HALT ISRAELI MASSACRES AGAINST PALESTINIAN CIVILIANS!

Call for International Protection of the Palestinian People and Israeli Adherence to UN Resolutions and International Law Standards
BADIL Resource Center, 6 October 2000

On 28 September 2000, Ariel Sharon, head of the Israeli Likud party, conducted a so-called private visit, accompanied by 3,000 Israeli police and special forces, to the Muslim holy site of al-Haram al-Sharif (site of the al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock) in the Old City of Jerusalem, despite warnings by Palestinian, Arab, and some Israeli and western officials that the visit could destabilize the situation on the ground. On Friday 29 September, the provocation created by the visit, and the massive Israeli police presence in the Old City and around the Haram al-Sharif, resulted in Israeli occupation forces, including snipers, opening fire on the large number of Palestinian worshippers assembled for prayer, thus triggering the bloodiest Israeli-Palestinian confrontations since the beginning of the Osloprocess in 1993. Since then, battles between civilian Palestinian protestors - many of them refugees - Palestinian security  forces, and the Israeli occupation have spread all over the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and Palestinian population centers inside Israel.

 Although termed "Jerusalem (Al-Aqsa) Intifada", the current popular protest is not mainly a struggle over religious symbols, but an expression of the deep frustration over the ongoing disrespect and denial of the Palestinian people's basic rights - including the right to free access to Jerusalem, security and development in the homeland, and the refugees' right to return, restitution and compensation - by a political process which is experienced as a process imposed by Israeli and the United States in order to negate Palestinian human and national rights for all times to come.

Israeli repression has escalated day by day, including measures which are clearly outlawed by international conventions (Fourth Geneva Convention/Protection of Civilians under Occupation; Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; Convention on the Rights of the Child), such as the use of life ammunition and dum-dum bullets against civilians, many of them children; the use of tanks, LAW(?) missiles, and gun-helicopters against large crowds of protestors, Palestinian civilian homes and security targets; shooting at Palestinian medical staff and ambulances.

Thus the violent confrontations between the heavily armed occupation forces and the Palestinian popular resistance equipped with stones and Molotov-cocktails - supported by weakly armed Palestinian security forces - has led to an unprecedented toll of deaths and injuries among the Palestinian people. By today, October 6, over 80 Palestinians have been killed, 14 of them Palestinian citizens of Israel. Among the killed are at least 15 children below the age of eighteen. In addition, over 2,500 have been injured, mainly by bullet wounds to the upper part of the body and head.

Public protest against the Israeli repression and solidarity with the Palestinian people has spread from the Paelstinian refugee camps in Lebanon and the Arab world to the United States, Canda and Europe, and an adequate official response by the internati-onal community is overdue.

In light of the aggravating situation, BADIL Resource Center joins the demand of Palestinian popular and official institutions and the international solidarity movement for a rapid and efficient intervention of the international community in order to oblige Israel to abide to all relevant UN resolutions (especially resoluti-ons 242, 338 calling for Israeli withdrawal from the 1967 occupied Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem) and international humanitarian and human rights conventions (e.g. Forth Geneva Convention;Convention on Civil and Political Rights; Convention on the Rights of the Child).

Specifically, we call upon the UN High Commission for Human Rights, its member states and High Commissioner, Ms. Mary Robinson, to implement the Commission's mandate by:
1. Holding a Special Session to discuss the current violent events and issuing a Special Statement, which condems injuries and loss of life caused by Israel's excessive and indiscriminate use of military and police force among the Palestinian people in the 1967 occupied territories and in Israel.

2. Launching and international investigation both within Israel and the 1967 occupied territories (including East Jerusalem) to determine responsibility and accountability for the injuries, loss of life and human rights violations by Israel.

3. Stimulating and coordinating action (including preventive action) for the protection of the human rights of the Palestinian people throughout the UN system. Protective human rights mechanisms must be extended especially to vulnerable groups, i.e. Palestinians in occupied Jerusalem and within Israel, and to Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons, who - excluded from the international protection regime for 50 years - continue to be denied their basic human right to repatriation, restitution and compensation according to UN Resolution 194.

Please express your concern and appeal to:
Mrs. Mary Robinson, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Fax: 0041-22-917 9016
Copies to: governments, members of the UN Human Rights Commission; Offices of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in the West Bank and Gaza Strip ([email protected]; [email protected])