Mundu multipolarra versus unipolarra
NBE (Nazio Batuen Erakundea) gaindituta, ICC (NAPE) (International Criminal Court) alboratuta, eta Mossad nagusi… aspalditik gainera…
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Stop saying history will judge them, judge Israel now. With ICC judges.
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ICC (international Criminal Court) NAPE (Nazioarteko Arlo Penaleko Epaitegia)
International Criminal Court judges refuse to be bow to Trump’s sanctions as he tries to exempt Israeli and American officials from the rule of law: “We are not going to be intimidated.”
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It’s always been their plan.
The Zionist movement evicted and displace Arabs and Palestinians throughout the 1920s-1940s.
Backed by British bayonets, Zionist immigrants flooded Palestine in the tens of thousands in the 1920s and hundreds of thousands in the 1930s and 1940s.
They transformed Palestine from 10% Jewish in 1918 to 17% Jewish in 1930 to 30% Jewish in 1940 to 33% Jewish in 1947, buying up 6-8% of the land (~2 million out of ~26 million dunams), wiping seventy Arab villages off the map and uprooting more than ten thousand Palestinians and Arabs in the process.
This boiled over into deadlier and deadlier violence, from dozens killed in the 1900s and 1910s, to hundreds killed in the 1920s to thousands killed in the 1930s. Zionist leaders tried to minimize the scale and visibility of the evictions and usually kept quiet about their vision for the native population of Palestine.
That vision, a land without a people, or as Chaim Weizmann put it in 1919, a Palestine “as Jewish as England is English, or America American,” formed the core of the Zionist consensus.
It’s why the Zionist movement evicted Palestinians from the lands it purchased, it’s why so many Zionist leaders developed proposals to expel Palestinians from Palestine and it’s why every major Zionist institution supported “transfer” by the 1930s, today known as forcible displacement or ethnic cleansing.
This is a brief history of the origins of the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian Arabs from their lands, 1920-1947.
Full article below
Aipamena
Zachary Foster@_ZachFoster
ots. 19
My latest: The Origins of the Ethnic Cleansing of the Palestinians, 1920-1947 https://palestinenexus.com/articles/origins-ethnic-cleansing-1920-1947
The Origins of the Ethnic Cleansing of the Palestinians, 1920-1947
(https://palestinenexus.com/articles/origins-ethnic-cleansing-1920-1947)
Feb 19
Written By Zachary Foster
Jewish-owned land in Palestine circa 1941. Colors correspond to the year of the land purchase. Source: Central Zionist ArchiveIntroduction
February 19, 2026 — The Zionist movement continued to evict and displace Arabs and Palestinians throughout the 1920s-1940s. Backed by British bayonets, Zionist immigrants flooded Palestine in the tens of thousands in the 1920s and hundreds of thousands in the 1930s and 1940s. They transformed Palestine from 10% Jewish in 1918 to 17% Jewish in 1930 to 30% Jewish in 1940 to 33% Jewish in 1947, buying up 6-8% of the land (~2 million out of ~26 million dunams), wiping seventy Arab villages off the map and uprooting more than ten thousand Palestinians and Arabs in the process. This boiled over into deadlier and deadlier violence, from dozens killed in the 1900s and 1910s, as discussed in part I of this II part series, to hundreds killed in the 1920s to thousands killed in the 1930s.
Zionist leaders tried to minimize the scale and visibility of the evictions and usually kept quiet about their vision for the native population of Palestine. That vision, a land without a people, or as Chaim Weizmann put it in 1919, a Palestine “as Jewish as England is English, or America American,” formed the core of the Zionist consensus. It’s why the Zionist movement evicted Palestinians from the lands it purchased, it’s why so many Zionist leaders developed proposals to expel Palestinians from Palestine and it’s why every major Zionist institution supported “transfer” by the 1930s, today known as forcible displacement or ethnic cleansing. This is a brief history of the origins of the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian Arabs from their lands, 1920-1947.
The British Regime in Palestine
The British Empire conquered Palestine in 1918 and established the colonial state called the Government of Palestine, also known as the Mandate. The Mandate embraced the Balfour Declaration, which called for the establishment of a “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine. An earlier draft seems to have made a provision for the Arabs, 90% of the population, to be removed altogether, although the final version affirmed their religious and civil, but not political rights. Democracy quickly emerged as Britain’s mortal enemy in Palestine.
British land policy was codified with the 1920 Land Transfer Ordinance. It stipulated that land had to be registered in the land registry by individuals and thus it rejected the customary practice of collective ownership known as musha‘a. The ordinance was amended to limit government interference in land transfers, a measure supported by certain Arab elites, the owners of much of the land, and the Zionist movement, the hopeful buyer of it. The British also required tax payments on land be made in cash, rather than cash or kind, as had been the case under Ottoman rule, and set fixed tax rates based on the net productivity of the plot, determined by agricultural output minus the cost of production (thus reducing the Jewish tax burden relative to the Palestinian tax burden due to higher wages and higher capital expenditures in the Jewish sector), further aggravating the economic condition of Palestine’s indigenous inhabitants. The ordinance could have been named, “British, Zionist and Arab capitalists of the world unite” (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)!
The policies accelerated both the privatization of land and the consolidation of land ownership. Arab landlords tempted musha‘a farmers with predatory offers and charged their own tenants with high interest rates, leading to farmer debt accumulation. As a result, many were forced to sell their land shares as debt payment, even if they continued to cultivate the land as tenant farmers (1, 2, 3). Arab cultivators despised the British Land Registry office just as they had its Ottoman predecessor, and so even without temptation, pressure or coercion to sell, they continued to register their lands in the names of village elders or sell their land titles to urban elites anyways.
The result was that Arab villages adhering to the collective ownership system fell from 56% in 1923, to 46% in 1930 to 40% in 1940. In one subdistrict of Palestine, for example, some 30% of the land passed from Arab farmers to Arab capitalists in the 1920s. This accelerated the process of land sales to the Zionist movement, as individuals were much more likely to sell land to Zionists than village collectives. The British set out to facilitate Arab land sales to Jews, and that’s exactly what happened.
Displacement in the 1920s
The Zionist movement doubled its land holdings in the 1920s, displacing some six thousand Arabs in the process, according to the best estimates (1, 2). The Jewish National Fund (JNF) adopted a policy that the lands it purchased be emptied of their Arab inhabitants. Dozens of villages were in effect wiped off the map following successive land acquisitions in the Jezreel Valley, the coastal plain, the Hula Valley, and the Baysan area, including Harbaj, Kneifis, Solam, Tel-Tora, Jenjar, al-Safafa, Tall al-Far, Jalud, al-Fula, Tall al-ʿAdas, Jayda, Tall al-Shumam, Qamun, Jabata and Khnayfas. By 1930, some 30% of all Palestinian villagers were landless and as many as 80% held insufficient land to meet their subsistence needs.
In the 1920s, Arab farmers were usually offered compensation and usually left without a fight, displaced to nearby plots of land, villages and towns (1, 2). In Ma‘lul, near Nazareth, and in the Beit She’an district, the Zionist movement hired Arab thugs to clear out tenants farmers or persuade them to sign release documents for their lands. In other cases, Bedouins were employed to raid the homes of tenants to intimidate them into leaving. Violence broke out occasionally, such as in al- ‘Afula, where Zionist settlers backed by British police killed a Palestinian who resisted eviction.
By the late 1920s, a burgeoning crisis had developed in the countryside due to a shortage in cultivable land, as more Palestinian tenant farmers and shareholders living on collectively owned lands became landless.
The case of Mishmar ha-Emek, southeast of Haifa, established on top of the Arab village of Abu Shusha, is illustrative of broader trends. The colony was established in 1926 when a half dozen settlers set out from Afula, proceeding along camel tracks and ridges lined with thorny cactus hedges until reaching a large home on the property. “When we came,” as one settler described it, “several fallahin families were still living there, land tenants of the previous owner. They received reparations from the JNF and left the next morning, without any trouble.” The Zionists settlers arrived, replaced the natives, and built a settlement next to the remaining six hundred Arabs of Abu Shusha.
In the late Ottoman period, many Zionist leaders had flirted with the idea of “transfer” as the solution to the “Arab problem,” as it was known, i.e., the problem that there were Arabs in Palestine. Those calls grew louder in the 1920s as Israel Zangwill frequently wrote and spoke openly of transferring Palestine’s Arabs to Transjordan, which he said was necessary to establish a Jewish, democratic state. The Arabs should be persuaded to “trek,” since the Arabs had the whole Arab world, while the Jews had only Palestine, in what was probably the single most popular Zionist talking point in the 1920s and 1930s. Palestinian Arabs began citing Zangwill as evidence of Zionism’s nefarious aims, teaching the movement an important lesson: eviction and expulsion would erode sympathy for Zionism, and so both the ongoing evictions, as well as plans for large-scale evictions, had to be carried out quietly.
From Displacement to Violence, the 1929 Riots
Although most evictions took place in rural Palestine, Jerusalem was also a target. For decades, the Zionist movement sought to take over the Mughrabi or Moroccan neighborhood and expel its residents because of its close proximity to the Western Wall, the Jewish holy site. Edmond de Rothschild tried to buy the neighborhood in 1887; Rabbi Chaim Hirschensohn and the Palestine Land Development Company in 1895; Chaim Weizmann in 1919 and Nathan Straus in 1926. The Zionist movement wanted to expel its residents and demolish the quarter for Jewish use.
By the mid-1920s, as one British official said, the Zionist objective was to “quietly evacuate the Moroccan occupants of those houses which it would later be necessary to demolish” to create more space for Jewish worshippers at the Western Wall. To that end, Yosef Hecht, the leader of the Haganah militia, planted a bomb in the home of a Palestinian family in the Mughrabi neighborhood in 1927, destroying it, causing panic and leading to the flight of some families from the area. By summer 1929, Zionist leaders began advocating for the forcible displacement of Palestinians living in the neighborhood and even for rebuilding the Third Temple on top of the third holiest site in Islam, the al-Aqsa Mosque.
These threats boiled over into violence, culminating in a countrywide rebellion known as “the 1929 Palestine riots.” It was the deadliest violence to date with some 133 Jews and 116 Arabs killed in what one historian called “Year Zero” of the Palestine question. Arabs massacred Jews in Hebron and Safed and the British and Zionists massacred Arabs throughout the country. Over half of the Jewish colonies in the country were attacked in late August as Arabs destroyed six or seven colonies and forced others to evacuate, including Mishmar ha-Emek, discussed above (1, 2). As a result of the bloodshed, the Zionist movement consolidated its land acquisition strategy, abandoning efforts to colonize Acre, Nablus, Beersheba, Ramle, Tulkarm and Gaza. The 1929 Riots marked the struggle over Palestine with front lines and lots of bloodshed.
Hartuv, a Jewish colony built in the Hebron Hills, set on fire by Arabs. August 23 to 31, 1929. source
The 1929 Riots were also a wake up call. British High Commissioner John Chancellor proclaimed there was no remaining uncultivated arable land in the country, which was, incidentally, the consensus among Zionist leaders as well, especially those in charge of land acquisition. Chancellor believed Zionist land purchases necessarily meant more Palestinian landlessness, which meant more violence. The British carried out multiple commissions of inquiry, concluding that Jewish immigration and Jewish land purchases were the root causes of the violence. The Arab Executive, the closest thing to a Palestinian political leadership at the time, went further. The Zionist project was, in their words, pursuing the “extinction of the Arab nation in its natural home,” and its replacement with a Jewish one.
No need to trust the Palestinians, though, just listen to the public statements of Zionist leaders, who continued to say the quiet part out loud. In April 1930, Menahem Ussishkin, JNF Chairman, publicly called for transfer in a speech to journalists in Jerusalem. “We must continually raise the demand that our land be returned to our possession,” he said. “lf there are other inhabitants there, they must be transferred to some other place. We must take over the land. We have a greater and nobler ideal than preserving several hundred thousands of Arab fellahin.”
For Chaim Weizmann, president of the Zionist Organization and the Jewish Agency (JA) Executive, the solution to the 1929 violence was not an end to Jewish immigration, it was Arab emigration. In May 1930, Colonel F. H. Kisch, head of the JA Political Department, told Weizmann the JA should pressure the British to promote the emigration of Palestinian Arabs to Iraq. Wiezmann began promoting the idea of a transfer of Arabs from Palestine to Transjordan or Iraq in private discussions with top British officials and ministers in 1929 and 1930, and asked his subordinates for a detailed account of land available in Transjordan. The result was the 1930 Weizmann – Rutenberg scheme, presented to the British Colonial Office, calling for the “resettlement” of Palestinian farming communities to Transjordan on land to be purchased by Jewish financiers.
The plan was quickly rejected by the British, but it kicked off a wave of proposals to depopulate Palestine. In 1930, the US American Zionist Felix Warburg wrote a letter to High Commissioner Chancellor, proposing the transfer of Arabs to Transjordan, apparently home to more, better and cheaper land than Palestine! A year later, Jacob Thon said similarly that moving Palestine’s Arabs to Transjordan was desirable, but any steps to transfer Arabs would have to be taken privately. In 1932, Victor Jacobson, then representative of the Zionist Organization at the League of Nations, agreed in a secret proposal to partition Palestine on condition that 120,000 Arabs be removed from the Jewish area. In 1933, Moshe Shertok suggested to the British they buy the village of Rumman in Transjordan to settle Arabs uprooted as a result of Zionist colonization. In 1934, the US American Zionist aficionado Edward Norman wrote a 19-page plan to transfer Palestine’s Arabs to Iraq, and spent the next decade and a half trying to implement it.
It wasn’t just Warburg, Ussishkin, Weizmann, Rutenberg, Kisch, Thon, Jacobson, Shertok, Norman and many others calling for transfer by the early-mid 1930s, it was the most important Zionist institutions as well. In July 1930 and April 1931, the JNF leadership supported a proposal to transfer Arabs from Palestine to Transjordan. The JA also submitted a proposal to the British in 1931, calling for dispossessed Arab farmers in Palestine to be removed to Transjordan. By the early 1930s, many Zionist leaders coalesced around transfer as the most desirable solution to the problem that there were Arabs in Palestine.
