South African Foreign Minister: Arrest Netanyahu and stop the Gaza genocide

According to the international group Tasnim news agency, Naldi Pandor In an article entitled “Arrest Netanyahu and stop the Gaza genocide”, the South African foreign minister has addressed the developments in Palestine.

The full text of this article is as follows. Here it is: 

The Palestinian people have for too long been denied their human rights and the freedoms we fought so hard for in South Africa. These rights do not belong to some and are not reserved for others. We have expressed the killing of civilians, many of them innocent children, as well as the destruction of civilian infrastructure, UN schools, and almost half of Gaza’s hospitals. Even in the darkest days of apartheid, we were not subject to targeted bombing of hospitals, schools or residential buildings. Apartheid South Africa was terrible for us for decades, but the scenes we are witnessing in Gaza are a different kind of cruelty.

ordinary people All over the world, including Jews who have made it clear that these crimes were not committed in the name of Jews, hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets to show solidarity with the Palestinian people.

They Failure to hold Israel accountable for its continued violations of international law emboldens Israel to continue its actions with impunity and undermine the just international legal order. Israel’s latest violation of international norms, which has been the deliberate killing of civilians, including children, warrants the immediate implementation of an arms embargo against Israel.

Just peace And stability will not be achieved through resorting to force by the occupying power, nor through armed resistance by the Palestinians. However, a just and lasting peace requires that the United Nations and the international community ensure that the impunity under which Israel and its leaders have operated for decades ends.

The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has started his investigation about the situation in Palestine. We call on the Prosecutor to speed up the investigation and investigate violations of three of the four crimes under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court: war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. We expect that the arrest warrants for those most responsible will be carried out in accordance with the ICC’s superior principles and responsibility. These cases include Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and some members of his cabinet. Failure to do so will fuel growing skepticism that international law is selectively applied for political ends.

The devastation of the current conflict is well documented. And it is terrible. Given the deteriorating situation, South Africa has repeatedly called for an immediate and comprehensive ceasefire that would allow all humanitarian corridors to be opened to provide essential aid and basic services to the civilian population of Gaza.

On October 27, South Africa, along with more than two-thirds of the members of the UN General Assembly, called for an immediate ceasefire. This action has been ignored.

The actions we see every day from Israel violate international law, including the UN Charter. Geneva Convention and its protocols. Hamas has also violated international laws in its attacks on civilians and taking hostages of civilians, and we have demanded the release of the hostages.

International Humanitarian Law It includes the commitment not to target the civilian population and the responsibility to protect civilians in armed conflict. According to the Geneva Convention, hospitals must be protected. It is clearly stated in Article 12: Medical units must always be respected and protected and should not be attacked.

In Article 14, too It is categorically stated: Starving civilians as a method of combat is prohibited. Therefore, it is forbidden to attack, destroy, remove or make unusable the necessities for the survival of civilian people, such as food, agricultural areas for food production, crops, livestock, facilities and equipment for drinking water and irrigation. With complete disregard for the Geneva Convention, Israeli bombardment throughout the Gaza Strip has continued and intensified over the past five weeks. For international law to be valid, it must be applied uniformly and not selectively.

Unfortunately, the crime of genocide in Gaza is widespread. Is. The roots of this war go back to the systematic oppression of the Palestinians by Israel in the last 75 years, the illegal occupation of their lands and the network of illegal settlements deep in the Palestinian territory.

International human rights organizations, at least 17 of which are Israeli, including Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and B’Tselem, have described Israel’s military occupation of Palestinian lands as the crime of apartheid. They condemn Israel’s siege of Gaza for the past 17 years, which is the world’s largest open-air prison, housing 2.4 million Palestinians who are unable to enter or leave freely and whose supply of water, electricity and goods is also at the hands of the occupiers. The extreme nature of the Gaza crisis should not hide the fact that the West Bank and East Jerusalem are in crisis.

Since the Oslo Accords in 1993, The number of illegal Israeli settlers occupying Palestinian lands has increased from 250,000 to over 700,000. The desecration of Al-Aqsa Mosque has worsened the situation with the escalation of mob attacks on worshipers and residents of East Jerusalem this year. The total cruelty experienced by the Palestinians in Gaza or the West Bank is what Antonio Guterres, the Secretary General of the United Nations, recently declared: Hamas attacks did not happen in a vacuum.

Israel is an occupying power, which the International Court of Justice and the United Nations have confirmed. Just as Israel can use tools to maintain the rule of law, an occupying state cannot control the territory it occupies and simultaneously launch a military attack on that territory based on its “foreignness” and exogenous national security threat. According to international law, those living under occupation have the right to resist. Armed struggle against a colonial occupying force is sanctioned under international law. Wars of national liberation have been universally recognized as an essential and protected right of people whose lands are occupied through the ratification of Additional Protocol 1 to the Geneva Conventions of 1949.

The final solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict lies in the creation of two states within the framework of internationally agreed parameters. We continue to support this approach, but we recognize that many Palestinians and Israelis believe that a just and sustainable solution may include approaches that allow Palestinians and Israelis to live peacefully under arrangements in which their human rights are guaranteed. and protected, facilitate.

The UN peace process initiative should start immediately. Our common humanity dictates that all human lives matter and it is time for the international community to act.

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