United Nations (UN) chief General Ban Ki-moon has issued a scathing attack on the Israeli government for what he has declared the illegal Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories and settlement construction on the occupied lands.
The Secretary General told the New York Times on Sunday that enough is enough, saying that the Palestinian people can no longer tolerate Israel’s aggression. “History proves that people will always resist occupation,” Ban told the newspaper.
Presstv.com reports:
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The UN chief denounced Tel Aviv’s plans to build over 150 new settlements and to confiscate 370 acres of agricultural land in the occupied West Bank.
“Israeli settlements keep expanding,” he wrote, adding, “At the same time, thousands of Palestinian homes in the West Bank risk demolition… Palestinian frustration and grievances are growing under the weight of nearly a half-century of occupation. Ignoring this won’t make it disappear.”
He said that keeping the Palestinians “under indefinite occupation undermines the security and the future of both Israelis and Palestinians.”
The South Korean diplomat also expressed concern about the continuation of tensions in Palestinian territories, which he said may jeopardize the so-called two-state solution. “I am so concerned that we are reaching a point of no return for the two-state solution.”
The UN secretary general has voiced strong criticism of Israel’s policies in recent days.
On January 26, he said in an address to the UN Security Council that Israel’s settlement activities should be stopped for “progress towards peace” to be achieved. The following day, Ban told a UN committee on Palestinian rights that the Palestinians, especially the youth, “are losing hope. They are angered by the stifling policies of the occupation.”
The remarks prompted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accuse Ban of giving a “tailwind to terror.” Netanyahu also claimed that the UN had lost its neutrality “a long time ago.”
In an apparent reaction to such rhetoric from Netanyahu, Ban titled hisTimes piece “Don’t Shoot the Messenger, Israel.”
More than half a million Israelis live in over 230 illegal settlements built since the 1967 Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East al-Quds (Jerusalem).
The UN and most countries regard the Israeli settlements as illegal because they are built on lands captured by Israel in a 1967 war, and are hence subject to the Geneva Conventions, which forbid construction on occupied lands.
The presence and continued expansion of Israeli settlements in occupied Palestine have created a major obstacle for the efforts to establish peace in the Middle East.
The Palestinian Authority wants the West Bank as part of its future independent state, with East al-Quds as its capital.
Sean Adl-Tabatabai
How does one remain neutral in the face of IDF’s international war crimes that casually take the lives of Palestinian civilians, including mothers and children, and of Israel’s arrogant and repeated violations of the rule of UN law by Israel, Mr. Netanyahu? Your angry, self-absorbed criticism only masks the immorality of the ethnic cleansing that Israel is now actively implementing. “Never again” somehow has been turned into calls for Palestinian genocide or “shoah” and, once again, for a “Greater Israel.” At bottom, Israel uses the smoke of self-defense to justify the slaughter of innocents and to expel Palestinians from the land their ancestors lived on for centuries. I’m hoping the BDS movement will bring all the stubborn Netanyahus to their economic knees; perhaps then, Israelis will treat others decently.
Well said Michael!
80% of Israel’s land is owned by the Rothschild family – centuries of retaliatory genocide.
I am only the very slightest surprised to hear this.
How does one remain neutral in the face of IDF’s international war crimes that casually take the lives of Palestinian civilians, including mothers and children, and of Israel’s arrogant and repeated violations of the rule of UN law by Israel, Mr. Netanyahu? Your angry, self-absorbed criticism only masks the immorality of the ethnic cleansing that Israel is now actively implementing. “Never again” somehow has been turned into calls for Palestinian genocide or “shoah” and, once again, for a “Greater Israel.” At bottom, Israel uses the smoke of self-defense to justify the slaughter of innocents and to expel Palestinians from the land their ancestors lived on for centuries. I’m hoping the BDS movement will bring all the stubborn Netanyahus to their economic knees; perhaps then, Israelis will treat others decently.
Well said Michael!
It should be abundantly clear to everyone that Israel has never negotiated in good faith nor will it ever. Israel is not, nor has it ever been, interested in any kind of peace or two state coexistence with Palestine. It is pursuing its expansionist Yinon Plan agenda for a so called “Greater Israel” . The plan, which they are not shy about, calls for expansion of Israel to include all land west to the Nile River, east to the Euphrates River, north to the Turkish border and south to approximately the middle of Saudi Arabia.
Mahmoud Abbas and Fatah have been playing nice with Israel only to be taken advantage of while West Bank Palestinians lose more lands and Gaza suffers from Israeli war crimes and ethnic cleansing. The day of trying to cooperate with Israel is over; this is ethnic cleansing by a Belligerent Occupier. Hamas has the only clear path to Palestinian survival and that is armed resistance to this illegitimate, oppressive terrorist state. Only by force of arms will Israel ever consider serious negotiation.
You mean the same Hamas that was largely created by Israel to be able to scream “self-defense” when Hamas sends its pitiful bombs that hardly ever reach the ground in Israel? I don’t know if you’re aware, but the first person to utter “Greater Israel” was not Benjamin Netanyahu, Golda Meir, Moishe Dayan, Yitzhak Rabin, Ariel Sharon, Ehud Barak, or any other Israeli prime minister. It was first used by David Ben Gurion, and he wrote about it eleven years BEFORE Israel came into being in 1948. You’re right, the two-state solution has always been a scam by ruthless Zionists.
It should be abundantly clear to everyone that Israel has never negotiated in good faith nor will it ever. Israel is not, nor has it ever been, interested in any kind of peace or two state coexistence with Palestine. It is pursuing its expansionist Yinon Plan agenda for a so called “Greater Israel” . The plan, which they are not shy about, calls for expansion of Israel to include all land west to the Nile River, east to the Euphrates River, north to the Turkish border and south to approximately the middle of Saudi Arabia.
Mahmoud Abbas and Fatah have been playing nice with Israel only to be taken advantage of while West Bank Palestinians lose more lands and Gaza suffers from Israeli war crimes and ethnic cleansing. The day of trying to cooperate with Israel is over; this is ethnic cleansing by a Belligerent Occupier. Hamas has the only clear path to Palestinian survival and that is armed resistance to this illegitimate, oppressive terrorist state. Only by force of arms will Israel ever consider serious negotiation.
You mean the same Hamas that was largely created by Israel to be able to scream “self-defense” when Hamas sends its pitiful bombs that hardly ever reach the ground in Israel? I don’t know if you’re aware, but the first person to utter “Greater Israel” was not Benjamin Netanyahu, Golda Meir, Moishe Dayan, Yitzhak Rabin, Ariel Sharon, Ehud Barak, or any other Israeli prime minister. It was first used by David Ben Gurion, and he wrote about it eleven years BEFORE Israel came into being in 1948. You’re right, the two-state solution has always been a scam by ruthless Zionists.