The British rejected Zionist calls for expulsion, instead issuing a call in 1931 for Arab landless claims, seeking a cosmetic remedy to the crisis. This terrified the Zionist leadership, which at first refused to appoint an advisor to the claims committee, hoping to stall or torpedo its work. When that failed, the Zionist movement lobbied the British to install a favorable figure to run it and ensure a highly restrictive definition of landlessness was adopted. As a last resort, they tried to force Arab resettlement in the interior rather than coastal plains or Galilee, the Zionist stronghold. In the end, the British accepted only a quarter of the 3,737 claims, or about 900, with only 74 families ever resettled.
Displacement in the 1930s
By the 1930s, the largest tracts of land for sale had already been purchased, forcing the Zionist movement to buy smaller tracts from a larger number of land owners, including many tracts operating under the communal land structure. From 1934-6, for instance, the Zionist movement made 2,339 separate land deals, more than 90% of which were plots of land of less than 100 dunams. This further exacerbated the landlessness problem.
Large purchases continued, of course, such as in Wadi al-Harawith, in the Tulkarem District, home to some 1,000-1,500 Arab Bedouin. The JNF purchased land there in April 1929 and first tried to evict its residents in November, but they refused to vacate in what had become an increasingly familiar scene. Meanwhile, a Jewish settlement was established on Wadi al-Harawith’s lands, and the Arabs were provided a smaller plot to rent nearby (1, 2).
This tense state of affairs persisted for years in Wadi al-Harawith. “The tenants lived face to face with some 22 Jewish settlers,” as one historian put it. Eventually, in September 1930, this boiled over into violence when Arab men and women, armed with sticks and stones, attacked both the British police officers and the Jewish settlers. Clashes continued to erupt over equipment, ploughing, digging wells accessing grazing pastures. In February 1933, the Zionist settlers tried to evict the Arabs, resulting in the death of a Zionist guard. The matter proceeded in court, and after countless appeals were rejected, the evictions were carried out with British bayonets and Zionist boots. In June 1933, about half of the Arab population of Wadi Hawarith was evicted, while the remaining half were evicted from an adjacent plot five months later.
A similar case unfolded in al-Sakhina, in the Baysan, home to over a hundred families. Their land was sold to the Zionist movement in 1925 on condition its tenants could not be uprooted for 15 years. In 1928, however, the British annulled the ordinance protecting the tenants, and the JNF pursued eviction, as they always did. The Sakhinites appealed to British officials and fought in court for years, eventually losing in early 1935. But the villagers refused to vacate, defying court orders by taking possession of the disputed plots. The JNF sent a group of settlers to plow the land and assert possession. Soon enough, the Sakhinites, armed with sticks, attacked the settlers later that summer, blocking access to their tractors. The police arrived, arrested 19 Sakhinites and evicted the villagers by threat of force, enabling the settlers to take over the land.
In another case, in 1935, Zionists built the settlement of Yokneʿam, southeast of Haifa, in close proximity to two Arab villages—Qira and Abu Zureiq. It was “irresponsible,” as one British official put it, but the settlers refused to budge. They dug ditches, erected a watchtower on a nearby hill, fortified with double wooden walls filled with gravel. They also built markers around their camp and fenced off their fields of cultivation. By the mid-1930s, this was the only way to take and hold land and it would become the hallmark of Zionist land acquisition for the next decade and a half.
From Displacement to Revolt, 1936-9
Hazorea settlers building a fence, 1938 (Source: Areej Sabbagh-Khoury, Colonizing Palestine: The Zionist Left and the Making of the Palestinian Nakba (2023, Stanford University Press), p.98)
As the British concluded, Zionist immigration and land purchases would continue to lead to displacement and violence, and that is exactly what happened from 1936–1939, when the Palestinian Arabs rose up in what became known as the Arab revolt. Its origins lie in alleyways of the urban slums that formed around Jaffa and Haifa to house the thousands of impoverished Palestinians pushed off their lands. Many found solace in the teachings of Shaykh ‘Izz al-Din al-Qassam, a charismatic Muslim preacher who built a following and a militia among Haifa’s underclass.
The revolt opened with a six-month general strike demanding an end to Zionist immigration and land sales. National committees were formed and the Supreme Arab Committee, later known as the Arab Higher Committee, was established out of a coalition of the six major Palestinian political parties. Soon enough, it morphed into an armed rebellion led by farmers turned rebels. “Life-and-death” battles broke out in the streets of many urban centers while bands of Palestinians took control of much of the mountainous interior, the Galilee and the Jezreel Valley area, establishing a base of operations in Nablus. The rebels bombed British and Zionist positions, mounted hit-and-run operations, cut telephone lines and attacked road traffic, railways, bridges, oil pipelines, Zionist colonies and police outposts. They destroyed Zionist farms and orchards and forced Arab landowners who had sold land to Zionists to flee Palestine. Within six months, two hundred Arabs, eighty Jews, and twenty-eight British had been killed (1, 2).
Palestinian rebels were recruited from the ranks of landless farmers and were sheltered by villages whose lands had been taken over. The vast majority of the rebels were landless farmers even though they comprised less than a third of the cultivator population, as one study has shown. Al-Hajj Hasan Mansur called for revolt in the Jezreel Valley, where thousands of Palestinians had been uprooted. The village of al-Mansi on the western edge of the valley which had faced encroachment throughout the 1930s, became famous for its participation in the uprising. Abu Zureiq, which lost its lands to multiple Jewish colonies, offered shelter to a Palestinian rebel unit. Farmers in Qira, al-Kafrayn, Abu Shusha, Daliyat al-Ruha, and all three al-Ghubayyat villages sheltered and fed fighters as well. Colonization and resistance have a shared history.
Alas, the British eventually squashed the revolt. They killed, wounded, imprisoned or exiled 10% of the Palestinian adult male population. Altogether, some 5,748 Arabs, 300 Jews and 262 Britons were left dead. The British deported hundreds of Palestinian political leaders to Lebanon, Syria, Turkey and beyond. The British decimated Jaffa’s Old City, demolishing a thousand homes and forcibly displacing ten thousand Palestinians in the process. They also carried out mass destruction in Jenin, Lydda, Khan Yunis, Beisan, Majd al-Kurum, Wadi al-Hawarith, Baqa al-Gharbiyya, Kawkab Abu al-Hayja and Sha‘b, confiscating property, livestock and crops (1, 2, 3). By the revolt’s end, Palestine’s political leaders were in exile, its farmer rebels killed, injured or imprisoned, their bodies tortured, weapons confiscated and the country’s economy left in ruins.
If the revolt decimated the Palestinians, it emboldened the Zionists, whose leaders developed Plan Avner in 1937 to conquer Palestine in the event of a British evacuation. It called for a reorganization of the Haganah into divisions and the conscription of 50,000 men, plus a garrison force of 17,000 out of a total population of 370,000, some 20% of the total population. The plan was to transform the settler society into a settler fighting force. The security-before-all-else doctrine was born.
As was the buffer zone doctrine. The logic of the buffer zone doctrine was that Palestinians, by the nature of their very existence, were a security threat. Settlers in Yokneʿam lobbied the British to order the evacuation of the neighboring villages Qira and Abu Zureiq on “security grounds.” The “frontier regions” were “one of the biggest strategic and security questions of the Jewish state,” as Katznelson argued in June 1938. “If Arab villages will remain in the border regions then no guarding or army is useful…. And if the transfer is carried out, it is required first of all in order to clear the border regions.” Prescient, indeed.
Of course, the colonization of Palestine continued despite the uprising, or perhaps because of it, with some 57 new settlements established from 1936-9. Partition of the country was potentially imminent, as we shall see in a moment, and the Zionist movement had ambitious territorial goals, far more ambitious than their existing footprint in Palestine. And so, for the next decade, the Zionist movement bought land with partition and statehood in mind. The idea was to ensure contiguous settlement, secure roads and lines of communication, strengthen territorial depth and establish more expansive borders by putting civilians on the front lines as human shields, one of the movement’s most beloved practices from its origins in the late 19th century to the present day.
In the process, they continued to evict Palestinians. In 1937, Kibbutz Ein Hashofet replaced the village of Joʾara. In 1938, the kibbutzim of Ma’oz-Hayim and Kefar-Ruppin were built over the ruins of Ghasawiya and Mesil el-Jizil, Arab villages in the Baysan, and their 1,048 inhabitants were transferred to Transjordan. In 1938, Kibbutz Hazorea, southeast of Haifa, took lands of the village of Qira by force on the exact same day it obtained the legal rights to it. In 1939, Kibbutz Dalia, Ein Hashofet and Ramat Hashofet were built on the village’s land of Umm al-Dafuf, whose residents were pushed out to al-Sindiyana or al-Kafrayn.
The Peel Commission Report & Transfer, 1937
While Palestinians revolted for freedom in Palestine, Zionists bet on their transfer out of it. The transfer idea received renewed attention among Zionist leaders in March 1936 shortly before the revolt erupted when the 1930 Weizmann-Rutenberg scheme resurfaced at a meeting among Mapai leaders, the dominant Zionist political party. Moshe Beilinson, a leading Zionist ideologue, and Menahem Ussishkin, both came out in strong support of transfer. “I would very much like the Arabs to go to Iraq,” Ussishkin said in May 1936, but since that didn’t seem feasible, the British should “resettle” Palestine’s Arabs in Transjordan so the Zionist movement can take over their lands.
The Jewish Agency (JA) Executive met again in October 1936 and agreed on the principle that removing Palestinians from Palestine was moral. Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, the president of the Va’ad Leumi, the Jewish National Council, supported sending dispossessed Arab peasants to neighboring countries, including Transjordan, on a “voluntary” basis. Moshe Shertok, head of the JA Political Department, agreed, since Transjordan had large land reserves. As David Ben-Gurion, the leader of the Zionist movement, put it, “there is nothing morally wrong in the idea.” Afterall, it was no different than what the Zionist movement had already been doing as it bought up land in Palestine, a point he repeatedly made. “If it was permissible to move an Arab from the Galilee to Judea, why is it impossible to move an Arab from Hebron to Transjordan, which is much closer?” On October 29, 1936, 19 out of the 21 members of the JA Executive endorsed the “voluntary” transfer of displaced Arab farmers to Transjordan.
If Zionist leaders had settled on the righteousness of Arab dispossession, the next step was to convince the British of the same. And so, in May 1937, the JA submitted a transfer proposal to the British, who were “very impressed” by it, according to one source. The Zionist movement played a secretive and critical role in lobbying Reginald Coupland, author of the report, to include a recommendation to “resettle” Palestinians. As the leading historian on the topic wrote, “the proposal of Arab transfer that was ultimately made by the Royal Commission originated from, and had been secretly conveyed by, top JA leaders, including Ben-Gurion, Shertok, and Weizmann.”
Alas, the Peel Commission Report was published in July 1937, and the Zionist movement got what it wanted, an official British endorsement of transfer. The report called for the partition of Palestine and the “re-settlement” of Arabs living in the Jewish area, either to the Arab part of Palestine or Transjordan. “Compulsory” transfer was recommended in the coastal plains, the heartland of Zionist colonization. The report noted that, should the Arabs refuse to leave on their own, they ought to be transferred by force, although this was left deliberately vague (1, 2). The report cited the 1923 “population exchange” in Greece and Turkey as a model, perhaps because it legitimized forcible transfer at a mass scale. The key difference, however, was that Palestine was not a population exchange, it was a population eradication: 225,000 Arabs would be removed from the proposed Jewish State, and 1,250 Jews would be removed from the Arab State, a rounding error of a rounding error of the displaced Arab population.
For Zionist leaders, the Peel Report was exciting not because of partition, but transfer. Ben-Gurion believed the transfer recommendation was the most important part of the Peel Commission report and that it outweighed all of its shortcomings. For Weizmann, the only practical way to partition the country was through transfer. If there were lingering Zionist doubts about transfer in the early 1930s, few remained by the late 1930s.
The publication of the report had its predictable consequences. The ongoing rebellion, which had lost momentum quickly, intensified, and Palestine experienced an unprecedented wave of renewed violence, before it was eventually crushed, as discussed above.
Nevertheless, the Zionist movement remained committed to transfer. They negotiated with the Emir Abdallah of Transjordan, and allegedly persuaded him to endorse a proposal to set up a company to raise £2 million to uproot Palestinians farmers and expel them to Transjordan. Zionist leaders set up a Transfer Committee, headed by Moshe Shertok, which analyzed financial and procedural aspects of the depopulation scheme, estimated how many Arabs would need to be expelled, in which order, from which regions over which time horizon. They asked the British for a copy of all land registration and tax documents relating to all land in Palestine owned by Arabs. Shertok, who had explicitly said transfer would result in “rivers of blood,” put aside his reservations to endorse the idea.
In the end, the British never implemented the Peel Commission plan. They concluded it was unworkable because there were too many Arabs living in the areas assigned to the Jewish state and there was no voluntary way to uproot them. The British were clearly not going to deploy the massive amount of violence that would be necessary to expel hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes. The solution to that problem was either a Jewish State that had too many Arabs or a tiny Jewish State, neither of which were acceptable to the Zionist movement.
This is why Ben-Gurion would not let the transfer idea go. It emerged as the only solution to the core problem facing the movement. “The compulsory transfer of the Arabs from the valleys of the proposed Jewish state could give us something which we never had,” he wrote in his diary in July 1937. “A Galilee free from Arab population.” (1, 2) In December 1937, he proposed in his diary a transfer of Palestine’s Arabs to Syria. A year later, when the JA executive took up the question, Ben-Gurion said, “I support compulsory transfer. I don’t see in it anything immoral.” In 1939, he put forward another plan to raise ten million pounds to expel some 100,000 Arab families from Palestine to Iraq and Saudi Arabia. And even though the British were unlikely to execute on the plan, and even though voluntary transfer was also highly unlikely, at least as Ben-Gurion saw things, he insisted transfer could be done. “We must prepare ourselves to carry out” the transfer [emphasis in original], he wrote in his diary.
