Condemnations of Israeli violence steeped in hypocrisy

Given US,British, EU and Arab dictators doing nothing to stop them

By Latheef Frook

Cars set ablaze by Israeli settlers, in the area of Lubban al-Gharbi in the occupied West Bank on 21 June 2023 (AFP)

According to the website  Middle East Monitor,MEM, during the Israeli bombardment and shelling of the Gaza Strip last summer, an Israeli soldier approached a 74-year-old Palestinian woman Ghalya Abu-Rida to give her a sip of water. He gave her the water, took a photo with her and then  shot her in the head from a distance of one metre. He then watched as she bled to death.

This speaks volume  for the cruelty   of  Jews  who were despised by the Christian west form centuries.

Days after killing a Palestinian toddler, Israel  raided  on  the West Bank Palestinian  refugee camps in Jenin on Monday  19 June  2023 and killed seven Palestinians. This include 15 year old  boy and  a girl.   

According to reports Israeli soldiers  fired live ammunition, stun grenades, toxic gas and used combat helicopters  for the first time in decades .Medical teams were first denied access and eventually arrived late to treat those  injured  . Some were “in a very severe condition” and needed urgent medical assistance. 

The armed Jewish settlers’ attacks backed by the Israeli occupation army    

 reached its peak on Wednesday  when  400 armed settlers attacked the small town of Turmusaya, killing Palestinians, setting fire to homes, cars and farmland.   

Lafi Adeeb, the mayor of Turmusaya, said more than 400 armed Jewish settlers attacked the Palestinian community and set fire to  houses and  160 vehicles. They were supported by Israeli forces who closed off the entrances to the town, making it difficult for fire engines and ambulances to arrive.

He told   that at times his town resembled a burning battlefield, its beautiful tiled houses turning black under a cloud of smoke.“We finished the noon prayer, then we heard screams on the northern side of the town. We rushed there and found the vehicles burning and everything on fire, which devoured the agricultural crops and trees.

 “Most of them were shot in the head, neck, chest, and abdomen. The soldiers were shooting to kill. It’s a massacre. If this happened anywhere else in the world, there would be mass mobilisation”, said Jamal Huweil, 52, a member of Fatah’s revolutionary council. Since the start of 2023, Israeli forces have killed around  170 Palestinians, including 26 children.

 The “appalling” settler attacks have been condemned by  United Nations Secretary general,  world leaders and  Arab dictators  while  European Union,United States and others expressed grave concern .

 Condemnations from the international community have been steeped in hypocrisy and, given the support that the US, the EU and Britain give to the apartheid state, do nothing to stop Israel’s violence.

The state and its Jewish citizens, especially settlers, are allowed to act against Palestinians with impunity, and yet settlers and the settlements in which they live are illegal under international law.

 The people of occupied Palestine are not alone in recognising the futility of international condemnation of settler attacks which isn’t backed up by action to stop them.

UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Francesca Albanese, is on record as saying:

 “Palestinians under Israeli occupation do need protection. Brutality, coming either from Israeli settlers or from the army will not stop, simply because the system is not designed to protect the Palestinians. Rather the contrary.” She insisted that, “Mere words of condemnation are meaningless.”

Enough is enough. We have heard such “meaningless” words from the world for decades. Governments and officials who call for an end to Israeli aggression against the Palestinians are the same governments and officials which back Israel in imposing blockades on Palestinians, whether in the occupied West Bank or the Gaza Strip. They turn a collective blind eye to the numerous UN resolutions calling for Israel to follow international laws and conventions regarding the Palestinians and their legitimate rights.

These hypocrites don’t dare to add Israel to the UN blacklist of human rights abusers and the UN list of those who abuse children’s rights, despite the fact that Israel has killed a Palestinian child every three days on average for more than 20 years. Even the labelling of goods produced in Israeli settlements built on stolen Palestinian land is too much for the hypocrites in Western capitals, many of whom are making it illegal to boycott such goods and the companies which profit from them.

While calling for the protection of the Palestinians, these world leaders are complicit in Israeli crimes against the Palestinians. They arm Israel and provide it with political and diplomatic cover at the UN and other forums.

Sadly, the Palestinian Authority is almost as guilty. No amount of calls for the protection of the Palestinian people and for Israel’s impunity to be ended, as well as recognition of the legitimate right of the Palestinians to defend themselves, can disguise the fact that the PA security forces collaborate with their Israeli counterparts against the same Palestinian people. There are dozens of Palestinian activists in PA jails, but the authority’s 70,000+ PA security personnel are not there to protect Palestinians; they exist to protect the Israeli occupation.

In the midst  Israel started speeding  up authorization of 1,000 new homes in occupied West Bank settlement. Israel is hell bent on  creating Greater Israel  with more and more settlements and inaction to stop this crime  help expedite this  a reality and  the two state solution is fast  fading.

If only the Arab tyrants who keep their people oppressed free them they would   end Israeli and settler violence ,perhaps,within weeks.

However UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk  warned  violence in the Occupied WestBank risks spiralling out of control, fuelled by strident political rhetoric and an escalation in the use of advanced military weaponry by Israel. He   called for an immediate end to the violence.

1. Sadeel Ghassan Naghniyeh Turkman, 15, shot in the head and killed   by Israeli forces (social media)
2. Mourners at the funeral of a Palestinian who was killed by Israeli troops in   Jenin, in the occupied West Bank [Mohamad Torokman/Reuters]

Mohammad Naghniyeh, aged nine, the day after his 15-year-old sister was fatally shot in the head by an Israeli sniper (MEE/Leila Warah) Jabreen, the doctor, said that “seeing children, young people, and women attacked and killed is miserable. They are our neighbours, our sisters, our brothers.