Reports of ongoing acts of genocide, war crimes, and despair; end of UNRWA aid to northern Gaza; West Bank restriction of movement; Blinken is “disappointed” about new settlement plans; update on ICJ occupation case; more

By IAK staff, from reports

Middle East Monitor reports: Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, an independent organization based in Geneva, reported Friday that it documented: “The killing of more than 3,847 Palestinians by the Israeli army, including 1,306 children and 807 women, in addition to the injury of about 5,119 since the ICJ issued its ruling.”

The organization confirmed that it had observed six main indicators that Israel is continuing the crime of genocide in the Gaza Strip within four weeks of the ruling issued by the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which required it to take measures to prevent this.

These indicators include continued mass killings of civilians, intentionally inflicting severe physical and psychological harm, deliberately subjecting residents to miserable living conditions with the aim of actual destruction, starvation, blocking the entry of humanitarian aid, imposing measures aimed at preventing childbirth within Palestinian families, and official and public incitement by Israeli officials to escalate its genocide.

Mourners in Gaza this month with the bodies of people killed in bombardments. More than 29,000 people, mainly civilians, have been killed in Gaza since the war began
Mourners in Gaza this month with the bodies of people killed in bombardments. More than 29,000 people, mainly civilians, have been killed in Gaza since the war began (photo)

New OHCHR annual report: the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) noted a broad range of concerns, including unlawful killings, hostage-taking, destruction of civilian property, collective punishment, forced displacement, incitement to hatred and violence, sexual assault, and torture – these acts are all prohibited by international human rights and humanitarian laws.

“The entrenched impunity reported by our Office for decades cannot be permitted to continue. There must be accountability on all sides for violations seen over 56 years of occupation and the 16 years of blockade of Gaza, and up to today,” said Volker Türk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.

“Justice is a pre-requisite for ending cycles of violence and for Palestinians and Israelis to be able to take meaningful steps towards peace.”

The New Arab reports: The head of Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) spoke to the United Nations Security Council on Thursday. Among his statements was this: “[For children] there is a repeated displacement, constant fear and witnessing family members literally dismembered before their eyes. These psychological injuries have led children as young as five to tell us that they would prefer to die.” 

UNICEF, the UN agency for the protection of children, estimated that at least 17,000 children in the Gaza Strip are unaccompanied or have been separated from their immediate family since the start of the conflict.

Children make up about half of the overall displaced population of 1.7 million people in Gaza.

Al Jazeera reports: A spokesperson for the Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA has said that the organization is no longer able to provide assistance in northern Gaza, where it only has “a few staff”, and that civil order has collapsed amid Israel’s ongoing assault and severe restrictions on food access. This comes just days after the World Food Program (WFP) ceased deliveries to the north.

UNRWA says it is struggling to offer assistance to millions of Palestinians in Gaza and throughout the region after several key donor countries froze funding for the humanitarian group following unsubstantiated Israeli allegations that around a dozen of its employees took part in the October 7 attacks. Israel has not provided evidence for those claims nearly one month after first putting them forward.

“I believe we have some weeks, five or six, less than that. After that, we will not be able to continue providing services, not only in Gaza, but also in places like Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, West Bank and East Jerusalem,” UNRWA spokesperson Adnan Abu Hasna told Al Jazeera.

Palestine Chronicle reports: This week, the Israeli army targeted the Gaza municipality warehouses once more, destroying the few remaining equipment used to provide services in northern Gaza.  

The vehicles destroyed are reportedly ‘coded’, in coordination with the International Committee of the Red Cross so that the Israeli army knows in advance that the equipment belongs to a civilian institution. The vehicles reportedly include three bulldozers, an excavator, a water pump, and an administrative vehicle.

The total of vehicles destroyed in the Gaza municipality is reportedly 95. The facilities themselves sustained serious damage. The Gaza municipality confirmed that its staff are no longer able to provide even basic services to Gaza’s residents.

One of the Gaza municipality vehicles that Israel recently destroyed
One of the Gaza municipality vehicles that Israel recently destroyed (photo)

Osama Hamdan, an official for Hamas, gave a press conference Friday in Beirut, Lebanon. Among his comments were:

  • Our people are waiting for the International community and the United Nations, with all its agencies, to take concrete steps immediately to bring aid into the Strip.
  • An explosion is coming in response to any restrictions on Muslims entering Al-Aqsa Mosque during the month of Ramadan. We call our Palestinian people in the occupied territories, Jerusalem and the West Bank, to reject this criminal decision, and to escalate the confrontation of the occupation everywhere, and to mobilize and march and band together in the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque.
RECOMMENDED READING (Al Jazeera): ‘Beaten, stripped, used as human shield’: Gaza victim recalls Israel terror
Large boulders block the entry and exit of cars outside Beit Jala, occupied West Bank.
Large boulders block the entry and exit of cars outside Beit Jala, occupied West Bank. (photo)

WEST BANK – +972 Magazine reports: The Israeli army has constructed or permitted the construction of makeshift barriers and checkpoints to prevent dozens of Palestinian villages, towns, and cities from accessing major West Bank arteries. In some cases, villages have been blocked off from every direction. 