In July 1937, Ben-Gurion wrote a letter to his son concluding the same. “We have never wanted to dispossess the Arabs [but] because Britain is giving them part of the country which had been promised to us, it is only fair that the Arabs in our state be transferred to the Arab portion.” A few months later, he wrote another infamous letter to his son, one whose authenticity is debated (1, 2, 3), which nevertheless declared “we must expel Arabs and take their places…and, if we have to use force-not to dispossess the Arabs of the Negev and Transjordan, but to guarantee our own right to settle in those places-then we have force at our disposal.” Ben-Gurion understood that Jewish statehood and Arab transfer were inextricably linked and both would be achieved through force.
The Peel Commission report unleashed a transfer bonanza in the Zionist world. “This process involved unprecedented discussion of the transfer solution and its approval in principle by a majority in the most important Zionist policy-making bodies,” as a leading expert on the topic put it. As another top historian wrote, “a consensus or near-consensus formed among the Zionist leaders [in the 1920s and 1930s] around the idea of transfer as the natural, efficient and even moral solution to the demographic dilemma.” The Peel Commission had given a false veneer of respectability to mass forcible transfer, and so Zionist movement seized the moment.
Soon enough, the fault line was not whether or not to uproot Palestinians from their homes. It was who to target, how to displace them, where to dump them, how much violence ought to be deployed in the process, and who would be doing the violence. In 1937, for instance, the delegates of the Twentieth Zionist Congress and the World Convention of Po’alei Tzion debated “maximum transfer,” i.e. the depopulation of all of Palestine’s Arabs and a rejection of any partition of the country, on the one hand, or a more tactical, short-term partial transfer of Palestinians out of the Jewish area, on the other, based on partition of the country (1, 2, 3).
The list of Zionist leaders who agreed on the moral righteousness of transfer is too long to mention in full, but, in additional to the key figures discussed above, also included Edward Norman, Eliezer Kaplan, Yosef Bankover, Aharon Zisling, Golda Meyerson (Meir) David Remez, Berl Locker, Shlomo Lavi, Eliahu (Lulu) Hacarmeli, Naftali Landau, Yosef Baratz, Rabbi B.S. Brickner, Berl Katznelson, Yitzhak Tabenkin, Rabbi Meir Bar-Ilan, Ze’ev Jabotinsky, Dr. Selig Eugen Soskin, Ya’acov Thon, Eliahu Epstein (Elat), Eliezer Kaplan, Arthur Ruppin, Avraham Granovsky (Granott), David Stern, ‘Oved Ben-‘Ami, Dr. Kurt Mendelson, Alfred Bonne, Fritz Simon, Yosef Nahmani, Dr. Bernard Joseph, Zalman Lifschitz, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, Eliahu Berligne, Yehoshua’ Suparsky, Felix Warburg, Lewis Namier, Shmuel Zuchovitzky, Eliahu Dobkin, Dov Joseph, Abraham Sharon (Schwadron), and Yitzhak Gruenbaum (1, 2, 3). Even the non-Zionist Werner Senator, one of the two dissenting voices in the October 1936 JA Executive vote noted above, eventually came around to the idea in October 1936. “We must aspire to a maximal transfer,” Senator said.
Displacements in the 1940s
Although the British adopted new regulations limiting Zionist land purchases in 1940, they had little effect. Since, from 1940-1946, the JNF had acquired an additional 238,000 dunams of land, 195,000 of which was located in zones ostensibly off limits to Zionists. Zionist institutions circumvented the regulations by registering the land in the name of an individual who would give the JNF an irrevocable power-of-attorney.
And so the evictions continued. The JNF worked to displace the hundreds of inhabitants of Ma’lul, west of Nazareth, throughout the 1940s. Zionist leaders including Ezra Danin, Yaacov Shimoni, Yehoshua Palmon and Tuvia Lishanski orchestrated multiple campaigns in the 1940s against Arab tenants who lived on land plots purchased by the JNF. As one historian put it, “Lishanski directed all his energy towards intimidating and then forcibly evicting these people from the lands their families had been cultivating for centuries.”
The militarization of Zionist settlements also drove Palestinians off their lands. By the 1940s, the village of Atlit had become a rare example of Arab-Jewish cooperation, with some 500 Jews and 1000 Arabs living together as miners in the nearby Atlit Salt company. But the Zionist militia, the Haganah, built a training ground in the village, effectively transforming the Jewish part of town into a military base. This intimidated the Arabs, whose population was reduced to 200 by the eve of the 1948 War.
Qira and Qamun, noted above, continued to face hostile settler encroachment, eventually boiling over into violence in February 1946. As one Palestinian newspaper described it, “about 150 Jewish men and women attacked these lands with armored tractors and barbed wire fences. They were divided into three groups: the first plowing, the second erecting fences, and the third intended to act upon any show of Arab resistance.” Then, at some point, about 30 Palestinian men, women, elderly people and children noticed the provocation, and “struggled with the Jews for two hours, stopped them, and forced them to retreat.” Over the next few years, the population of Qira declined from 410 in 1945 to 150 in 1948 as a result of the violence.
The conquest of land also continued in the 1940s. In 1946, Zionist forces established 11 outposts in the southern desert, including Tkuma, Be’eri and Nirim, with the goal of putting civilian settlements on the frontiers of the areas Jews hoped to control in an eventual partition of the country. The settlements, built on non arable land, were economically unviable, but were needed to extend the borders of the settler-society and gather intelligence about the Arabs in the area. They were built to serve as a human shield, a front line for the war the Zionists knew they would have to fight to establish a state in Palestine. [Tragically, on October 7, 2023, many of these communities served the purpose for which they originally built].
Meanwhile, Zionist leaders continued to fantasize about transfer. In 1941, Ben-Gurion thought that Druse, Bedouin tribes in the Jordan Valley and the South, the Circassians, the Shi’ites living in northern Galilee, tenant farmers and landless labourers, could all be transferred to a neighbouring country (1, 2). Throughout the early-mid 1940s, Shertok, Weizmann and Weitz kept proposing transfer to whoever would listen to them. “There is no room for both peoples in this country, ” Weitz wrote in his diary in 1940. He was obsessed with expelling the Palestinians, and he led Zionist land purchasing activities. “After the Arabs are transferred, the country will be wide open for us … and the only solution is the Land of Israel, or at least the Western Land of Israel [i.e., Palestine], without Arabs. There is no room for compromise on this point (1, 2).” Zionist leaders continued to keep most of these ideas private, believing a public campaign for the forcible removal of the Palestinian Arabs would backfire.
Zionist emissaries were sent to Damascus, al-Jazirah, in northeast Syria, Transjordan, Iraq and elsewhere in the region to scout out dumping grounds for Palestinians. In 1943, for instance, the Zionist movement reached a land deal with Mithqal al-Fayez, a tribal chief in Transjordan, to buy tens of thousands of dunums of land in the Ghor al-Kabid of Transjordan to allocate to Palestinians who were to uprooted from Palestine. Weitz claimed al-Fayez received an advance payment in July for the land, to be registered in the names of Moshe Shertok and Yosef Stromza. In fact, Yosef Weitz, Zalman Lifschitz, the lawyer A. Ben-Shemesh and others visited the land in April 1944, but nothing seems to have come of the matter.
In December 1944, The JA Executive supported yet another transfer proposal, one that received official endorsement of the British labor party. “Let the Arabs be encouraged to move out as the Jews move in,” the resolution said. The JA described the draft as “very encouraging” and noted that it was received with “great satisfaction” by Ben-Gurion, although the language that tied Arab dispossession with Jewish immigration as a condicio sine qua non needed revision. It was too honest, since that’s exactly how Zionist leaders thought about transfer. “When we bring a plan for transferring one million Jews to the Land of Israel,” said Moshe Shapira, former director of the JAE Department of Immigration, “we cannot avoid the transfer” of Arabs out.
Alas, we have not even mentioned the revisionist Zionists, for whom neither partial transfer within the Jewish areas, nor a complete transfer within all of Palestine, was sufficient. Instead, they advocated for the transfer of all Arabs in all of Palestine and Transjordan, the latter of which had a Jewish population that rounded down to zero. “I suggest that the Arabs of Palestine and Transjordania be transferred to Iraq, or a united Iraq-Syrian state,” The revisionist leader Eliahu Ben-Horin wrote in 1943. “That means the shifting of about 1,200,000 persons. A larger number were involved in the Greco-Turkish exchange of population; many more in the internal shifts in Russia,” he added.
Conclusion
Zionist leaders understood the basic problem of Zionism: the Palestinians. There were too many of them. It would be impossible to establish a Jewish State in an area where Palestinians constituted a majority or even a large minority. And so Arabs needed to be removed from lands purchased by the Zionist movement.
This process involved a lot of violence, from deadly clashes in the 1900s and 1910s to nation-wide riots in the 1920s to one of the longest lasting revolts in all of colonial history in the 1930s, all driven by the same underlying force: Zionist colonization and Arab displacement. Meanwhile, the British continued to acknowledge the cause of the violence was Zionist immigration and land purchases, and continued to facilitate Zionist immigration and land purchases.
The Zionist movement obsessed over transfer from the mid-late 1930s onwards, since it was the only apparent solution to the core problem facing the Zionist movement. Indeed, as Zionist leaders told us over and over again, expulsion was merely an extension of eviction, a policy the Zionist movement already embraced. And that’s exactly what would happen in 1948, mass forcible expulsion.
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They came to Palestine as refugees with these permits.
They now claim to own the land...
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About the Nakba
(https://www.un.org/unispal/about-the-nakba/)
The Nakba, which means “catastrophe” in Arabic, refers to the mass displacement and dispossession of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. Before the Nakba, Palestine was a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural society. However, the conflict between Arabs and Jews intensified in the 1930s with the increase of Jewish immigration, driven by persecution in Europe, and with the Zionist movement aiming to establish a Jewish state in Palestine.
In November 1947, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution partitioning Palestine into two states, one Jewish and one Arab, with Jerusalem under a UN administration. The Arab world rejected the plan, arguing that it was unfair and violated the UN Charter. Jewish militias launched attacks against Palestinian villages, forcing thousands to flee. The situation escalated into a full-blown war in 1948, with the end of the British Mandate and the departure of British forces, the declaration of independence of the State of Israel and the entry of neighbouring Arab armies. The newly established Israeli forces launched a major offensive. The result of the war was the permanent displacement of more than half of the Palestinian population.
As early as December 1948, the UN General Assembly called for refugee return, property restitution and compensation (resolution 194 (II)). However, 75 years later, despite countless UN resolutions, the rights of the Palestinians continue to be denied. According to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) more than 5 million Palestine refugees are scattered throughout the Middle East. Today, Palestinians continue to be dispossessed and displaced by Israeli settlements, evictions, land confiscation and home demolitions.
The Nakba anniversary is a reminder not only of those tragic events of 1948, but of the ongoing injustice suffered by the Palestinians. The Nakba had a profound impact on the Palestinian people, who lost their homes, their land, and their way of life. It remains a deeply traumatic event in their collective memory and continues to shape their struggle for justice and for their right to return to their homes.
On 30 November 2023, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution A/RES/77/23 requesting the Division for Palestinian Rights of the Secretariat, for the first time in the history of the UN, to dedicate its activities in 2023 to the commemoration of the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Nakba, including by organizing a high-level event at the General Assembly Hall on 15 May 2023. Furthermore, the UN General Assembly adopted another resolution A/RES/79/82 requesting the Division to commemorate the anniversary of the Nakba, including by organizing annual events and through the dissemination of relevant archives and testimonies.
Nakba Commemorations
- On 15 May 2023, for the first time in the history of the UN, this anniversary was commemorated pursuant to the mandate by the General Assembly (A/RES/77/23 of 30 November 2022).
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Commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the Nakba at UN Headquarters in New York
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOao7xQ7qMQ)
2023 marks the 75th anniversary of the mass displacement of Palestinians known as “the Nakba” or “the Catastrophe”. The UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (CEIRPP) commemorated the 75th anniversary of the Nakba at UN Headquarters in New York. For the first time in the history of the UN, this anniversary was commemorated pursuant to the mandate by the General Assembly (A/RES/77/23 of 30 November 2022).
Transkripzioa:
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foreign
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the general assembly is now voting on
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draft resolution title division for
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Palestinians 90.
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the draft resolution is adaptive
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yeah
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we will remain nationally United
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the matter the challenges
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we call on you to join this Mighty and
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marvelous chorus of Justice
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and sing a song of freedom
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we are amazed by the resilience of the
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Palestinian people
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that said practice their Courage the
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dignity is an inspiration to all of us
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[Applause]
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foreign
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despite of millions of Palestinians has
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been one of patients
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persistence and resilience
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for the first time in history of the
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United Nations
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foreign
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[Music]
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[Applause]
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[Music]
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- In 2024, the Committee held a commemorative Panel Discussion “1948-2024: The Ongoing Palestinian Nakba” on 17 May 2024 at United Nations Headquarters. The event examined the historical context of the 1948 events and the ongoing process of the Nakba over the past 76 years, culminating in the current war on Gaza. It also presented testimony on the current conflict and highlight international obligations and responsibilities.
