Palestinian official has urged the Security Council to compel Israel to stop its illegal settlement activities and to act in a responsible manner so that the peace process can resume, warning that failure to do so will have far-reaching consequences for the whole region.
In a letter to the UN Secretary-General and the Security Council, Palestinian Charge d’Affaires Feda Abdelhady-Nasser said “it is imperative that the international community, including the Security Council give due attention to the grave situation in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and that timely measures and action be undertaken to compel Israel, the occupying power, to cease forthwith its illegal colonization campaign and all other illegal policies and to instead finally commit to the pursuit of peace.”
“For all of these war crimes, acts of state terrorism and systematic human rights violations committed against the Palestinian people, Israel, the occupying power, must be held accountable and the perpetrators must be brought to justice,” she said.
She said Israel’s rabid and illegal colonization campaign throughout the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, is not only further destabilizing the fragile situation on the ground but is gravely undermining prospects for a resumption of the peace process.
She recalled that earlier this month extremist settlers committed arson in a mosque in the village of Yasouf, near the city of Nablus, in addition to ongoing acts of provocation by other extremist settlers in East Jerusalem, particularly in and around the compound of the Al-Haram Al-Sharif.
“Such lawlessness and impunity have clearly been fostered and fuelled by the military, financial and physical reinforcements and incentives provided to the settlers by the Israeli government, including its absolute failure to hold the settlers accountable for their crimes,” she noted.
She said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s 10-month moratorium on settlement activities was only meant to distract the international community while the illegal settlement campaign is going on.
“The Israeli agenda is clear: to create as many facts on the ground as possible aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the occupied territory in order to prejudge the outcome of any final peace settlement,” she indicated.
The continuation of all such illegal Israeli actions and provocations, she warned, will only further ratchet up tensions and cause the further destabilization of an already fragile situation, with far-reaching consequences not only for the prospects of peace but for the region as a whole.
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