Major roads are now virtually inaccessible to Palestinians, almost exclusively servicing settlers. In order to travel around the West Bank, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are now forced to drive along unpaved, narrow, and winding roads.

Israeli soldiers are stationed at many of these new roadblocks, and they sometimes shoot at unarmed Palestinians who try to cross. One such fatal incident at the end of December was captured on video.

We recommend visiting the International Middle East Media Center (IMEMC) for more regional news.

Al Jazeera reports: US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken spoke Friday about Israel’s announcement on Thursday of building new settlements in the occupied West Bank:

  • We are disappointed … it has been longstanding US policy under Republican and Democratic administrations alike, that new settlements are counterproductive to reaching an enduring peace.
  • They are also inconsistent with international law.
  • Our administration maintains a firm opposition to settlement expansion.
  • In our judgment, it only weakens, doesn’t strengthen Israel’s security.

Blinken also referred to the issue of the buffer zone that Israel has been creating on the Gaza side of the border: “There should be no Israeli reoccupation of Gaza. The size of Gaza territory should not be reduced.”

NOTE: The Israeli government has said that it will maintain military control of the strip after the war and has already destroyed large swaths of the territory near the boundary with Israel for an apparent “buffer zone”, demolishing many buildings and reducing the territory of Gaza.
The US has not announced any steps to pressure Israel over such actions, despite the fact that they run counter to US calls and that experts have said they could constitute war crimes.

Al Jazeera reports: A team of United Nations experts have said the transfer of weapons and ammunition to Israel for use in Gaza could violate international humanitarian law, raising the prospect that countries such as the US – that have enabled Israel’s campaign in Gaza through large weapons transfers – could be complicit in possible rights violations.

Palestinians inspected the destruction in the Al-Rimal neighborhood of Gaza City soon after the start of the war.
Palestinians inspected the destruction in the Al-Rimal neighborhood of Gaza City soon after the start of the war. (photo)

Summary of International Court of Justice proceedings, Friday

  • Namibia said it still suffers from the effects of a long and unlawful occupation, but the ICJ “played a vital role in our liberation struggle”. In its 1971 opinion, the court confirmed the right to self-determination as a “legal imperative”, paving the way to Namibia’s independence in 1990.
  • Norway stated that the legal consequences arising from a prolonged occupation violate the principle of self-determination and every state has the duty to refrain from any action that deprives people of this right.
  • Oman told the court that the people of Palestine “have been living under occupation, oppression, injustice and daily humiliation, while the international community failed to assist them in realizing their aspirations to an independent state”.
  • Pakistan said that while Israel has sought to make its occupation of Palestinian territories irreversible, history shows that reversibility is possible, such as when France withdrew more than a million settlers from Algeria in 1962.
  • Indonesia said there is no ground for the court to decline giving an advisory opinion (as the US suggested). Some countries have argued that doing so would undermine the peace process, but this argument is invalid because there are no viable negotiations taking place at the moment and the court is not called on to decide on the conflict as a whole.
  • Qatar said there is growing perception that some basic tenants of international law “apply to some but not to others, that some people are seen as deserving security, freedom and self-determination but others are not…Some children are deemed worthy of protection while others are killed in their thousands. Qatar rejects such double standards. International law must be upheld in all circumstances.”
  • The UK said Israel’s occupation is illegal and called for a two-state negotiated solution, but argued against the court giving an advisory opinion on a number of grounds, including: the court’s advisory jurisdiction cannot be used to provide a form of judicial recourse for parties, nor should the court resolve disputes between the parties using its advisory jurisdiction.
  • Slovenia said, the right to self-determination is not “some random right” but runs parallel to the equal rights of people. It is a “fundamental human right having a broad scope of application.” The people of Slovenia were able to establish their own sovereign and independent state and believe this right to be an “indispensable pillar of the international legal order”.
  • Sudan said that the ICJ should issue an advisory opinion to “convey a definitive message to both Israel and Palestine that they need to redouble their efforts to achieve peace and security”.
  • Norway said, “the injustice to which the Palestinians are subjected must stop” and “while the eyes of the world are focused on the horrific war in Gaza, the situation in the [occupied] West Bank, including [occupied] East Jerusalem, is also very serious”.
  • Switzerland said that Israel has put in place in the occupied Palestinian territories a “coercive environment” that “cannot be justified under security requirements because it affects the well-being of the population and is discriminatory in nature”.
  • Syria said that the “huge record of UN resolutions” that Israel continues to violate – 180 from the UN General Assembly and 227 of the Security Council – testify to its wrongdoings, that Palestinians must be able to exercise their right to self-determination, and that Israel must remove all settlement structures “without delay.”
Judges at the International Court of Justice attend a hearing of the genocide case against Israel brought by South Africa in The Hague
Judges at the International Court of Justice attend a hearing of the genocide case against Israel brought by South Africa in The Hague (photo)

