that profits from the occupation.”

Similarly, humanitarian organizations have raised concerns and issued warnings over Israel’s dispossession campaign against the Palestinian people. On 9 February, the Norwegian Refugee Council underscored the urgency of the matter, warning that the international community “has once again witnessed attacks on some of the poorest families on occupied Palestinian land. Empty words of ‘concern’ are not enough for these families who find themselves homeless and deprived of the most basic needs. The international community, including European governments, must do more to stop forced displacement and demand that Israel provide reparations to Palestinian victims.”

Regrettably, the failure to hold Israel accountable thus far has greatly emboldened these crimes, including acts of violence, destruction and terror by Israeli settlers across Occupied Palestine. Under the protection of Israeli soldiers, extremist settlers continue to kill, assault and abduct Palestinian civilians and to damage homes, uproot trees, desecrate houses of worship, and routinely incite against, harass and intimidate the Palestinian population, including children.

On 5 February, Israeli settlers shot and killed a Palestinian man in Ras Karkar, north of Ramallah. Khaled Nofal, 34, was killed by settlers near the illegal outpost of “Sde Efraim”, which was erected on privately-owned Palestinian land seized for settlement expansion. Israeli occupation forces prevented Palestinian medics from accessing the site, and have yet to bring the perpetrators to justice.

On 10 February, an Israeli settler from the infamous settlement of “Ariel” ran over a Palestinian man near Salfit, killing him instantly. On 12 February, another settler car attack took place near Tubas, killing one Palestinian and injuring two others. While on a hike, Bilal Bawatneh, 52, was killed instantly as the criminal settler escaped using settler-only roads leading to nearby settlements. Had the perpetrators been Palestinian, it is well known that Israeli forces would have demolished their families’ homes and restricted movement across the West Bank, imposing collective punishment on the entire civilian population, in order to punish the perpetrator and in complete disregard for international law.

Also last week, video footage emerged showing an Israeli settler carrying out an attack against the Romanian Orthodox Church in Jerusalem, causing damage to the church property. A statement by the Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem warned that “Israeli extremists’ attacks against churches and mosques in Jerusalem are alarmingly on the rise, and the failure of Israeli official authorities to deal with them and their tolerance towards such terrorist acts will definitely lead to more fueling of the conflict in the Holy City, and will keep it further away from achieving peace and stability.”

On 10 February, the mayor of Al-Khalil (Hebron), Mr. Taysir Abu Senineh, received numerous death threats from the leader of the so-called “Kiryat Arba” settlement, along with threats from Israeli parliamentarian Moshe Abutbul. Both the settler leader and politician have intensified their collaborative campaign of anti-Palestinian incitement aimed at intimidating the population and consolidating Israel’s “eternal occupation” of Al-Khalil, including in the southern hills of the area where Palestinian communities, including in Masafer Yatta, are under grave threat of displacement.

Even in this time of the COVID-19 pandemic, Israeli attacks and military raids have escalated. During an overnight raid on 10 February, Israeli occupation forces launched multiple incursions across the occupied West Bank and detained over 30 Palestinians, most of them children, adding to the thousands of Palestinian civilians being illegally held captive by the occupation.

It is beyond disturbing to imagine the experience and trauma endured by Palestinian children as they are detained, blindfolded, and taken away from their parents and homes in the middle of the night only to be victims of Israel’s systematic practices of arbitrary detention and torture. We reiterate the call for the immediate release of all Palestinian children being held by the occupying Power and for Israel’s respect for its obligations under international humanitarian and human rights law, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Turning to the situation in the Gaza Strip, we again sound the alarm about the deplorable humanitarian and socioeconomic conditions there due to the illegal Israeli blockade that has caused such severe deprivation, hunger and misery on its two million inhabitants, the majority Palestine refugees, who continue to bear the hardships of the original dispossession and displacement inflicted on them by Israel. Today, in yet another act of inhumanity, the occupying Power blocked the entry to Gaza of 2,000 doses of coronavirus vaccines intended for frontline health workers, including personnel in ICU units treating patients with the virus. This constitutes yet another grave breach of Israel’s obligations under the 4^th Geneva Convention.

Israeli occupation forces continue to infiltrate Gaza’s shores and agricultural lands with military boats and earth-moving machinery, indiscriminately attacking civilians and causing significant damage to Gaza’s already devastated economy and infrastructure. Just two days ago, occupation forces opened on fire at Palestinian farmers working in their land near the border, depriving them of their source of sustenance and livelihood. This was preceded by yet another attack on Palestinian fishermen, who were fired at with live ammunition and water cannons on 7 February.

The International Criminal Court’s (ICC) recent decision affirming jurisdiction as to the situation Palestine brings hope that long-overdue accountability and justice are possible. The deterrent capacity of the Court is also undoubted as the perpetrators of war crimes against the Palestinian people have been put on notice. Despite Israel’s threats and false accusations of anti-Semitism against the ICC, the Court has recognized that the legitimacy and necessity of impartially investigating the situation in Palestine for the cause of justice, a central element for the realization of peace.

Since the onset of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territory in 1967, Israel has yet to bear an ounce of accountability for decades of impunity and oppression. The result has been devastating for the Palestinian people and for the goal of a just and lasting peace and security between Palestine and Israel, making the applicability of international law, including UN resolutions, more imperative than ever. The Security Council in particular must uphold its Charter duty for the maintenance of international peace and security. This too surely requires preventive measures, including measures of accountability. We therefore again appeal for action by the Council to uphold the law and implement its resolutions on the Palestine question. The Council must overcome its paralysis and act forthwith towards ending the Israeli occupation in all its manifestations, including the colonial settlement regime, and supporting the realization of a just, lasting and comprehensive peace.

In closing, we recall, when asked about the Israeli occupation in late 2016, then Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, stated: “The lack of any significant movement towards a political resolution and ongoing violations of international human rights and humanitarian law are exacerbated by the lack of accountability for previous violations… Tackling impunity must be the highest priority.” Nearly five years later, the occupation is entrenching by the minute while accountability remains absent. We must seize this opportunity to prevent the passing of yet another year of inaction and raging impunity at the expense of more Palestinian suffering and yet another lost generation.

I should be grateful if you would arrange to have the text of the present letter made available to the members of the Security Council for their immediate, valuable consideration and also distributed as an official document of the Security Council.

Please accept, Excellency, the assurances of my highest consideration.

Dr. Riyad Mansour

Minister, Permanent Observer