Going out with C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Chinese leader Xi Jinping decried “tremendous sufferings” in the Middle East and called for an international peace conference as leaders from Arab nations visit Beijing this week amid mounting global concern over Israel’s war in Gaza.
“Since last October, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has escalated drastically, throwing the people into tremendous sufferings. War should not continue indefinitely. Justice should not be absent forever,” Xi said Thursday at the opening of a meeting between top diplomats from China and Arab states, also attended by several leaders from the region.
He also reiterated China’s call for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, as well as Beijing’s support for a “more broad-based, authoritative and effective international peace conference.”
Over seven months have now passed since 7 October. The horrific terror attacks perpetrated by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups and the ensuing Israeli military campaign and relentless hostilities in Gaza have caused widespread suffering on every scale imaginable.
There are reports more than 36,000 Palestinians and over 1,500 Israelis and foreign nationals have been killed, 125 hostages are still held in Gaza and tens of thousands of people injured, the vast majority Palestinian.
Nearly two million Palestinians have been displaced from their homes in the Gaza Strip many of them multiple times, and some one hundred thousand Israelis have been displaced from communities in Israel’s north and south.
Agreement on a deal to achieve a ceasefire and secure the release of hostages is blocked and as Israel rolls out a significant ground operation in and around Rafah, the devastation is only intensifying.
The appalling incident on Sunday when a reported 45 Palestinians were killing and 200 injured as the tents they were sheltering in burned around them does not stand alone amid shocking numbers of civilian casualties. I remind all parties of their obligations to protect civilians.
At the same time, the occupied West Bank remains a pressure-cooker of negative trends. The risk of a regional conflagration is constant and is mounting every day this war continues.
This trajectory must change if we are to avoid further catastrophe.
I urge all parties to return to the negotiating table immediately and in good faith. I reiterate my and the Secretary-General’s repeated calls for the immediate release of all hostages held in Gaza and for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire.
Mr. President,
Palestinians in Gaza face another round of mass displacement, with one million fleeing from Rafah, many being displaced multiples times. Overcrowded conditions and acute shortages of food, water and medicine have led to misery and the spread of disease. The humanitarian response is woefully inadequate to address these needs.
On 24 May, the International Court of Justice delivered its Order on the Request of South Africa for the modification of the Order of 28 March in the case concerning Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in the Gaza Strip, reaffirming its previous provisional measures and indicating new measures.
Humanitarians are heroically continuing to deliver life-saving assistance in an incredibly difficult environment. Unsafe conditions resulting from a dangerously deficient humanitarian notification mechanism are compounded by overcrowding, desperation and a breakdown of law and order, imperiling humanitarian operations and costing the lives of humanitarian workers – including some 200 UN staff. Just hours ago, this breakdown of law and order has resulted in a well-organized looting of the UNRWA Rafah log base, making it more or less inoperative. This a key center for our operations. While we are investigating the circumstances, I condemn any violations of UN premises.
As I briefed this Council a little over a week ago, the opening of two crossings in Gaza’s north, alongside the entry of humanitarian goods arriving from Ashdod and from Jordan, as well as through the U.S. built floating pier via Cyprus – which is now under repair - are positive developments, but not sufficient. I reiterate the Secretary-General’s calls for an immediate re-opening of the Rafah crossing and for unimpeded humanitarian access throughout the Gaza Strip.
Mr. President,
Let me also focus on the occupied West Bank, where violence and other negative trends continue at an alarming rate. Large-scale Israeli operations persist, which are often met by lethal exchanges with armed Palestinians, as well as a spike in settler violence and attacks by Palestinians against Israelis. Friction points around settlements are getting worse as the settlement enterprise expands in a very well-planned manner.
I am particularly concerned by Israel’s lifting of the military order banning Israelis from entering three evacuated settlements in the northern West Bank, a policy in effect since the 2005 disengagement law was put in place, and I do take note of the subsequent military order declaring the area a closed military zone, effectively preventing the entry of Israelis and Palestinians.
Around the region, the threat of a serious escalation has intensified. Exchanges of fire across the Blue Line between Israel and Hizbullah and other non-state armed groups in Lebanon continued. In addition to the deeply concerning escalation between Israel and Iran witnessed last month, aerial attacks toward Israel from militants in the region and Houthi attacks against international shipping in the Red Sea persisted. This is a combustible mix.
Mister President,
It is clear that all sides must urgently change course.
It is right that we are all focused on preventing a further deterioration or looking for solutions to the most pressing needs, yet without linking these urgent efforts to a longer-term political strategy, any solution will be short-lived or even counterproductive.
No attempt to address the humanitarian and security challenges will be sustainable unless it is part of a broader approach that addresses Gaza’s political future. That future is as an integral part of a single, unified Palestinian state, which is a crucial foundation for realizing a two-state solution.
This has been and will continue to be a key focus of my own efforts.