“1948 – 2024: The Ongoing Palestinian Nakba” Commemorative Panel Discussion at the UN Headquarters
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXkfHnjWZfs)
The Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People convened a commemorative Panel Discussion “1948-2024: The Ongoing Palestinian Nakba” on 17 May 2024 (10 a.m. – 1 p.m.) in the ECOSOC Chamber, at United Nations Headquarters. By holding a commemoration of the Nakba, the Committee intended to continue highlighting this historical event marking the plight of the Palestinian people, following the 2023 Commemorations mandated by the General Assembly in resolution A/RES/77/23 of 30 November 2022. The panelists included Phyllis Bennis, Fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies, Washington, D.C.; Ardi Imseis, Assistant Professor of Law at Queen’s University, Ottawa, and Karameh Kuemmerle, Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School. Poems were recited by Palestinian poet Zeina Azzam.
https://www.un.org/unispal/panel-disc…
00:13:00 – Statement by Ambassador Riyad Mansour, representative of the State of Palestine.
00:21:30 – Poetry reading by Zeina Azzam
00:26:10 – Zeina Azzam read “Write my name on my leg, Mama” poem
00:37:32 – Presentation by Ardi Imseis, Assistant Professor of Law at Queen’s University, Ottawa
01:00:01 – Presentation by Karameh Kuemmerle, Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School
01:13:16 – Presentation by Phyllis Bennis, Fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies, Washington, D.C.
Transkripzioa:
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representatives of governments intergovernmental and non-governmental
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organizations United Nations agencies and programs
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excellencies distinguished speakers ladies and
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gentlemen on behalf of the United Nations committee on the exercise of the
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inable rights of the Palestinian people it is my privilege to welcome you
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today to this commemorative panel discussion
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entitled 1948 2024 the ongoing Palestinian
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nagba convened under the opes of our
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committee please allow me to mention before we begin
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that as reminded by the UN Department of Safety and Security
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and according to the rules of the Secretariat no form of
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protest during this meeting the committee established by the
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general assembly in 1975 has an annual program of work to
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promote the inable rights of the Palestinian people to
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self-determination independent dependence and to establish their own state in accordance with international
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law and un resolutions as
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such we Advocate with member states and international
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organizations we have regularly a series of Publications and we have capacity
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building program for staff of the Palestinian
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government we we also organize delegation visits and international meetings in
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various regions to promote constructive discussions on the question of
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Palestine and mobilize support for and assistance to the Palestinian
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people by holding a commemoration of the nagba we intend to continue highlighting
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this historic iCal moment marking the plight of the Palestinian
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people following the events we organized in
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2023 to Mark the nagar’s 75th Anniversary as mandated by the general
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assembly in resolution a/r 7723 of 30 November
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2022 today’s event will consist of a short opening followed by a panel
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discussion I will now deliver remarks in my capacity as chair of the
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committee for the exercise of the inable rights of the Palestinian
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people excellencies colleagues dear guests ladies and
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gentlemen last year our committee hosted the first ever un commemoration of the
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nagba to observe its 75th anniversary today we again commemorate
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the events of 1948 and subsequent years which led to the disposition and
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displacement of approximately 750,000 Palestinians from their
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ancestral lands one year has passed
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and after the atrocities committed by Hamas and other militant groups on 7th of
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October the Israeli response continues to be disproportionate and
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indiscriminate breaches of norms by one group do not excuse breaches of
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international law and Norms by another what we have witnessed over the
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past seven months much of broadcast live across the globe and even by the victims themselves
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is unparalleled in recent history with Gaza being under constant
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attack and bombardment by Israeli forces almost 40,000 Palestinians have
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been killed and almost 880,000 injured the vast majority of whom women
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and children that is one in every 25 Gins
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killed one in every 25 Gins killed 70% of all buildings have been
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destroyed schools and universities are in rubble hospitals are not
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functioning and in parallel while the war on Gaza
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rages Israeli attacks by its security forces and armed illegal settlers
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protected by them those attacks on Palestinians in the
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occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem have increased Palestinian land and buildings
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are expropriated Palestinians are beaten and killed with
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impunity the number of Palestinian detainees often held without charge for extended periods of time is
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increasing this is the situation today the nagba of 194 48 and today’s
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nagba in Gaza are not two separate distinct
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events today’s nagba is repetition of the nagba of
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1948 and all this time in between we witnessed Israel’s
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occupation and dispossession of Palestinian property denial of
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rights arbitrary arrests including of children brutal and disproportionate use
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of force judaization of East Jerusalem and its cultural symbols eviction and
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displacement of its inhabitants the nagba thus is an ongoing
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process which has affected the Palestinian people over
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Generations International Norms are flouted and the perpetrator is seemingly
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immune from being held accountable Palestinians are starving and under
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threat of famine humanitarian Aid is not delivered in the amounts
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necessary humanitarians including un staff and journalists are killed and
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injured with impunity often despite previous coordination and Promises of so-called
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safe Roots this is a dark time for
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international Justice for accountability under international
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law for the rules based International order that this organization was founded
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to uphold conflict is spreading in the Middle
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East the security Council appears paralyzed and member states
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divided excellencies ladies and gentlemen in this situation we ask
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ourselves what can be done the various actors and concerned
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parties citizens of the States Civil Society organizations and NGS
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governments and international organizations all play their part working
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together and we have seen throughout the world how civil societies civil servants
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academics students clab for an end to this conflict the return of all
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hostages the return of historical Justice freedom and protection for the Palestinian
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people within the United Nations our committee plays a key
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role we continued advocacy here in New York in the general assembly and the
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security Council through events like like the one we are holding today through the committee advocacy via
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our website and social media our Publications the development of our of
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capacities of the Palestinian government our International conferences the panels and delegation
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visits we organize just a few we a few weeks
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ago a committee delegation comprising of myself and uh
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Minister Mansour visited Trinidad in Tobago
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Guyana and also it included also the uh ambassador of
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Kuba we visited Tobago Guana Trinidad Ando Guana in the headquarters of
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CARICOM the Caribbean community in the context of that visit four countries have officially
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recognized the state of Palestine Barbados and Jamaica in April
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Trinidad in Tobago and the Bahamas in May thus by
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now all CARICOM members and almost the whole Caribbean
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has done so and we hope that this recent wave of support will carry toward the rest of
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the region and Beyond a key aspects of the efforts
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towards ending the war on Gaza ending the
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occupation ending the Palestinians suffering is the work in our
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sphere that of international law and relations on ensuring that the rules we
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set for ourselves the nations of the world that those rules apply to
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everyone that nobody is above the law and at grave Brides of internation
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law and Norms must have consequences in short that the weak should be protected
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from the attacks of the strong in this the vast majority of
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member states and indeed peoples of the world Stand Together We also call upon the
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International Community member states and Society alike to redouble our efforts to end the
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occupation and this ongoing nagba and bring to
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reality the inable rights of the Palestinian people including to self-determination
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and Independence and a just resolution to the plight of Palestinian
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refugees our committee will continue to work towards the
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day that the Palestinian people will enjoy all day inable rights and live in
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a state of their own in peace and
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prosperity based on the two-state solution that we all know so
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well that yet that has for too long eluded
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implementation we are determined to continue to stand with the Palestinian
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people so that one day the nagba will land and we call upon all
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others member states organizations Civil Society to do the same I thank
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you excellencies ladies and gentlemen dear guests I would
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like to now request the representative of the State of
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Palestine and per obser to the United Nations in New York Minister Riyad
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Mansour to Del his remarks you have the
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[Music] FL Mr
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chair my dear brother Sheik Nang actually my twin brother she
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Nang dear panelists dear colleagues and
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friends the NABA encompasses both a personal tragedy for every Palestinian
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family and a collective ordeal a historic
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Injustice endured by an entire nation a majority of which was uprooted
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overnight from its ancestral land while the rest were treated as strangers in
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their own country it is an Enterprise of
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displacement and replace ment of a people that continues to this very
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day it took 75 years for the United Nations to recognize and commemorate the
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nakba but the nakba is not a historical event it is a terrible reality still
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endured by our people as Israel has yet to abandon its
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plans to push us out of history and
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geography and this commemoration today comes at a time where one of the most
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terrible chapters of this ongoing nakba is
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underway our people in Gaza are besieged bombed and starved with one
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aim their destruction or their removal the Israeli government no longer
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hides its true intentions the Palestinians have three
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options displacement subjugation or
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death ethnic cleansing apptide or
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genocide the denial of our existence as a people
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continues the denial of our rights continues the denial of our statehood
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continues but at least Israel unchecked and unhinged has
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confessed to the nakba it had deemed denied so
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far its extremist leaders say it
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unequivocally they want a second NABA thus conf confessing to the
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first a a second NBA that allows them to
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get rid of the Palestinian people once and for all finish the job started
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decades ago but the Palestinian people are here to
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stay their Resurrection after 1948 should convince anyone that our
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nation will never die but that is not a reason to allow our
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people to be killed once more there is now Universal recognition
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of the Palestinian people and soon it will be matched by Universal recognition
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of our state there is a global consensus on the
