Remarks of UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini at the Global Refugee Forum
Geneva
December 13, 2023
[…] Most of Gaza’s population has been forcibly displaced, largely into the southern part of the Strip, Rafah. Rafah is now hosting well over a million people. It used to be home to 280,000 people. […] UNRWA is still operating 8 health centres, out of 22. We are sheltering more than a million people in our schools and other facilities. […]
[…] More than 130 UNRWA staff are confirmed killed. Many of our staff, who are themselves displaced, take their children to work with them to ensure that they are safe together or die together. […]
[…] The people of Gaza are running out of time and options, as they face bombardment, deprivation, and disease in an ever-ever-shrinking space. They are facing the darkest chapter of their history since 1948. And it has been a painful history. The events in Gaza are taking place against a backdrop of 75 years of displacement. 75 years of failure to find a just and lasting solution to the plight of Palestine Refugees. During this time, they have been deprived of their basic human rights and their right to self-determination. Throughout the region, many continue to live in overcrowded refugee camps with substandard living conditions, generation after generation. […]
[…] I also thank our partners and donors for their support and trust. But Palestine Refugees need a just solution, not just aid. Today, they feel abandoned by the international community. They feel betrayed as the world fails to act in the face of one of the worst humanitarian catastrophes of our time in Gaza. They now believe that human lives are not equal and human rights are not universal. This is a dangerous message, and it will have serious repercussions. […]
[…] The people of Gaza, like all people, long for safety, stability, and fulfilment. This is also the forum where I must raise the alarm about the dehumanization that is rampant during this war. The war in Gaza heavily relies on a media war. Dehumanizing and derogatory language should not be normalized. The lack of empathy only fuels divides, polarization, and hatred. I am horrified at the smear campaigns that target Palestinians and all those who provide assistance and protection to them. Our partners present here must help us push back against hatred and debunk repeated vulgar accusations. […]
Read the full text:
PDF: PL13.12.2023
******
Why does Israel have so many Palestinians in detention and available to swap?
By Omar Shakir
November 29, 2023
******
Gaza is ‘running out of time’ UN experts warn, demanding a ceasefire to prevent genocide
Time is running out to prevent genocide and humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, UN experts warned today, expressing deep frustration with Israel’s refusal to halt plans to decimate the besieged Gaza strip.
November 2, 2023
******
Letter of resignation: Craig Mokhiber, Head of the OHCHR Representation in New York
October 28, 2023
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24103463-craig-mokhiber-resignation-letter
******
‘Unchilded’ from birth: UN expert calls for decisive protection of Palestinian children under Israeli rule
UN Press Release
October 24, 2023
[…] From 2008 until 6 October 2023, 1,434 Palestinian children were reportedly killed, with an additional 32,175 sustaining injuries, primarily at the hands of Israeli occupation forces. Of these, 1,025 children were killed in Gaza alone, since the unlawful blockade began in 2007. During the same timeframe, 25 Israeli children were killed, mostly by Palestinian assailants, and 524 were injured. Between 2019 and 2022, 1,679 Palestinian children and 15 Israeli children sustained lasting physical injuries, leaving many permanently disabled. An average of 500-700 Palestinian children are reported to be detained by Israeli occupation forces each year, with an estimated 13,000 mostly arbitrarily detained, interrogated, tried in military courts and imprisoned since 2000. […]
******
Gaza: UN experts decry bombing of hospitals and schools as crimes against humanity, call for prevention of genocide
October 19, 2023
******
Special Rapporteur says Israel’s unlawful carceral practices in the occupied Palestinian territory are tantamount to international crimes and have turned it into an open-air prison
July 10, 2023
The Human Rights Council this afternoon held an interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967 on her report on arbitrary deprivation of liberty. It also started an interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and related forms of intolerance on her reports on increasing efforts to implement international legal provisions providing protection from racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, and on combatting the glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism and related ideologies.
******
Bachelet alarmed by number of Palestinian children killed in latest escalation, urges accountability
August 11, 2022
******
Israel’s apartheid against Palestinians: Cruel system of domination and crime against humanity
Amnesty International has analysed Israel’s intent to create and maintain a system of oppression and domination over Palestinians and examined its key components: territorial fragmentation; segregation and control; dispossession of land and property; and denial of economic and social rights. It has concluded that this system amounts to apartheid. Israel must dismantle this cruel system and the international community must pressure it to do so. All those with jurisdiction over the crimes committed to maintain the system should investigate them.
February 1, 2022
https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde15/5141/2022/en/
******
Palestinian children detained by Israel increases amid COVID-19 pandemic
April 21, 2020
[…] At the end of March, 194 Palestinian children were detained in Israeli prisons and detention centers, an increase of six percent from January, according to data released by the Israel Prison Service (IPS). The IPS data from a headcount on March 31 shows that only 28 percent of Palestinian children in IPS custody were serving sentences. Over 60 percent (117 out of 194) of Palestinian child detainees were held in pre-trial custodial detention, according to IPS data. […]
******
Military Courts
The Israeli Military Court System
ADDAMEER (Arabic for conscience) Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association
July 2017
https://www.addameer.org/israeli_military_judicial_system/military_courts
******
Amir Mortasawi (alias Afsane Bahar) (امیر مرتضوی (افسانه بهار 