Throughout the past months, the Secretary-General and I have engaged extensively with the parties, the region and international actors to encourage a common approach to addressing the complex humanitarian, security and political crises affecting not only Gaza, but the whole of the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Israel and the region.
We must reach an agreement to release the hostages and put in place an immediate ceasefire.
There is absolutely no time to lose.
The UN remains in regular contact with the mediators and parties, and we are committed to support the implementation of an agreement. A sustained ceasefire will be critical to a full-scale humanitarian and early recovery response to meet the immense needs in Gaza.
At the same time, we should be putting in place the framework for Gaza’s recovery and doing so in a way that tangible for moves forward, rather than away from a long-term political resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
I have previously outlined some of the key principles that should guide us in that work - allow me to reiterate and expand on several of them here:
There should be no long-term Israeli military presence in Gaza, while at the same time Israel's legitimate security concerns, particularly in the wake of the acts of terror committed on 7 October, must be addressed.
Gaza is and must remain an integral part of a future Palestinian State – with no reductions in its territory.
Gaza and the West Bank must be unified politically, economically, administratively. They must be governed by a Palestinian Government that is recognized and supported by the Palestinian people and the international community. If transitional arrangements are required, they must be designed to achieve a unified Palestinian Government within a precise and limited timeframe.
There can be no long-term solution in Gaza that is not fundamentally political.
Mr. President,
My message in Brussels at the International Partners Meeting on Palestine was as follows, and it is the same message I am giving you here today:
– we must strengthen and preserve the institutions of the Palestinian Authority (PA) before it is too late, while rejecting any steps that seek to systematically undermine its viability, such as Israel’s withholding of the PA’s clearance revenues.
The fiscal situation for the PA is very serious, Mr. President.
I warned over a year ago that thirty years of state-building in Palestine were at grave risk. That is even more true today and the consequences are even more serious.
Affirming a path to the two-State solution means preserving and safeguarding the very institutions that are meant to govern such a state. Moreover, these institutions will be vital to the essential objective of ensuring Palestinian-led governance in Gaza.
The new technocratic Palestinian Government under Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa, with eight ministers from Gaza - represents an important opportunity for us all to support tangible steps in the right direction, and in line with the principles for Gaza’s future as I just outlined.
The international community should provide support to, and work with, the new Government to address the PA’s dire fiscal crisis, strengthen its governance capacity and prepare it to reassume its responsibilities in Gaza and, ultimately, govern the whole of the Occupied Palestinian Territory. Political, institutional and economic reforms will be needed – but they must be achievable, credible and financed. We should ensure that the Palestinian Authority is an integral part of planning for Gaza’s recovery and reconstruction.
I urge all actors to recognize the critical role of the PA and how that should play out in Gaza and work toward enabling its return because there is actually no other credible alternative.
We already know the scale of damage is immense - the World Bank and the United Nations, with support from the EU, conducted an Interim Damage Assessment of the impact of the first four months of conflict in Gaza - quantifying the cost of the physical damages to critical infrastructure like hospitals, housing and roads to be at around US$ 18.5 billion. The final cost will likely be multiples of this figure.
The massive scale of this effort will clearly require mobilization of the widest possible coalition of donors, private sector sources of financing, and significant improvements in how the necessary reconstruction materials should be able to enter Gaza.
We know already that donors and investors will not be forthcoming without concrete steps by the parties to find a political solution and ensure that Gaza is not rebuilt only to be destroyed yet again.
Let me be clear: The political framework and structures we establish now will play a significant role in the success or failure of what follows. This requires us to plan and act deliberately and thoughtfully, knowing that today’s decisions will not only shape the future of governance in Gaza, but also determine the trajectory of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict more broadly.
Mister President,
I am aware of the many challenges in trying to achieve these objectives while war rages in Gaza and while our attention is rightly focused on urgent needs on the ground.
But it is a time for making difficult political choices. If we neglect to lay the foundations of a lasting resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and end the occupation, the price of failure will reverberate for generations.
These foundations will not only be laid in Gaza, but also in the occupied West Bank; and they must be set in place not just by donors and the international community, but by committed leaders on all sides of this conflict. The drivers of the conflict must be addressed, including violence, settlement advancements and militant activity. Israeli measures that undermine the PA must halt now. Without progress on each of these, we will begin the process of undermining what we have not yet even started.
After the horrors of the past seven months, and past days, Palestinians and Israelis desperately need a political horizon. Without it, there is no sustainable path out of the suffering and misery we are witnessing now.
Two days after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordered Israel to halt its military offensive on Rafah, dozens of displaced Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes. On Sunday night, the Israeli military bombed civilians whom it had previously ordered to move to the designated “safe zone” of Tal Al-Sultan in the northwestern part of Rafah.
Israel has bombed Rafah dozens of times since the ICJ ruling. But on
Sunday, the bombardment of Palestinians in a tent encampment behind the
UNHCR school in Rafah resulted in a large inferno and massive
casualties, including children who were burned alive in a sea of flames.