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imperative of ending Israeli occupation fulfillment of our national
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and human rights including to the independence of our state and having to
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Democratic states Palestine and Israel live side by side in peace and security
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on the 1967 borders these should not be mere wishes
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expressed in resolutions and obliterated by Israel on the ground in full impunity
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these should be commands the violations of which should
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trigger the strongest response it is time for accountability
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and Justice so Freedom can Prevail and peace can be
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achieved the nakba must end on stopping the Israeli assault against our people
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people is the indispensable first step on that course including regarding
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Rafa Gaza is composed mostly of refugees who endure the nakba and
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instead of witnessing its end they have to live through through it once again or
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scum to it this time around enough pain enough suffering
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not a single Palestinian generation was spared not
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one it is time to end the Carnage to end the
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occupation and to end to end the Exodus and save generations to come from Death
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servitude and force displacement together all of us including the brave
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students from universities across the United States and in all corners of the
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globe and I mention again the brave spark that started at Colombia
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University which we salute them for their bravery and for principle position
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calling for the end of the war and the disarming of the Israeli Army to gather all of us with the
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solidarity of peoples and Nations around the world we can finally start to
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correct one of the greatest injustices of our time
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Palestine has become a symbol for all Freedom loving and peaceloving
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Nations I repeat Palestine has become a symbol for all Freedom loving and
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peaceloving Nations palestine’s Destiny was
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is and will always be Freedom it should not be delayed any
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longer in the Injustice and free Palestine thank you Mr
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chairman uh thank you Minister Mansour I think the words we have just heard
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convey the conviction of a people who is a victim of tyranny but has remained
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determined to keep the hope of prevailing Justice uh alive in the face of uh oppression we
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admire your resilience we admire the resilience of the Palestinian people
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that is why you continue to inspire the International Community to inspire the committee with the
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convention conviction that in the end Justus justice will prevail will triumph
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over Injustice as history has has always shown thank you Minister Mansour for your inspiring
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statement excellencies uh ladies and gentlemen I would like now to
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request uh Miss Z aam whom I welcome Miss Z aam who is a Palestinian
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American writer poet editor and Community
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activist whose work addresses themes including war and displacement uh
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Refugee and immigrant experiences I invite her to take the floor and today
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we have the privilege really to hear her reading some of her poetry Mrs aam you
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have the floor your your excellencies ladies and
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gentlemen good morning and thank you to the committee for the exercise of the inalienable right of the Palestinian
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people for inviting me to participate in this solemn and meaningful
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program it’s my honor to commemorate with poetry the 70 sixth year of the
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neba the Palestinians forced displacement from their Homeland as I watch the ongoing genocide
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in Gaza I have a greater understanding of the trauma my parents suffered as
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refugees from Palestine indeed for Palestinians the neba never ended it has been 76 years of
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loss Injustice ethnic cleansing dehumanization and attempts at Erasure
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on all levels I’m honored to pay tribute to all the Palestinian Martyrs the
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wounded starving imprisoned and abused whether living in occupied Palestine
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refugee camps tents or in the diaspora my parents were originally from
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Nazareth and my mother grew up in Jaffa after they married they were living in haa in
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1948 they and my oldest brother mother and my entire extended family were
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forced to flee during the war my parents names are Sam and Alis
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aam my poems and my activism for Palestine are all dedicated to their
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memory the first poem I’d like to read today is about my father I thought I’d mention that he
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worked for many years for Ana in the Beirut office when I was a child this is a poem I wrote after he
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died it’s titled my father is now a
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memory my father is now a memory dreamlike clinging fleeting
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rooted I will nurture it as he nurtured his plants babies in a cradle rocking
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gently the roses in his garden mourn he loved us we loved him
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the figs stand still wishing for his tenderness my father searched for
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Palestine in them the memory of sweetness reawakened Nostalgia guiding
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him Homeward I can’t remember him as a younger man anymore he’s an old man with
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clouds for hair crevices and the Earth of his face waterfall nose Crescent Moon
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smile he would sing Snippets of a song recite a line of
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poetry sometimes it would make sense sometimes it was out of place he
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might laugh heartily amused by a memory he tried to teach my children to
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lick a drop of coffee from his little finger as he had done with me on his lap
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decades ago he clung to Memories found solace and reliving
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replicating maybe he could find a home for the old and the new my father yearned for the Homeland
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he saw again only once in 50 years we should never have left he would
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say out of the blue shaking his head they shot your neighbor it was Wartime
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the Daren Massacre had just come to light no matter we should have
25:30
stayed maybe he would have been killed too maybe I would never have been born a
25:38
fig tree cut down a fig imagined 15 roses he bought the day
25:45
before he died planted only three my mother gave the others away to friends
25:52
one by one they will yearn for him be planted far from home home refugees in
26:01
diaspora he loved us we loved
26:10
him since October 2023 Israel’s war on Gaza has been a war
26:16
on gaza’s children palestin red crescent Society just reported that over 15,000 children
26:24
in Gaza have been G killed and in entire generation has been
26:30
annihilated or physically and mentally scarred forever I wrote a poem at the end of
26:37
October 2023 when I learned that some parents in Gaza were writing their children’s names
26:43
on their legs so they could be identified should the parents or the children be
26:49
killed I recently saw a video of a little boy in Gaza who was writing his own name on his leg quote so I can be be
26:58
identified unquote he cried it was truly
27:03
heartbreaking as a parent and as a grandparent I am so
27:09
heartbroken the poem is titled write my name and it’s in the voice of a child
27:15
from Gaza write my name on my leg Mama use
27:22
the black permanent marker with the ink that doesn’t bleed if it gets wet the
27:28
one that doesn’t melt if it’s exposed to heat write my name on my leg
27:36
Mama make the lines thick and clear and add your special flourishes so I can
27:43
take comfort in seeing my mama’s handwriting when I go to
27:48
sleep write my name on my leg mama and on on the legs of my sisters and
27:56
brothers this way we will belong together this way we will be known as
28:02
your children write my name on my leg mama
28:08
and please write your name and Baba’s name on your legs too so we will be
28:14
remembered as a family write my name on my leg mama
28:21
don’t add any numbers like when I was born or the address of our home I don’t
28:27
want the world world to list me as a number I have a name and I’m not a
28:34
number write my name on my leg mama when the bomb hits our house when
28:42
the walls Crush our skulls and bones our legs will tell our story how
28:50
there was nowhere for us to run
29:01
one day it struck me how Central the concept of or goodness is to Arab
29:09
culture the Arabic word is uttered often during each
29:15
day how lovely it is that one of our major touchstones of Our Lives is the
29:22
idea of goodness and we use it in our speech and with each other all the time
29:29
here’s a poem titled from the time Farmers rise with
29:36
the sun until night descends there is talk of it songs and quranic verses
29:44
about morning of evening of there is no getting around
29:54
goodness my mother would wish me as she kissed my forehead at bedtime may you
30:00
wake up to goodness later I learned to
30:07
respond may you be part of its family the family
30:13
of even watching TV as we waited for bad news from Gaza she would
30:20
admonish and Shah goodness God willing no matter the misfortune she was
30:28
sure Allah would eventually bring to Palestine maybe it all started with her
30:36
neighbors and Jaffa the family whose name was Allah God’s
30:45
goodness from kindness to Comedy their ancestors packed so much in this name it
30:53
was a hedge against hardship an incantation in their bones palestine’s
31:01
bones where resides from morning till night in a Mother’s kiss at
31:08
bedtime deep in a farmer’s land there the roots of multiply in the
31:16
earth goodness
31:24
bristling before I read my last poem today I’d like to leave leave you with a thought palestine’s beloved National
31:32
poet Mahmud darsh once said that quote every beautiful poem is an act of
31:40
resistance unquote so here’s my final poem it’s
31:46
titled colors for the diaspora it was originally inspired by
31:51
the colors of the Palestinian flag how it’s been illegal for Palestinians to
31:57
display the these colors although I do mention the four band colors in this poem I include other
32:05
colors as well in this way the black green red and white are found
32:12
organically with other colors in nature in Palestine the poem can be read as an
32:18
elegy to our forefathers and foremothers who were displaced and dispossessed of
32:24
their National home searching for the of their land and struggling for the
32:30
liberation of Palestine colors for the
32:37
diaspora blue green watery Globe tugging to a red
32:43
core we are a distant Comet White Cloud of unburnished rocks frisking the
32:50
heavens for an arc to Earth sea
32:56
Home Green Brown Palestine cactus fruit and wild thyme
33:04
Olive Orchards cypress trees we travel on your mountaintops tethered by Voices
33:11
From suitcases and the yaw of blackened
33:16
Keys blue black night silver stars of
33:22
ancestors traveling a displaced orbit around a lost son
33:29
repeating when will we see the colors of our land when will we
33:39
land thank
33:51
you uh Mrs aam I cannot thank you enough not only for honoring us with uh your
33:58
presence here but also for sharing through your very beautiful poems uh such a moving captivating and
34:07
emotional testimony of the Palestinian resilience thank you so very
34:13
much this concludes the opening session of our panel discussion but before moving to the next
34:20
segment I would like to really uh thank here uh our colleagues because we have
34:28
seen so many peers attending this important event and also we have seen
34:33
also the highest representative of organizations such as the OIC and uh the
34:39
Arab League being here so to all of you I would like to express the Gratitude of
34:46
the committee for your involvement and for your support I will now go to the next
34:53
segment by giving the floor to each of our panelist for short
34:59
briefings on the respective uh topics and areas after the interventions I will
35:06
open the floor for questions uh starting with
35:12
committee uh members and observers and then to others in the interest of time and to
35:19
allow for rich rich discussion uh I will invite those representative of of member and observer
35:25
States and intergovernmental organization I ations who prepared statements uh to send these documents to
35:33
the division for Palestinian rights of the United Nations Secretariat and these
35:38
statements will be posted on the Committee website please be reminded that uh
35:45
simultaneous interpretation is provided in six languages Arabic Chinese English
35:51
French Russian and Spanish to accommodate all interventions of our panelist as well as our diverse uh
35:59
esteemed audience this event is webcast live on the UN web TV site on all
36:09
languages I also want to inform that uh you uh inform you that to reduce the
36:15
usage of paper documents related to this panel discussions and the committee have
36:20
been put in a virtual folder and you can access it by scanning the QR code near
36:26
the entrances uh into your smartphones all participants are also
36:32
encouraged to disseminate information about the panel discussion on the social media and use the hashtag rights for
36:40
Palestine for figure let’s start with our first
36:45
panelist Mr rdmc who I’m I’m pleased to see
36:50
again uh who is an assistant professor an academic director at Queens University
36:56
Otawa his main focus is on the intersection of power politics Law And
37:03
Justice and the Practical impact of those phenomena on international relations in general and on
37:11
unprecedented peoples in particular Mr ISM joined the Queen’s
37:16
faculty of law in 2018 following a 12year career as a un
37:23
official in the Middle East First with unra and then with un
37:28
it’s Mr MCS you have the
37:33
floor your excellencies ladies and gentlemen I should like to begin by
37:38
thanking the committee on the exercise of the inable rights of the Palestinian people for convening this event and also
37:45
its division for Palestinian rights it is a pleasure to be with you once
37:50
again it is exceedingly difficult to speak about the NECA in a manner that
37:55
sufficiently captures the enorm it of the Palestinian predicament a long
38:01
festering wound upon the conscience of these United Nations ethnically cleansed
38:08
denationalized dispossessed occupied rationally discriminated against and now
38:15
the target of what the international court of justice has determined is a risk of irreparable harm to their right
38:21
to be protected from genocide it is as though the Palestinian
38:26
people have been made to endure an endless Calvary as Edward S once put it
38:33
incessant unremitting unforgiving As We Gather to Mark 76
38:41
years of neba under the long shadow of Gaza the theme of continuity is ever
38:47
present what the Palestinian people has been enduring for three quarters of a century uniquely on full display in real
38:55
time on social media de feeds as we speak is a singular experience of
39:01
unmitigated disaster of the sustained and concerted effort to do away with their Collective
39:07
and National existence in their native land the neck buuck continues because it
39:13
is The Logical culmination of Zionist settler colonialism in Palestine which
39:19
has yet to complete its task with its insatiable desire to displace and
39:25
replace Palestine natives as foretold and proclaimed
39:31
openly by its founding fathers institutions and present day
39:37
adherence as Patrick Wolf has noted settler colonialism involves quote a logic of
39:44
elimination this logic strives for the disillusion of native societies while it erects new Colonial Societies in their
39:52
place in this sense settler colonizers come to stay with Invasion and
39:59
colonizing constituting in Wolf’s words a structure not an
40:06
event your excellencies the NECA is a structure not
40:12
an event this structure is an overdrive as we speak with a pace and fervor never
40:19
