Malaysia leader slams the West for turning blind eye to Israel ‘atrocities’ in Palestine

Malaysia’s Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim attends the 18th East Asia Summit as part of the 43rd Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit in Jakarta on September 7, 2023. [YASUYOSHI CHIBA/POOL/AFP via Getty Images]
Malaysian Prime Minister, Anwar Ibrahim, criticised Western countries on Tuesday for their continued silence about the situation in the Gaza Strip and said Israel is committing the “ruthless massacre” of Palestinians, Anadolu Agency reports.

Ibrahim said Israel has murdered more than 24,100 innocent lives with utter impunity on the 100th day of the attacks.

He said the vast majority of the international community has condemned its “vile and genocidal acts”.

“This recent spate of brutal slaughter of innocent Palestinians is but a mere extension of a protracted seven decades of oppression and tyranny, clearly manifesting the hatred, revulsion and antagonism of the Israeli regime towards the Palestinian people,” he wrote on X.

“Such a deep seated animosity is only matched by the insidious and heinous right-wing racist sentiments and views espoused by the Zionist leaders against the Palestinian people,” he said.

VIEW: Aid available in Gaza is far from covering its needs

Ibrahim also criticised Western countries for being silent and said, “To turn a blind eye to the atrocities committed by Israel, becoming effectively complicit in the insidious acts of crimes against humanity.”

He praised South Africa’s move to take Israel to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and said Malaysia fully supports the move.

Like other like-minded nations, Malaysia firmly reiterates its stance in full support of South Africa’s action in the ICJ to oppose tyranny and uphold justice, he said.

The South-east Asian nation has seen massive support for Palestine, with Ibrahim in the lead. Last month, it banned any port call or docking by Israeli-flagged ships in Malaysia.

Israel has pounded the Gaza Strip since a cross-border attack Hamas on 7 October, killing at least 24,285 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injuring 61,154, according to local health authorities.

Israel said 1,200 people have been killed in the Hamas attack.

However, since then, it has been revealed by Haaretz that helicopters and tanks of the Israeli army had, in fact, killed many of the 1,139 soldiers and civilians claimed by Israel to have been killed by the Palestinian Resistance.

The Israeli onslaught has left 85 per cent of Gaza’s population internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while 60 per cent of the enclave’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.