According to Al Jazeera, the Israeli airstrikes struck the
camp at night. The fire from the bombs falling on the plastic tents
spread rapidly, killing at least 45 Palestinians, injuring 249, and
razing the tent camp to the ground. This was reportedly followed by an Israeli drone strike on the Kuwaiti Hospital entrance as medics were bringing in the dead and the wounded, killing two staff members.
Hospital
director Suhaib al-Hams announced on Monday that the Kuwaiti Hospital
would have to suspend services due to “the repeated and deliberate
attacks on the hospital’s surroundings.”
The graphic images and
cell phone video recordings that have been circulating on social media —
a headless child, charred bodies of children, women and children
frantically running in all directions trying to escape the fires — are
painful to watch. They bring Israeli atrocities in Gaza to a new level
of unspeakable cruelty and horror.
I don’t know how anyone can recover from this gruesome monstrosity.
Do we mourn the dead infants or weep for those who have just been
orphaned? Do we scream for those children who have been maimed, or for
the parents who had to wrap their loved ones in white shrouds?
Israeli
officials first said the strike was “based on precise intelligence” and
claimed that the bombardment targeted a Hamas compound, killing two senior Hamas officials. After global condemnation, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instead started calling the strike “a tragic accident.”
The U.S.-made bombs that were dropped on the camp in Tal Al-Sultan came after Israeli airstrikes hit shelters in northern Gaza and Gaza City, killing 160 displaced Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials. In Jabalya, at least four people were reportedly killed when a missile hit a residential building during an intense night of shelling. Witnesses reported raging fires throughout the city. Elsewhere in the north, Israeli occupation forces continue to demolish residential neighborhoods, burying countless numbers of people under the rubble. Israeli soldiers were also seen firing on a group of Palestinians filling water containers in the Al-Faluja area.
Israel’s Rafah massacre has been widely condemned as a grave violation of international law, but there has been no clear criticism or outrage from the White House. As the Biden administration emphasizes the deaths of Hamas leaders and utters the same words we’ve become accustomed to hearing over the past eight months — that the U.S. urges Israel to protect civilians and minimize civilian casualties — its statements have become a farce.
Israel
used U.S.-made bombs in its attack on a camp of displaced Palestinians
outside Rafah that killed dozens on Sunday night, according to analyses
from bothThe New York Timesand CNN.
Humanitarian groups had condemned the Israeli strike, which killed at least 45, mostly women and children, and injured more than 240. The attack left medical personnel dealing with charred corpses and missing limbs. An expert at the Council on American-Islamic Relations called it a "U.S.-backed massacre."
Using videos from the site of the attack, weapons experts identified remnants of GBU-39s, which are relatively small bombs designed and manufactured by Boeing in the U.S. One expert, interviewed by the Times and CNN, said that the tail actuation unit of the GBU-39 was visible, helping with identification of the weapon.
Two more US officials have resigned over the Gaza war, saying that the Biden administration is not telling the truth about Israeli obstruction of humanitarian assistance to more than two million Palestinians trapped and starving in the tiny coastal strip.
Alexander Smith, a contractor for the US Agency for International Development (USAID), said he was given a choice between resignation and dismissal after preparing a presentation on maternal and child mortality among Palestinians, which was cancelled at the last minute by USAID leadership last week.
Smith, a senior adviser on gender, maternal health, child health, and nutrition chose to resign on Monday after four years at USAID. In his resignation letter to the head of the agency, Samantha Power, he complained about the inconsistencies in USAID’s approach to different countries and humanitarian crises, and the general treatment of Palestinians.
Less than two weeks after its installation off the Gaza coast, a US-built pier helping to deliver aid to Palestinians on the brink of famine broke apart.
Officials say rough seas and stormy weather caused the damage and it will now take more than a week to repair.
The pier will be reassembled at a port in southern Israel and should be back in place and working again next week, the Pentagon said.
Aid organisations have criticised a US-built temporary pier in Gaza used to transport aid into the besieged enclave, after satellite images revealed it breaking apart.
The imagery showed the sea damaging the pier on Tuesday, with sections needing rebuilding and repairing.
The pier, which is made up of a narrow causeway and an area used to place supplies transported by ship, cost $320 million and went into use on 17 May.
US Department of Defense spokesperson Sabrina Singh spokesperson told reporters it will now have to be moved to Ashdod in Israel, where repairs will take at least a week to be completed.
According to CNN, the pier, known as the Joint Logistics Over the Shore (JLOTS), can only operate in good conditions.
Michael Selby-Green, a media spokesperson from Islamic Relief told The New Arab that his group and other aid organisations have repeatedly warned that the pier could not be a substitute for getting aid through land crossings that already exist.
"The damage sustained by the floating pier two weeks after it began operating exposes the structure for the distraction that it is," he said.
He clarified that even at full capacity, the pier only delivers a small fraction of aid that could be brought in by trucks.
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