before seen it is happening publicly its authors openly admit its aims and yet
40:25
little to nothing is being done to stop by those in a position to do so it is
40:30
being actively colluded in by a small number of Western States and political Elites led by the United
40:37
States it has cast doubt serious doubt over the continued viability of the post
40:43
World War II International legal order these western states have fashioned all manner of orwellian
40:50
justifications for their collusion with the NECA in Gaza whether nonsensical
40:56
argum about Israel’s so-called right of self-defense dismissed by the
41:02
international court of justice 20 years ago or Israel’s purported purity of Arms
41:09
beled by countless Tik Tock videos of sadistic IDF soldiers on the ground or
41:15
acquiescence in spous Israeli allegations or claims that unra the
41:20
lifegiving life-saving humanitarian arm of the United Nations in Gaza was
41:26
somehow involved in 7 October now debunked by a highlevel independent
41:31
review panel if any was ever needed the vascious of these Western
41:37
justifications is rooted in one simple truth that runs like a thread
41:43
throughout the consistent denial of the very Humanity agency and political rights of
41:51
the Palestinian people a people for whom the United Nations has a permanent responsibility until their plight is
41:58
resolved in accordance with international law the un’s permanent responsibility
42:03
for the question of Palestine is often spoke of in these hallowed halls but what is not spoken of as often or at all
42:12
are the reasons as to why this respons responsibility actually
42:17
exists and for that it is essential to discuss the Fateful decision made by the then Western dominated United Nations
42:24
General Assembly to recommend par of Palestine against the will of the
42:30
country’s indigenous population the majority population through resolution 181 of 29 November
42:38
1947 a review of the terms of the partition plan and the accompanying un record recounted in my recently
42:45
published book on the United Nations in the question of Palestine reveals that the plan was illegal under prevailing
42:51
international law this illegality helped lay the groundwork for the NECA of 1948
42:57
and its painfully unjust results that have continued and indeed accelerated
43:03
ever since remain with us your excellencies as many of you know
43:09
resolution 181 provided for the partition of Palestine into an Arab State and a Jewish state in economic
43:15
Union with the city of Jerusalem and its environs established as a corporate
43:20
separat both states were required to adopt Democratic constitutions establish
43:26
government on the basis of universal suffrage and guarantee to all persons equality before the law sounds good
43:34
doesn’t it but by any objective assessment the terms of the partition plan revealed an
43:40
absolute contempt for the principle of self-determination of peoples as applied
43:45
to Palestine as a class a mandated territory rooted upon the
43:51
idea which you will all recognize of majority Democratic rule
43:58
territorially the plan allotted the Jewish state 57% of Palestine including
44:03
its most fertile land despite the Jewish settler population comprising only onethird of the country and possessing
44:11
only 5.6% of registered land ownership demographically although the
44:17
proposed Arab state would include a clear majority of approximately 725,000
44:23
Arabs to 10,000 Jews the proposed Jewish state would contain a total population
44:30
of 1, 80,000 1, 180,000 consisting of
44:35
59,000 Arabs to 499,000 Jews and this meant that based
44:43
on the United Nations record minority rule would Prevail in
44:48
the purported Jewish state from the outset this despite the terms of
44:54
resolution 181 requiring that the opposed Jewish State be Democratic
44:59
ensure universal suffrage and guarantee equality before the
45:05
law the UN partition plan was a glaring anomaly under prevailing international law as I outline in my book only two
45:12
courses of action were legally open to the assembly at the time first immediate
45:19
Independence of the whole of Palestine in line oh shock and horror of it with
45:24
the wishes of the majority of its inhabitants or two second un
45:31
trusteeship put simply if the new UN Charter system was to Prevail partition
45:36
could never be legal without the freely expressed consent of the government the UN record demonstrates
45:43
that partition was not based on these International legal considerations rather it was driven by
45:49
hegemonic European states and their settler Colonial Affiliates for political reasons the UN record show
45:57
that the declared goal of these states was to rectify Europe’s centuries old Jewish question in the wake of the
46:04
Holocaust and to do so at the expense of the innocent third-party
46:10
Palestinians as noted by the permanent representative of Yemen at the timee if
46:15
Jews were persecuted in Europe what have the people of Palestine to do with that
46:20
end quot the UN record demonstrates that partition was accompanied by a complete
46:26
contempt for principles of self-determination and Democratic governance as applied to Palestine as a
46:32
class a mandated territory for instance in its majority report recommending
46:38
partition to the assembly the UN special committee on Palestine unscop expressly noted and I
46:46
quote with regard to the principle of self-determination although International recognition was extended
46:52
to this principle at the end of the first world war and it was adhered to with to the other Arab territories at
46:59
the time of the creation of the a mandates it was not applied to Palestine
47:04
obviously because of the intention to make possible the creation of the Jewish National home there actually it may well
47:12
be said that the Jewish National home and the sui generous mandate for Palestine run counter to that principle
47:19
end quote run counter to the principle of self-determination astoundingly none of
47:25
this gave the unscoped majority reason for pause an even more animated rationale
47:31
and supportive partition came from one of unsc’s members who unabashedly asserted on the floor of the general
47:37
assembly on 10 October 1947 and I
47:42
quote Palestine was no more Arab than certain Spanish countries of Latin America were
47:48
Indian the Jews had made a pleasant and healthy country out of a land in which a
47:54
sparse and ritic population had m nearly vegetated it was incomprehensible that
48:01
the Arabs should educe their numerical superiorities and argument an ignorant majority should not
48:08
be allowed to impose its will end quote an ignorant majority should not be
48:14
allowed to impose its will end quote your
48:20
excellencies one could go on but you get the point for the Western dominated when
48:27
at the time of course the Palestinian people did not matter when it came to the application of international law in
48:34
1947 their claims let alone their existence were not taken seriously by the Western
48:40
powers like all Colonial peoples they were treated with racist contempt and as
48:46
a mere impediment to more noble European interests that were to be pursued come
48:52
what may why one might ask does any of this matter when we speak of the 1948 NECA
48:59
and the un’s permanent responsibility for the question of Palestine while the UN record shows that
49:05
unscop and the Western dominated General Assembly suffered from a cognitive dissonance as to the inevitability of
49:11
violence befalling Palestine and its people following the passage of the partition plan we now know from the UN
49:19
record that the 1948 nebba consisted of innumerable acts of widespread
49:25
premeditated and systematic violence aimed at expelling or encouraging the mass Flight of the indigenous
49:31
Palestinian population from the country these acts included the wholesale and
49:36
indiscriminate bombardment Siege and expulsion of the Palestinian population
49:41
from cities towns and Villages at least 31 confirmed massacres
49:48
of Palestinian civilians including use of mass Graves as means of
49:54
concealment rape and other forms of sexual and gender-based
49:59
violence psychological Terror campaigns broadcasting Horrors to befall the population if it did not
50:06
flee biological warfare and a host of scorched Earth tactics including the
50:12
deliberate destruction of between 392 and 418 Palestinian Villages when at
50:19
least half the refugees were expelled and as the ethnic cleansing was
50:25
unfolding and well before the last armyus agreement was signed in 1949 the new state of Israel
50:32
Consolidated its Conquest seizing looting and settling Palestine refugees
50:38
and state property on the eve of the Zionist offensives in April 1948 David benuron who would become
50:46
Israel’s first prime minister said quote we shall enter the empty Villages and
50:52
settle in them in peace time we would not have been able to do this end
50:58
quote accordingly about 135 new Jewish settlements were established during the
51:04
1948 War most of which on Arab owned land including
51:11
dozens on territory e earmarked by the UN partition plan for the Palestinian
51:16
Arab State tens of thousands of new Jewish settlers were moved in by Israel into Palestinian refugee houses that
51:24
remained intact they and their descendants remain in that property to this
51:30
day it is therefore not without reason that When isra leaders Now call for the
51:36
resettlement of the Gaza Strip In the Heat of battle the people of Palestine
51:41
shudder in fear of what is to come your
51:47
excellencies palestine’s initial ethnic cleansing in the 1948 neck buub was Consolidated by an Israeli cabinet
51:54
decision of 16 June of that year year to Bar Return of the Palestinian refugees to their property and their homes and
52:02
this was followed by various administrative Acts including the blocking of Palestinian refugee bank
52:07
accounts and the passage of legislation in Israel aimed at giving the impr premature of legality to it
52:15
all Israel’s ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian refugees its wholesale dispossession and usurpation of their
52:22
property its mass denationalization of that population and its denial of the
52:27
right of those refugees to return and restitution constitute gross and
52:32
systematic violations of relevant international law which continue to the present
52:39
day for almost eight decades they have been compounded by Myriad actions of
52:44
Israel administrative legislative judicial and now military all of which
52:50
have been animated by what Israeli human rights organization bet selum has declared is a regime of Jewish Supremacy
52:59
their words not mine between the river and the Sea an apartheid regime friends
53:06
literally no facet of Palestinian life has been left untouched which brings us to the NECA of
53:15
today even before 7 October before 7 October Gaza had been shorn by Israel of
53:22
anything remotely capable of sustaining a dignified life for one person let
53:28
alone 2.3 million 56 years of illegal Israeli military occupation compounded
53:35
by 16 years of Israeli blockade multiple Israeli military assaults resulting in tens of thousands
53:41
of casualties including the killing and maming of thousands of children a multi-decade process of De
53:48
development and deindustrialization resulting in a 45% unemployment rate and a 60% poverty rate
53:57
with 80% of the population dependent on some form of international assistance 97% of drinking water unfit
54:07
for human consumption and a Health Care system on its last legs for having been
54:12
suffocated by the blockade all of that before 7
54:18
October all this to say and as noted by the Secretary General on 25 October the
54:24
events of 7 October did not happen in a vacuum since that fateful day Israel has
54:30
deployed a level of violence not seen anywhere this Century Total War has
54:35
descended upon Gaza according to the United Nations approximately 35,000 Palestinians have been killed so far
54:43
2third of whom women and children and another 78,000 are injured many for Life a
54:52
further 1.7 million that’s almost 80% of the population of the Gaza Strip have
54:57
been forcibly displaced with indiscriminate bombardment yet again scorched Earth tactics and starvation as
55:03
a tool of War deployed against them humanitarian Aid is in frighteningly short supply as objects indispensable
55:10
for the survival of the civilian population continue to be arbitrarily withheld by the occupying power
55:17
life-saving medicines anesthetics food fuel water electricity according to the
55:25
international court of justice famine is setting in in Gaza and as mentioned there is a risk of irreparable harm to
55:32
Palestinian rights to be protected from genocide Gaza a place I once called
55:46
home is being ground to
55:53
dust no place is safe no home no hub no refugee camp no hospital no school no un
56:02
shelter not in the North not in the middle not in the South
56:10
nowhere I’ve often wondered what I would have done had I lived during the time of
56:16
the 1948 NECA would I have acted on my conscience to stop the atrocities unfolding before
56:22
me or would I have remained silent as much of the world did it would appear that fate has now
56:29
ironically presented us all dear friends comrades with such a moment in
56:35
Gaza Israeli leaders are now openly boasting that Gaza is quote rolling out
56:40
the neck the Gaza neba forgive me that Israel is now rolling out the Gaza
56:46
NECA their soldiers are planting Flags in Gaza beaches vowing to reestablish Israeli colonies there but the world is
56:53
watching in the words of one sitting member of the icj quote the alarm has
56:59
now been sounded by the court all the indicators of genocidal activities are flashing red in Gaza an injunction has
57:06
been served for ending the atrocities the provisional measures indicated by the court are binding they
57:13
are not something that a state party to the convention is free to respect or to ignore according to its own pleasure
57:20
they must be implemented end quote your excellencies ladies and
57:25
gentlemen the question is will they be implemented it is clear that the answer
57:31
to this has already been furnished by Israel and that answer is no not when the court issued its first provisional
57:37
measures order on 26 January nor when it issued its last one on 28
57:43
March just as international law was trampled on in the 1948 neba so too is
57:48
it being trampled on in the 2024 necka the historical record is clear if
57:56
change is to happen it must come from elsewhere and this means you this means
58:05
all of us if the words never again are to mean anything if these United Nations are to
58:12
honor the legacy of those for whom those words were initially fashioned we must summon the courage to apply them at all
58:19
times and in all places without fear or favor if anything
58:26
is is clear that time and that place is the Gaza ghetto that time and that place
58:31
is now the people of Palestine demand nothing else and nothing less our
58:37
Humanity does too thank
58:49
you Mr MCS I would like to thank you for your strong and very pertinent
58:56
intervention and yet moving intervention and for your very important
59:02
reminder uh of the responsibility of the International Community and of the UN on the question of Palestine I would
59:09
appreciate if I can if the committee can have a copy of your of your text and I make the same request for the other
59:15
panelist please provide those uh text to the committee the
59:22
floor is now going to be given to our second briefer
59:27
Mrs kame gule assistant professor at Harvard
59:32
Medical School Cambridge a clinical pediatric neurologist who specializes in traumatic
59:39
brain injury and epilepsy she is the co co-founder of doctors against
59:45
genocide an organization driven by global concern over injustices Wars
59:51
racism war crimes and crimes against humanity with a focus on Palestine Mrs
59:58
qule the floor is
1:00:03
yours thank you very much ladies and gentlemen distinguished
1:00:09
delegates members of the United Nations fellow advocates for justice and
1:00:15
peace thank you so much for having me here the ne is a word that lived with us
1:00:21
Palestinians since we were born it is the catastrophe of the pales Ian people
1:00:27
it was not a natural catastrophe and it’s not a merely historic event it is a
1:00:33
word that does not do justice to the ongoing complete denial of Human Rights
1:00:39
and self-determination for us Palestinians it is the genocide that was
1:00:44
allowed to Fester like a disease without prevention or treatment n at times was given the
1:00:51
description of ethnic cleansing which we all know is a euphemism for Gen genocide
1:00:57
this genocide was a culmination of settler Colonial Legacy in our homeland
1:01:02
it is a disease that had many symptoms and continues to mass killing Mass
1:01:08
expulsion Force ection unlawful settlements land confiscations programs
1:01:14
executions detentions restrictions of movements checkpoints Relentless assaults on civilian population
1:01:21
especially in Gazza it is no accident that Gazza is the single largest Palestinian city in the world and it is
1:01:28
the city that has been attacked most brutally and most regularly and now the
1:01:33
goal of the perpetrators is to send it to dystopic
1:01:45
Oblivion I am a a clinician and as clinicians we diagnose and we look for
1:01:52
signs and symptoms and we look for prevention the failure to formally recognize the ne
1:02:00
as a genocide despite meeting all the criteria of clear intent organization
1:02:06
and preparation for genocide including arming militias with the explicit purpose of carrying out atrocities as
1:02:14
documented in Declassified Israeli archives has allowed the perpetrators to
1:02:20
commit genocidal acts with impunity the nakba brutal reality
1:02:26
of more than 15,000 Palestinian killed Mass expulsions rape and massacres
1:02:32
qualifies as a category 7 on the TMK genocide scale this failure to
1:02:39
acknowledge and the International Community complicity in legitimizing
1:02:44
these crimes empowered the perpetrators to continue heinous acts
1:02:50
unchecked rather than facing accountability for the gravest of crimes
1:02:56
in the contrary the International Community rewarded the perpetrators by recognizing their state and continued to
1:03:03
offer multiple failed attempts at peace despite them not abiding by un1 1811 94
1:03:12
that they agreed to as preconditions for such recognition in the duty to prevent and
1:03:19
protect against genocide the reclassification of the nak as genocide
1:03:24
stands as a critical step in fortifying the legal case of the South Africa case
1:03:30
against Israel at the international court of justice and ensuring that the perpetrators of are finally held to
1:03:37
account for their crimes with the urgent need for justice and accountability immediate and
1:03:42
decisive action must be taken to rectify the historical injustices of the ne and
