The Doha-based Arab Network for National Human Rights Institutions (ANNHRI) has called on the international community to urgently intervene to stop the continuous Israeli occupation aggression against the Palestinian people.

The network condemned the Israeli occupation forces' continued systematic aggression and escalation against the Gaza Strip since the start of the aggression on May 10, 2021, during which it targeted various populated residential areas, and deliberately targeted safe Palestinian homes and demolished them without prior warning, which caused the annihilation of entire families, in addition to deliberately targeting civilian and public facilities in an organized manner, and damaging them on the basis of revenge and collective punishment, causing dozens of martyrs and leaving hundreds wounded, with suspicion of using prohibited international weapons and gases.

This came during the emergency meeting of the ANNHRI's executive committee held today by the Network's general administration via video conference technology at the invitation of the Independent Commission for Human Rights in Palestine, which chairs the ANNHRI in its current session, and with the participation of the national human rights institutions members in Qatar, Jordan, Bahrain, Egypt, Oman, Iraq, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Lebanon, Mauritania and Sudan.

The network called on the international community, especially the High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention on the Protection of Civilians in Time of War of 1949, to shoulder their legal and moral obligations by providing protection for Palestinian civilians in the occupied Palestinian territories, taking urgent action and taking effective measures to stop the Israeli aggression on the Strip by exerting serious pressure on the occupying power to immediately stop its aggression against the besieged Gaza Strip, protect the lives of its residents and prevent more bloodshed, put an end to its gross violations of their rights and the right to their property, and ensure that the occupying power respects the principles of international humanitarian law that are binding on it in all cases. It urged the international community and the specialized United Nations institutions to take all measures to stop the mass forcible displacement the residents of the Gaza Strip carried out by the Israeli occupation forces.

 

The ANNHRI held the Israeli occupation authority fully responsible for the lives of Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian territories, and for the plan of expulsion and forced displacement of tens of Palestinian families from Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in occupied Jerusalem, warning of the profound humanitarian impact and repercussions this has on the affected families.

The emergency meeting of the ANNHRI's executive committee discussed a range of issues. The meeting reviewed developments in Palestine and violations in Jerusalem and all the Palestinian territories in addition to what can be done at the level of the Arab network and member institutions to support the rights of the Palestinian people and pressure to stop the Israeli aggression in addition to agreeing on an action plan to support the Independent Commission for Human Rights in Palestine. The meeting listened to a working paper presented by the Independent Commission for Human Rights in Palestine on a number of proposals to support the rights of the Palestinian people and pressure to stop the Israeli aggression. (QNA)