Gaza: UN rights chief condemns Israel and Hamas

GENEVA – Israel’s military actions in the
Gaza Strip could amount to war crimes, UN
rights chief Navi Pillay said Wednesday while
also condemning indiscriminate rocket attacks
by Palestinian militants Hamas.
“There seems to be a strong possibility that
international law has been violated, in a
manner that could amount to war crimes,”
Pillay told an emergency session on Israel’s
Gaza offensive at the UN Human Rights
Council, citing attacks that have killed
Palestinian civilians, including children.
She said Israeli children and other civilians
also had a right to live without constant fear
of rocket attacks.
“Once again, the principles of distinction and
precaution are clearly not being observed
during such indiscriminate attacks on civilian
areas by Hamas and other armed Palestinian
groups,” she said.
The 46-nation council — which is the United
Nations’ top human rights forum — was
poised to call for an international inquiry into
Israel’s offensive in the Palestinian territories.
The meeting was called by Arab and fellow
Islamic nations.
It was set to vote on a resolution lodged by
Palestine — which has observer status at the
UN — condemning “the widespread, systematic
and gross violations of human rights and
fundamental freedoms” since Israel launched
its crackdown last month to stem rocket
attacks by Palestinian militants.
The resolution also called on the international
community to “urgently dispatch an
independent, international commission of
inquiry” tasked with probing “all violations of
international human rights law and
international humanitarian law in the
Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East
Jerusalem, particularly in the occupied Gaza
Strip”.
The aim, it said, was to “establish the facts
and circumstances of such violations and of
the crimes perpetrated and to identify those
responsible, to make recommendations, in
particular, on accountability measures, all
with a view to avoiding and ending impunity
and ensuring that those responsible are held
accountable, and on ways and means to
protect civilians against any further assaults”.
It also called for the “immediate International
Protection for the Palestinian people” and
requested that Switzerland, as guardian of the
Geneva Conventions governing conduct in
warfare, organise an urgent conference on the
situation in the region.
The Gaza offensive, which marks the worst
Israeli-Palestinian violence since two spikes in
conflict in 2009 and 2012, has already
claimed the lives of 639 Palestinians, most of
them civilians, and 31 Israelis.
“The right of the Palestinian people to resist
occupation cannot justify the launching of
thousands of rockets and mortars directed
against Israeli civilians,” the UN’s rights
monitor for the region, Makarim Wibisono, told
the session.
“Rockets attacks cannot justify the
disproportionate use by Israel of air, sea and
ground firepower against targets, including
tunnels and rocket launchers, amidst a
population of 1.7 million people trapped in
one of the most densely populated areas of
the world,” he added.