He Palestinian government denounced this Monday that Israel has been “decades of impunity” in Palestine, “committing violations inherent to its colonial objective,” and urged the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to demand that the Jewish state “immediately, unconditionally and completely end the illegal occupation” of Israel of the Palestinian territories.
Several officials participated in this Monday's hearing before this court, which This week, it studies “the legal consequences derived from Israel's policies and practices in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem.”
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The Court will issue a non-binding legal opinion, in a case prior to the current Israeli war in Gaza, which has already killed a total of 29,092 people and has left the Strip devastated, with 1.9 million displaced in a territory inhabited by 2.3 million people.
On January 26, in a separate case, the ICJ issued precautionary measures requiring Israel to take “immediate and effective” steps to prevent the commission of genocide against the Palestinian population of Gaza as a consequence of the Israeli bombings of the Strip since on October 7, after the Hamas attack on Israel, which claimed the lives of 1,200 people and kept more than a hundred hostages in the hands of the Islamist group.
At the hearing featuring calls from Palestinian leaders for a “lasting peace” between Israel and Palestine and for two states that coexist “in peace and security,” the ICJ judges saw images of the life of the Palestinian population before the creation of Israel in 1947, compared with photographs of the current humanitarian massacre in the Gaza Strip, as well as maps of the evolution of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories.
Strong speeches followed, especially by the Palestinian Foreign Minister, Riad al Maliki, and the Palestinian permanent representative to the UN, Riyad Mansour, whose voice broke on several occasions when he urged to defend the law so that the group's identity to which they belong does not diminish the human rights to which everyone is entitled as individuals.
The Palestinian people have been denied their rights and have endured both colonization and apartheid
Al Maliki, for his part, urged a “just and lasting solution of two democratic States: Palestine and Israel, side by side, in peace and security.”
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The Palestinian minister warned that “the ongoing genocide in Gaza is the result of decades of impunity and inaction,” in which Israel “has given the Palestinian people three options: displacement, subjugation or death” and recalled that “ending that impunity Israeli is a moral, political and legal imperative.”
“These are the options: ethnic cleansing, apartheid, or genocide. But our people are here to stay. You have the right to live in freedom and dignity in the land of your ancestors. We are not going to give up our right,” said Al Maliki, who urged a “just and lasting solution of two democratic states.”
Al Maliki recalled that Israel “continues to defy with impunity” the ICJ orders and warned that “the prolonged Israeli occupation of Palestine aims to achieve the complete disappearance of Palestine and the destruction of the Palestinian people. “There can be no justification for these injustices and indignities, allowing them to continue is unacceptable and inexcusable.”
“For decades, the Palestinian people have been denied their rights and have endured both colonization and apartheid. There are those who are outraged by the use of these words, when they should be outraged by the reality we live in. This reality is known to every Palestinian “Suffered by millions. Generation after generation. It is the reality of the expulsion of the Palestinian people from their own land,” said Al Maliki.
The Palestinian permanent representative to the UN, Riyad Mansour, for his part, urged the ICJ, through tears and with his voice breaking on several occasions, respect the right of self-determination of the Palestinian people in the face of “humiliation” at the hands of Israel, and to declare the Israeli occupation of Palestine “illegal.”
Mansour denounced, in this sense, that Israeli leaders “no longer feel the need to hide their intentions, and openly talk about getting rid of the Palestinian people in one way or another, they defy the law, and the law is barely defended.”
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“We ask you to confirm that the Israeli presence in the occupied Palestinian territories is illegal. I repeat, it is illegal. That the presence of its occupation forces and its settlers is illegal. And that its occupation must come to an immediate, total and unconditional end,” requested Mansour, a Palestinian diplomat born in 1947, the year of the creation of the State of Israel.
“Palestine appeals to this Court to guide the international community in defense of international law, to end injustice and achieve a just and lasting peace. To guide us toward a future where Palestinian children are treated as children, not as a demographic threat. A future in which no Palestinian or Israeli is killed,” she added.
EFE
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