Middle East Monitor / March 24, 2021
The Palestinian Authority’s permanent representative to the UN, Riyad Mansour, said on Monday that “the time has come to stop Israel’s blatant impunity,” Wafa news agency reported.
“The time has come to stop Israel’s blatant impunity, the occupying power, this occupation that causes a lot of harm and despair to the Palestinian people, and destroys the prospects for a just solution based on the international consensus for the Israeli-Palestinian struggle,” he said in a letter sent to the UN Secretary-General, President of the Security Council and the President of the UN General Assembly.
He highlighted Israel’s murder of 45-year-old Palestinian, Atef Yousef Hanaisheh, who was shot in the head by occupation forces as they attacked a peaceful anti-settlement demonstration in the village of Beit Dajan, east of Nablus, last week.
“The occupation forces continue to respond to any legitimate opposition to Israel’s theft of Palestinian lands and dispossession of Palestinian families by lethal and criminal force, in many Palestinian areas, which indicates that Israel is not interested in potential accountability,” the ambassador said.
Mansour pointed out that the Israeli occupation authorities are going ahead in their plans to demolish more than 100 homes in the Al-Bustan neighbourhood in Silwan, noting that “if this war crime was carried out, it would lead to the forcible displacement of at least 1,550 Palestinians.”
To highlight the Israeli crimes, he referred to an OCHA report, which stated that in February 2021 alone, the Israeli occupation demolished or seized 153 Palestinian properties, which led to the displacement of 305 people, including 172 children, and damaged the livelihoods of 435 others.
Mansour once again appealed to the international community to act urgently to assume its responsibilities in line with international law, including humanitarian law, human rights law, and the relevant UN resolutions.