1:03:47
bring to an end an end to the cycle of genocidal violence in the
1:03:53
region we demand the esta lishment of an independent legal investigative body
1:03:59
sanctioned by the United Nations to thoroughly reassess and examine NE as
1:04:04
genocide without reservations I am one of many
1:04:11
Palestinians before me who stood here in different spaces at the United Nation demanding our inalienable rights our
1:04:20
message we all know our rights and we will not Tire of demanding them or
1:04:25
pursuing them doctors against genocide is the brainchild of the Palestinian
1:04:31
Sons and Daughters of the neck B survivors those born after the ne are
1:04:37
committed to Justice and peace for all as a pediatrician and as a as a
1:04:43
geriatric doctors Dr Jour and myself became deeply aware of the potential for
1:04:50
Perpetual genocide against our people we participated in a group in
1:04:57
2021 with Palestinians Israelis and Internationals aiming for a peaceful resolution in
1:05:03
Palestine the discussions revealed a stark denial of Palestinian rights as a
1:05:09
condition for peace from the Israeli side proposals like a two-state solution
1:05:15
faced opposition with Israeli concerns about security and their view of any and
1:05:20
all Palestinians as security threats or demographic threats
1:05:26
they demanded re-education of the Palestinians and constant reassurance of
1:05:32
permanent security from us while our people are the ones violated violently
1:05:38
abused and marginalized our severe lack of security
1:05:43
was an nonissue some stated that the illegal settlements were needed for
1:05:50
their Israeli Security in our efforts to raise
1:05:56
awareness about genocide risks in the West Bank we planned a workshop on genocide prevention for October
1:06:04
2023 the importance of our work was minimized and the workshop was barely
1:06:09
mentioned during a dinner at a conference which was later cancelled due to resistance to including Palestinian
1:06:16
perspective naming our organization doctors against genocide faced skepticism especially given our
1:06:23
Palestinian identity itics doubted the success of the organization but we
1:06:28
persisted driven by the need to educate and unify the medical community against human rights abuses doctors again
1:06:36
genocide due to the persistent of its Founders was ultimately launched successfully receiving strong support
1:06:43
from medical professionals globally and adopting never again for everyone as our
1:06:49
guiding principle and advocating for Universal values across all communities
1:06:56
we are now using our skills as medical community in accordance with our moral
1:07:02
obligation we are Guided by the principle of our vocation in holding life and health sacred for All Humans
1:07:10
regardless of origin ethnicity race gender religion politics or sexual
1:07:16
orientation our mission goes beyond the mere treatment of physical wounds as a
1:07:23
medical community it involves address addressing deep systematic injustices that prevent healing and prevent peace
1:07:31
we advocate for cation of hostilities we advocate for lifting of blockades that
1:07:37
suffocate Gaza the establishment of a fair and just peace that acknowledges
1:07:42
the rights and dignities of all Palestinians we know health is
1:07:47
determined by factors that transcend a drug or a vaccine health is rooted in
1:07:54
Justice equity ACCESS food and water security education
1:08:00
and general well-being in Palestine there is everything but and any and all
1:08:07
of the above as proud Palestinians we leverage our Collective power to Define
1:08:14
our own narrative describe our own pain and heal our own wounds no Nation no
1:08:20
people no Community should ever endure what we have faced before for nak until
1:08:26
now it is our life mission to ensure that history will not judge us for our
1:08:32
failures but commend us for our resolve in correcting
1:08:37
them we see the repercussions of our inactions in the eyes of every wounded
1:08:43
child with no surviving family in gazda we know that prevention is far
1:08:49
superior to treatment these principles should not only apply to medicine but should apply
1:08:55
to human rights violations while there is no universally accepted medical definition of genocide
1:09:02
let us consider it as a systematic and intentional Campaign Of Violence destruction and Stark
1:09:08
Injustice it involves the deliberate infliction of harm that leads to severe widespread suffering and long-term
1:09:16
Health consequences least of which is death ethically the only way forward for
1:09:22
us as a medical community and as and as an International Community is to
1:09:27
advocate for prevention intervention and mitigation of such
1:09:33
atrocities stopping the genocide in Gaza requires more than acknowledgement it
1:09:38
needs immediate and effective action the strategies are clear we have to
1:09:44
recognize and prevent we have to apply pressure coupled with legal
1:09:49
accountability for the perpetrators we have to consider deployment of peacekeeping forces is
1:09:55
when necessary as all else has failed in Gaza comprehensive support for survivors
1:10:01
to Foster healing and resilience is a must in the medical community we are
1:10:07
ready to support all these efforts we raise our we raise awareness we provide
1:10:13
direct Medical Aid we advocate for policy changes we support organizations
1:10:18
striving for justice some of our own are now trapped in Rafa treating patients
1:10:24
while sleeping on the floors and unable to return to their duties and obligations in their home countries but
1:10:31
their commitment is only strengthened by the suffering of the children in Gaza we need a safe passage for them to leave
1:10:39
and for the next teams to take their place let’s ensure that our Legacy as
1:10:44
doctors Palestinians and a global Community is defined not by the
1:10:50
atrocities we failed to stop but by by the lives we choose to say we chose to
1:10:55
save and the peace we help to forge Above All We Are inspired by our
1:11:02
colleagues in Gaza in the words of Dr hamam eloh do you think I went to
1:11:09
medical school for 14 years to think about my life and not about my patients
1:11:15
and if I go who treats my patients we are not animals we have the right to
1:11:21
receive proper health care so we can’t just leave he said that in response to a
1:11:28
question about him evacuating uh the hospital uh that he was in to a safer
1:11:34
area he was killed a few weeks after he said these words in an
1:11:39
interview if I die you must live saidat
1:11:44
aluri who was also killed by Israeli bombardment we need an immediate
1:11:51
ceasefire to save the rest of Gazza and we need to to free Palestine thank you
1:11:56
very [Applause]
1:12:06
much Professor qule we thank you for this uh very insightful analysis through
1:12:12
the lens of your very specific medical expertise of the harsh reality uh lived
1:12:19
by the Palestinian people harsh reality of the trauma lived by these people and also for the strong uh lessons and
1:12:27
messages you have so clearly and convincingly expressed thank
1:12:33
you we are now going to listen to Mrs phis Bennis Mrs Bennis is a fellow at The
1:12:41
Institute for policy studies in Washington DC and there she directs the
1:12:46
new internationalism project and the and she’s also an international advisor to the Jewish
1:12:54
voice for piece a writer a political
1:12:59
commentator and a leading advocate for Palestinian rights she focuses mainly on
1:13:06
issues related to the Middle East and the United Nations Mrs benis I have the pleasure to
1:13:13
give you the floor thank you Mr chairman and thank
1:13:19
you all for participating in this I’d like to thank particularly the committee on the exercise of the the inalienable
1:13:25
rights of the Palestinian people and the division for Palestinian rights for organizing this very important
1:13:32
commemoration of the nakba even commemoration is perhaps not the right word because it implies something of the
1:13:38
past not something that continues you know we are meeting today
1:13:44
at a very strange moment of history and we are commemorating if you will a very
1:13:51
contradictory reality 1948 saw the birth of the universal
1:13:57
Declaration of Human Rights and the birth of the convention against
1:14:02
genocide it could have set the stage for an era of human rights in the postor War
1:14:09
II era but 1948 was also the year that gave
1:14:14
rise to apartheid in South Africa and to the neba in
1:14:19
Palestine and instead of an era of Human Rights we saw a continuation of the era
1:14:27
of settler colonialism knowing that settler colonialism even though it was
1:14:33
under attack it was being ended in so much of the world through Brave
1:14:38
struggles across Africa the Middle East Asia Latin America in this case settler
1:14:45
colonialism was not over and the NECA of 1948 transformed Palestine it pal it
1:14:53
transformed Palestinian history and it Consolidated one of the last
1:14:58
colonial projects in the era of decolonization both South African
1:15:04
apartheid and the NECA in Palestine were enabled by Western Colonial and Imperial
1:15:12
interests South Africa and Namibia are now free playing an extraordinary role
1:15:18
in the world and now the United States unlike the earliest stages of the neba but now
1:15:25
for sure the US is the main enabler of the current version of the NECA which is
1:15:32
underway particularly what we see in the genocide in Gaza which is funded and
1:15:40
armed by the United States arming genocide through its provision of
1:15:47
military aid transfer of weapons and the provision of absolute impunity to the
1:15:54
Israeli state for its violations of international law international humanitarian law and the human rights of
1:16:01
the population we have already seen in this escalation of the nakba we have seen
1:16:10
three times as many people killed in Gaza in a very small piece of historic
1:16:15
Palestine than were killed during the original nakba in
1:16:21
1948 36,000 people known to to be killed tens of thousands probably more
1:16:28
buried under the rubble 15,000 were killed in the period of the nakba in
1:16:34
1948 500 Villages were destroyed in the nakba in 1948 in Gaza we have already
1:16:41
seen the destruction of six major cities eight major refugee camps and virtually
1:16:47
the entire infrastructure of the Gaza Strip all destroyed the expulsion and
1:16:54
dispossession of 750,000 Palestinians in 1948 in the NBA
1:17:00
has now led to the expulsion and dispossession in many cases more than
1:17:06
once of 1.3 to 1.5 million of gaza’s 2.3
1:17:12
million people already and that is underway over and over again on a daily
1:17:18
basis what we see shared in the period from 1948 until 2023 and now 2024
1:17:25
is that none of this was accidental none of this was simply the unfortunate
1:17:30
result of a military battle because we see the deliberate nature of these
1:17:37
attacks we see the plan because it’s the same plan the plan for ethnic cleansing
1:17:44
for seizing the land for settling new colonies on what had been Palestinian
1:17:51
land before October 7th of 20202
1:17:57
23 the year 2023 those first eight months had already been the bloodiest
1:18:03
months across the occupied Palestinian territory since 1948 in the West Bank there was an
1:18:09
escalation of massive number of arrests of pgrs carried out by settlers in
1:18:16
Palestinian Villages against those Villages military attacks by Israeli Soldiers the death of more Palestinians
1:18:24
than any year before and in Gaza that year a new study
1:18:29
was released indicating that in the 16 years of the siege of Gaza 20% of gaza’s
1:18:39
children were already stunted by the age of two before October 7 before October 8th and
1:18:48
the period since then that has led to an absolute denial of food of water of
1:18:54
Medicine of of shelter this was under the easy version
1:18:59
of a Siege the easy blockade that lasted for 16 now 17 years and that was the
1:19:07
effect on the children of Gaza already in that entire period from 1948
1:19:14
till 2023 24 we have seen absolute impunity for
1:19:20
the Israeli State since 1967 with the creation of the so-called special
1:19:26
relationship between my government the government of the United States and the state of Israel we have
1:19:33
seen the absolute impunity guaranteed directly by the United States including
1:19:39
here in the United Nations where the US consistently uses its veto in the security Council to undermine efforts at
1:19:47
creating a ceasefire whether it was in 2006 in Israel’s war against Lebanon in
1:19:53
2008 and n in operation castled against Gaza again in Gaza in 2012 again in
1:20:01
2014 in the 55 day assault on Gaza of that year in 2018 in
1:20:08
2021 and now again the United States has said we don’t need a ceasefire
1:20:15
yet what do they mean not enough people have been killed yet not enough children have been killed yet we don’t need a
1:20:21
ceasefire yet and in the General Assembly excellencies where there is no veto let
1:20:29
us be very clear that the United States has been extraordinarily successful at
1:20:35
using bribes and threats and punishments against those countries that had the
1:20:40
tarity to stand up against us domination of this very
1:20:46
institution that’s not a new reality that’s something that goes back to the origins of the United Nations I’m sorry
1:20:52
to say there’s not time today to go through that history but it is a long-standing
1:21:00
reality in the current period in this escalation that we have seen of the
1:21:06
nakba process that has been underway the specific in intent required
1:21:13
by the convention against genocide was made very clear by Israeli officials
1:21:19
military officials political officials members of the knesset members of the government the president the Prime
1:21:25
Minister the defense minister other ministers over and over again bragging
1:21:31
Not Afraid not ashamed that they were intending to wipe
1:21:36
Gaza off the face of the Earth to bring it back to the Stone Age that they were dealing with animals
1:21:43
and not people they weren’t worried about these statements because they knew they had
1:21:49
the protection of the United States that they would never be held accountable they would not be held accountable in
1:21:55
the international Court of uh the international criminal court they would not be held accountable by the security
1:22:01
Council they would not be held accountable by the United Nations itself and they would not be held accountable
1:22:07
in the international court of justice it took the initiative of South Africa now the rainbow Nation the post-apartheid
1:22:13
nation taking that initiative to say to the world that the institutions largely
1:22:19
created in the interest of the colonial countries in the post World War II
1:22:25
moment could now themselves be claimed by the once colonized
1:22:30
countries it was a huge Victory a huge Victory even before their ruling their
1:22:36
almost unanimous ruling that the actions of
1:22:41
Israel are possibly
1:22:47
genocidal those actions were first welcomed by the president of the United States by President Biden with a bear
1:22:54
hug and with more weapons the $3.8 billion worth of weapons that the US sends to
1:23:00
Israel every year this year has skyrocketed up to17 billion dollar worth
1:23:06
of weapons the US is now more complicit in
1:23:12
this genocide than it ever has been before not only because of the weapons that it is providing to carry out the
1:23:19
genocide but because of the impunity and then the additional weapons on top of
1:23:24
that but this time there are consequences that we are seeing Israeli
1:23:31
cruelty seen across the world on our screens on our phones on our computers
1:23:37
on our tablets on our televisions heard on our radios across the world has not
1:23:42
fallen on deaf ears there is a movement that has risen across the world to say
1:23:48
no to say we demand a genocide that will last a permanent genocide
1:23:55
and in that context across the United States public opinion has dramatically
1:24:01
shifted in a way I never thought I would experience I’ve worked on this issue well let’s just say for a longer time
1:24:07
than I care to admit and I thought I would never see a a position in which a US elected
1:24:15
official would be threatened with losing their their next election because they were seen as being too supportive of
1:24:21
Israel that might happen to President Biden that’s not my choice that’s not
1:24:27
something I applaud because it’s resulting from the
1:24:32
US complicity in the death of thousands of Palestinians thousands of
1:24:38
children but what we are seeing is this incredible shift in public opinion so
1:24:44
that 80% of President Biden’s own party want an immediate
1:24:49
ceasefire right we’re not surprised to see that this movement that is not new
1:24:57
there has been a movement for Palestinian rights in the United States for decades if we look back 2025 years
1:25:04
that movement has made incredible progress at changing public opinion at changing media coverage but it’s not
1:25:11
anywhere near where it needed to be to actually result in policy shifts
1:25:17
Shifting the public opinion Shifting the media coverage is only step one it’s
1:25:23
much more difficult to change the actual policy but what
1:25:29
we’ve seen here we saw it earlier in in 20123 44% of Democrats 44% said that
1:25:38
Israel was like an apartheid state two years before that in 2021 in a poll of American Jewish voters
1:25:47
25% of Jewish voters in this country said Israel is an apartheid state and
1:25:53
38% % of young Jews not my generation the young
1:25:59
Jews said that Israel is an apartheid state so what we’re looking at now is a
1:26:05
movement that has grown from that beginning to something extraordinary that we’ve never seen with occupations
1:26:12
of the halls of Congress Jewish voice for peace the organization I am privileged to work with occupying Grand
1:26:18
Central Station the Statue of Liberty the resignation of more and more
1:26:23
administration of officials who say I cannot work for administration even when I believe in what what it is doing on so
1:26:30
many domestic issues but I cannot be part of it when it is carrying out this
1:26:35
policy towards Gaza rabbis for ceasefire came here to the United Nations they
1:26:40
prayed in the security council chambers they met with the SG on the 38th floor
1:26:45
to say we are here to support the United Nation’s efforts at creating a ceasefire
1:26:51
and we’re here to tell you that we do not stand with our government’s refusal to allow the United Nations to do its
1:26:58
job that kind of work has never been seen before the vote of uncommitted
1:27:04
across this country which is now enough to send delegates to the Democratic
1:27:10
party convention this summer to say we are going to vote
1:27:17
against the support for genocide we don’t know what we’re going to do but we are saying we cannot now vote