Video footage authenticated by Al Jazeera’s Sanad verification unit shows Palestinian worshippers being turned away or forcibly removed as they attempt to head to Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem:

Translation: Occupation forces attack Palestinians and obstruct worshippers’ access to Al-Aqsa Mosque.

RECOMMENDED READING (Mondoweiss): Biden won’t let Israel’s rejection of a Palestinian state interfere with his delusions

Al Jazeera reports: The New York branch of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has said that Columbia University must reinstate two student groups who were suspended by the university for pro-Palestinian activism, or face a court challenge:

NYCLU added, “Universities should be havens for robust debate, discussion, and learning – not sites of censorship where administrators, donors, and politicians squash political discourse they don’t approve of.”

 

STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – FEBRUARY 23:

Palestinian death toll from October 7 – February 23: at least 29,811* (29,915 in Gaza* (over 12,660 children, 8,570 women), and at least 401 in the West Bank (100 children). This does not include an estimated 7,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 38,066 Palestinian deaths.

About 1.7 million, or 75% of Gaza’s population are currently displaced.

About 2.2 million are facing Crisis, Emergency, or Famine levels of food insecurity.

Palestinian injuries from October 7 – February 23: at least 74,161** (including at least 69,616 in Gaza and 4,545 in the West Bank).

It remains unknown how many Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.

Reported Israeli death toll from October 7 – February 23: ~1,387 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~574 were civilians, 373 or 337 were security and/or military forces, ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 236 military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza;, 12 in the West Bank) and~8,730 injured.

NBC reports: “According to the latest available IDF data… nearly 1 in 5, or 17%, of all Israel’s losses have come not at the hands of Hamas but from mishaps on its own side.”

NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries in Israel on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

*Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.

Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.

For more news, go here and here. Broadcast news from the region is here.

Source: https://israelpalestinenews.org

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3 COMMENTS

  1. Of course, any decent human being reading through this article and perusing the awful pictures is going to feel uncomfortable. Who is doing all of these horrible things to these Palestininan people in Palestine? It is the state of Israel, obviously. But why? To answer that, we need to look back to what happened before. In all of God's creation, nothing ever happens in a vacuum. Everything that happens is caused by what happened before, and everything that happens now is causitive of what happens in the future. So what happened that inspired the state of Israel to do what it is doing?

    The recent inspiration came from a rainstorm of deadly rockets and murderous raiders from Gaza on 7 October of last year. That was just the most recent provocation of a long and bitter history of ultraviolence on the part of some of the Palestinians. The Palestinian violence inspired hatred on the part of Israel. Israel's violent reactions inspired more hatred on the part of Palestinians. The whole vicious circle of hate and its manifestation into violence has been raging in earnest since 1948 and was simmering before that.

    So now, what is israel to do? Nothing and just allow the rockets and the rest of the murderous violence to eradicate them? That is obviously not on. The hate is so severe that the two sides simply can not live peacefully within rocket, artillery, and bullet range of one another. One side or the other is going to have to die or otherwise be gone. So, what can one reasonably expect the state of israel to do? Everybody just forgive and forget? When you are bleeding, your child is dead, and your house is a pile of rubble, it is a hard thing to do. Some could do it, but not a critical mass sufficient to stop a war.

    If you think that what Israel is doing in and to Gaza is very bad, cruel, horrible, etc., then you are obviously correct. So, what alternative do you suggest for Israel? For my part, I have to admit that I simply do not know the answers to all of the world's problems. Recognising that, I just try to think of ways that I can become the changes that I want to see in the world around me.

    • Your being played, or are you a player? Al Jazeera is a private media network headquarters in Doha of Quatar. Founded by Sheikh Hamad ibn Khalifa Al Thani, Al Thani Qatari royal family.
      It is nothing more than a CNN for Arab's.

  2. awaken human in a much higher consciousness & knowledge Netanyahu Government is inhumane because they are not real human in nature,Hail you all brother and sister who sacrifice your sacred life into this time of transformation,

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