By IRNA,
New York : Iranian Ambassador to United Nations Eshaq Ale Habib on Friday urged the Security Council to take immediate action to alleviate sufferings of people living in Gaza Strip.
He said in his statement to United Nations Security Council meeting that humanitarian situation in Gaza Strip, has reached a disastrous point and the people living there are subject to untold Israeli crimes, and are enduring a humanitarian catastrophe unprecedented in the last several decades.
“In the past several weeks, the situation in the occupied Palestinian territories has further deteriorated as a result of the continued Israeli illegal policies and practices.
“Military attacks against Palestinian civilians and properties, demolition of homes and other properties, targeted killings, unlawful construction and expansion of settlements, colonization measures, the transfer of settlers, imposition of a permit regime and other severe restrictions on movement in the occupied Palestinian territories and construction of the unlawful apartheid Wall are a few examples of Israeli criminal activities that have continued unabated and have even accelerated.
“Moreover, all forms of inhumane and unlawful measures are imposed on the Palestinian civilian population, particularly in the Gaza Strip.
“Israeli settler’s heinous violence, terrorism, harassment and racist acts against Palestinian civilians, their properties and agricultural land has increased. The recent shocking and condemnable events in Al-Khalil where extremist Israeli settlers set fire to Palestinian homes and orchards and cold-bloodedly killed Palestinian civilians, display a pre-planned campaign of terror and intimidation in order to make the life there even more miserable for the innocent Palestinians civilians.
“The world community is today witnessing the unprecedented tragic situation that the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip are facing as a result of the atrocious crimes of the Israeli regime. The international community is witnessing the perpetration by the Israeli regime of some of the most horrendous crimes ever committed in the mankind’s history, against innocent people.
“More than 1.5 million people in the Gaza Strip are starved, massacred and are subject to collective punishment. They are deprived of the most basic goods, medical supplies and services that are necessary to keep them alive.
“The Israeli regime has turned a deaf ear to numerous calls on the part of the international community and is practically eliminating a whole population before the eyes of the world community in a criminal move that has been termed as “crime against humanity” by the UN human rights officials.
“For the founders of the United Nations it would have been certainly impossible, a few decades ago, to imagine that in the 21st century a whole population would be subject to such a horrendous crime against humanity and starved to death by a criminal regime, while the Security Council would remain idle.
But it is unfortunately happening now. It is long overdue for the United Nations and the Security Council to take urgent and meaningful action in order to counter these atrocities and war crimes against the Palestinian people and to help alleviate the sufferings and pains of the people in the Gaza Strip.
“Silence on the part of the international community is neither an option, nor justifiable.
“Hundreds of thousands of people, including women and children, are looking at the United Nations and the international community at large, in anguish and disillusionment, while under constant threat, intimidation and abhorrent crimes of the Israeli regime.
“We should not leave them alone. The Security Council must live up to its responsibilities and move quickly to protect the innocent civilians facing collective punishment in the Gaza Strip.
“The Israeli regime continues its brutal occupation of, and unlawful acts in, the occupied Syrian Golan too. It also continues to occupy parts of the Lebanese territories and persists on its daily violation of the Lebanese airspace in blatant breach of Security Council resolution 1701.
“These are other showcases of Israeli regime’s contempt for this Council and for its decisions, and should be addressed in a serious manner.
“Undoubtedly, inaction on the part of the Security Council, which is in turn due to the unqualified support extended by a permanent member of the Council to the Israeli regime, has emboldened the said regime in its war crimes and crimes against humanity.
“The Israeli regime not only continues its abhorrent crimes against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip and other parts of the occupied Palestinian territories with full impunity, but it also persists on its intimidation and harassment of the UN agencies and human rights officials and on its vicious threats against the nations who show sympathy to the innocent Palestinian people.
He deplored that the unconditional support extended to the Israeli regime by a permanent member of the Council cannot but be regarded as an explicit support for the war crimes and unlawful activities persistently pursued by the Israeli regime.