1:27:25
for someone we see as supporting genocide this has never happened before and then on the campuses the campuses
1:27:32
across this country 175 campuses at the last count it’s probably more because
1:27:37
it’s rising day by day where the tents are going up you know the tents were
1:27:43
first a symbol of the genocide the nakba of 1948 and now the tents have become the
1:27:50
symbol of the resistance the resistance of students around the world not only in
1:27:56
the United States across Canada in Germany in South Africa across the world
1:28:03
students are building encampments on their campuses to be part of a global
1:28:09
opposition to say we need a ceasefire now and it’s not only young Jews
1:28:14
obviously this is the Justice generation this is the the generation in my country
1:28:20
that came of age politically in the summer of 2020 with the protests against the police
1:28:26
killing of George Floyd and came to see Palestinian rights as an issue of being
1:28:33
Against Racism seeing the colonization of Palestinian land as a racist
1:28:41
occupation and that Justice generation has been pretty active lately and they
1:28:46
are changing the political character of what political leaders across this
1:28:52
country have to take into into account we have been hearing from the administration a new kind of rhetoric
1:28:58
they are hearing these demands there’s no question they are hearing it they are changing their rhetoric at the beginning
1:29:05
it was only about all we would hear is Israel has the right to self-defense Israel has the right to protect itself
1:29:12
as if that included the right to impose genocide on an entire population but now
1:29:18
we’re hearing that President Biden was brokenhearted when he heard about the world Central Kitchen humanitarian
1:29:24
workers being killed seven of them that same day his administration authorized
1:29:30
the sending of a thousand or more new bombs including the 2,000 pound bombs
1:29:36
one of which can decimate the structures and the people of an entire city block
1:29:42
so we’re hearing a shift in the language we’re not yet hearing the necessary shift in the in the policy three days
1:29:52
ago we heard about a new shipment of tank ammunition and mortar rounds
1:29:57
this is not the ceasefire that we are demanding yet the change in the rhetoric at the White House has not been
1:30:03
translated into accepting the need for a ceasefire you know it it took our
1:30:09
movement more than 20 years to normalize the understanding that apartheid was the
1:30:15
right term for describing Israeli actions in carrying out its occupations throughout the occupied
1:30:22
Palestinian territory it has taken less than three months to normalize the term
1:30:28
genocide to describe what Israel is doing across Gaza and because the
1:30:34
Israeli actions and its intentions are so clear that movement is now growing we
1:30:40
still have a huge amount of work to do we need to unite our movement with the
1:30:46
United Nations as a partner and we know that there is a huge
1:30:52
example of how to do that in the years of the 1970s and 1980s in the struggle
1:30:57
against South African apartheid where the United Nations played a huge role in helping to build the global movement
1:31:05
against aparte and in those years it was mainly in the general assembly because like now the security Council had a veto
1:31:12
and the US often Great Britain as well over and over and over again would veto
1:31:18
any resolution calling for sanctions against the apartheid regime in ptor but somehow those resolutions kept
1:31:25
getting passed in the general assembly urging member states to impose an arms
1:31:30
embargo to impose a trade embargo to stop allowing the apartheid government in South Africa from having access to
1:31:37
the global banking system and over and over again we would hear in the United States oh don’t worry it’s not binding
1:31:43
in international law but somehow country after country faced with protest after
1:31:49
protest in their own countries using the statements and the the resolutions of the general assembly
1:31:56
as evidence came to their governments and said this is your obligation and we
1:32:02
are demanding we the people of your country are demanding that you carry it out whether or not it’s legally binding
1:32:09
according to the UN Charter and what do you know one day in the 1980s enough
1:32:14
countries had done that enough allies of the United States had done that that the United States itself finally gave in and
1:32:21
the Congress passed a resolution calling for sanctions against apartheid South Africa and yes then President Reagan
1:32:28
vetoed the resolution but that veto was overturned by the Congress that’s what
1:32:33
we need to do South Africa showed us the way with its recent initiative in the international court of justice
1:32:40
challenging the US guarantee of impunity for Israel the icj ruling is now a tool
1:32:47
of global Civil Society to hold up to our governments demanding that your
1:32:53
governments Excell icies the governments that all of you represent who now have this obligation most of your governments
1:33:00
are signatories are State parties of the genocide convention and unlike most
1:33:05
conventions the genocide conventions puts obligations on every state party
1:33:11
not only on the country being accused of violating the terms but on every country
1:33:17
that is a state’s party to the genocide convention there is the obligation to
1:33:22
work to prevent genocide and if a genocide occurs to do everything in your power to stop it you have the model in
1:33:30
the resolutions that were pass and how they were implemented during the years of struggle against South African
1:33:37
apartheid it’s your opportunity to be on the right side of History the committee
1:33:43
can take the lead to with Palestinian and Global Civil Society to bring the UN
1:33:50
as a whole back to doing what the charter says it was created to do to
1:33:55
stop the scourge of war and doesn’t that have to also mean to stop the scourge of
1:34:02
genocide even when that genocide is being enabled by the most powerful member state of this
1:34:09
organization we have a lot of work to do we start with the demand for an immediate and Lasting ceasefire and we
1:34:16
move on from there we have a lot of work to do thank you [Applause]
1:34:28
Mrs Bennis we are once again honored to have you with us I would like to seee
1:34:33
this opportunity to really thank you for your principal stances on the question
1:34:38
of Palestine we appreciate uh the perspective and the very passionate views you have shared on the question of
1:34:46
Palestine as uh perceived uh by uh large
1:34:52
sections here of in the US by the administration and uh by Society at large and I paid attention to what
1:34:59
you said about uh the Justice uh justice generation and we thank you for your
1:35:06
encouragements also for your recommendations and I’m sure what you have said has not fallen in in defair so
1:35:13
thank you so very much uh for also being a very uh constructive and longstanding
1:35:20
partner of the committee
1:35:25
we have listened to all our distinguished panelists whom I thank for the pertinent
1:35:32
statements I would like to request those who are going to take the floor if they have a written statement to send it to
1:35:39
uh uh to the e e the E statement yeah to send the E statement uh to the
1:35:47
dgacm I think you know how to proceed with that you are used to it so I’m going to open the floor uh to uh those
1:35:55
member states who want to take the floor and for the time being on my list for
1:36:01
member states I have Malaysia Sri Lanka Mor Morocco Jordan
1:36:09
Libya and then I have a a an NGO called
1:36:14
Ido but I will start with Malaysia Malaysia you have the floor
1:36:30
uh thank you Mr chair and I would like to I’m just taking the mic to say thank
1:36:36
you to the panelists for sharing their thoughts and their insights on the issue
1:36:44
uh there are some points there for us to ponder and I like to thank uh the
1:36:50
organizer for organizing today’s event thank you very
1:36:59
much no
1:37:10
not Malaysia
1:37:22
please thank you very very much sh but I already made my remarks thank you
1:37:27
thanks sorry for not pay paying attention I will get the gist of what you have said with my Secretariat I was
1:37:33
conferring with uh uh Minister Mansour Minister Mansour was was supposed to make concluding remarks but he has now
1:37:40
an engagement and I would like to give him the floor so far to comment on what
1:37:46
he has just heard and then uh we’ll be able to proceed and after I give the
1:37:52
floor to Sri Lanka Minister mans do you want to say something thank you Mr chairman I just
1:37:58
want uh to uh say again know how grateful we are for
1:38:05
organizing uh this uh event to the committee to you Mr chairman to the
1:38:11
division and to all to our distinguished uh panelist who gave us uh very inspiring
1:38:20
statements and assessments about uh the global picture uh which uh is creating a new
1:38:29
condition that did not exist in the history of the Palestine question in the
1:38:35
United States for for example and at at the global level which uh again it
1:38:42
complement the steadfastness and the struggle of the Palestinian people and the massive support in the United
1:38:49
Nations that should uh create the condition for putting us on the fast track on the
1:38:56
attainment of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people ending occupation
1:39:02
self-determination statehood and the right of the refugees uh as you remember last year it
1:39:10
was different conditions somehow uh we succeeded in having a
1:39:15
resolution in the general assembly uh commemorating the nakba
1:39:21
which is acknowledgment finally after 75 years of the fact that
1:39:27
there is an akba that has been inflicted upon the Palestinian people and the
1:39:32
United Nation is recognizing it and we had special events last year covering
1:39:39
you know a high level event of statements from heads of states and
1:39:45
governments to a massive cultural performance in the general assembly in
1:39:52
which we were really uh lucky to be able to assemble a number
1:39:58
of Palestinian musicians with American musicians and others and they displayed
1:40:05
to us the story of the nakba of the Palestinian people in four movements one
1:40:12
our life before the nakba then the life during the nakba then the aftermath of
1:40:18
the horror of the nakba what it did and then the final movement of the resiliency of the Palestinian people and
1:40:26
that and their determination to continue the struggle for the attainment of their inalienable
1:40:32
rights uh we wanted really to have that symphonic performance to tour the globe
1:40:40
to tell also our story not only in uh in giving speeches and statement and
1:40:48
excellent ones but also to give to tell our story in a cultural performance at
1:40:55
its excellent level through the performance of that nakba Symphony I
1:41:01
believe that that opportunity is still available and I urge uh those countries
1:41:07
that are interested in Reviving that effort and inviting it to perform in
1:41:13
their countries uh to tell our story in a cultural form to do so uh let me
1:41:20
conclude Mr chairman because I have to run to an engagement it is you know a TV
1:41:26
uh interview with BBC in their studio and you know how these stations you have
1:41:32
to be there at a very precise time because it’s a a live show I would I
1:41:38
would have led to stay longer with you but I have certain obligations and
1:41:44
responsibilities and I need to reach the largest number of audience as possible we are grateful for all those who are
1:41:51
watching us including in Palestine and in all corners of the globe I am delighted that many of my colleagues
1:41:58
ambassadors and diplomats uh attended this event uh of course influenced by
1:42:05
the tragedy of what is really happening to us in the Gaza Strip in particular
1:42:10
but also with the promises and the inspiration and admiration of the
1:42:16
heroism of the Palestinian people and their supporters uh everywhere uh I want
1:42:21
to thank you again for for being with us staying these two hours with us and uh
1:42:28
uh we need we we still have many things to do at the UN whether in the general assembly or in the security Council we
1:42:35
will not rest for a moment until we succeed in having an immediate ceasefire
1:42:41
to save lives to provide our people in the Gaza Strip with all the humanitarian
1:42:46
needs that they need and to to oppose and stop the crime against humanity or
1:42:53
the mass transfer whether inside Gaza or outside Gaza and for sure to succeed in
1:42:59
not allowing the fascist in the Israeli government and the government of Israel
1:43:05
to storm Rafa we need to stop them from doing so we need to succeed in having an
1:43:12
immediate ceasefire and in this connection we totally support the courageous position of Secretary General
1:43:19
Antonio guz who stated early on in this
1:43:24
uh aggression against our people when he kept repeating a humanitarian immediate
1:43:30
ceasefire and that has been the official position of the UN Secretariat and
1:43:36
everyone else since that time we need collectively to succeed in stopping this
1:43:42
aggression against our people in the Gaza Strip and to succeed in having a ceasefire Mr chairman my twin brother I
1:43:50
want to thank you again and all of my colleagues all those who are watching us
1:43:55
uh to to to live with us these painful moment but also to be inspired by the
1:44:03
resiliency of the Palestinian people to continue the struggle and as they as they say in Spanish the luchas
1:44:10
continuous as you know my colleague from Kuba
1:44:15
and necar tell me all the time thank you very much and by the way there are two
1:44:20
Vice chairs of the committee thank you Mr chairman thank you thank you uh Minister mansu for your
1:44:29
intervention uh I must uh precise here that the countries are indicated as
1:44:34
being part of the list of speakers uh that list was created by a glitch so that list is not valid so I
1:44:41
have an updated list and my list is composed of Pakistan turkey Indonesia
1:44:48
China and in the league of Arab states so we’ll start with Pakistan
1:44:59
thank you very much Mr chairman thank you for your remarks and to his Excellency Minister Riyad manzur the
1:45:06
permanent representative of the State of Palestine for his insightful comments we
1:45:11
would like to pay special gratitude to the distinguished panelists for their
1:45:17
very moving and very insightful and thought provoking statements on the solom occasion of the
1:45:23
nakba day I on behalf of the people and the government of Pakistan extend our
1:45:30
deepest solidarity and support to our Palestinian brothers and sisters we
1:45:35
empathize with them and feel their profound pain of displacement and of the
1:45:40
oppression that they endure over the past seven decades the Palestinian
1:45:46
people have not only been denied their inalienable right to self-determination
1:45:51
with Millions expelled from their homelands but they have also been subjected to a prolonged and brutal
1:45:58
foreign occupation for the past 57 years Pakistan strongly condemns Israel’s
1:46:05
latest and most brutal war against the Palestinian people in Gaza and the large
1:46:10
scale displacement of an already occupied and battered people the international court of justice has
1:46:17
called this plausible genocide Pakistan reiterates its call
1:46:22
for an immediate unconditional and sustainable ceasefire in Gaza
1:46:27
unrestricted humanitarian supplies to the besieged people and holding Israel
1:46:33
Accord accountable for its grave crimes we reaffirm our solidarity with
1:46:39
the brave people of Palestine and call for the establishment of a viable
1:46:44
independent and contiguous state of Palestine on the basis of internationally agreed parameters of the
1:46:51
pre-1967 borders with Al Al Sharif as its capital I thank you very
1:46:57
much thank you very much uh Pakistan for your intervention uh the next on my list
1:47:04
uh is uh Indonesia but I would like to uh ask for his Indulgence and
1:47:09
understanding because China has to leave the room and attend urgent meeting so with your permission I’ll give the floor
1:47:15
to China China you have the floor
1:47:25
president I thank the committee on the exercise of the inable rights of the Palestinian people for organizing
1:47:30
today’s commemoration and thank the scholars for sharing their insight and their moving statement 76 years ago when
1:47:38
the first Middle East war broke out a large number of Palestinians lost their homes and the Palestinian people have
1:47:44
since embarked on the uous path of fighting for their legitimate rights for decades the Palestinian people have
1:47:51
suffered from war conflict fcts occupation and blockade to this day the
1:47:57
historical Injustice suffered by the Palestinian people have not being rectified but rather
1:48:04
exacerbated more than 7 months after the outbreak of the current rounds of the Gaza conflict the fighting has claimed
1:48:10
more than 35,000 innocent lives and brought Untold sufferings to the people of Gaza leaving behind nothing but wage
1:48:18
and Devastation at present millions of people uh in Gaza are trapped in an
1:48:24
unprecedented humanitarian disaster while Israel is still pushing ahead with its largescale military attack on Rafa
1:48:32
China urges Israel to heed the strong voices of the International Community effectively implement the security
1:48:38
Council and the g resolutions and immediately seize all SE military
1:48:44
actions Israel as the occupying power must fulfill its obligations under International humanitarian law
1:48:50
guaranteeing access to humanitarian supplies into Gaza and provide security
1:48:57
guarantees colleagues the current round of the conflict has served as an extremely tragic warning to the
1:49:03
International Community it can no longer avoid the long-cherished dreams of an independent state of Palestine or to
1:49:09
perpetuate the historic Injustice suffered by the Palestinian people China’s president Xi Jinping has
1:49:14
repeatedly expounded China’s position and ideas on the settlement of the Palestinian issue emphasizing that our
1:49:20
fundamental way out lies in the establish M of an independent state of Palestine based on the 1967 borders with
1:49:27
East Jerusalem at its capital and enjoyment of full sov as a permanent member of the
1:49:33
security Council China will continue to work tirelessly with all peace loving countries to advance implementation of
1:49:40
this two-state solution with the aim to bring an early end to the occupation and to realize a comprehensive just and
1:49:46
long-lasting solution to the question of Palestinian so the N KN day will forever
1:49:52
remain history thank you president I thank the distinguish of
1:49:57
China now I give the floor to
1:50:04
Indonesia thank you very much Mr chair and I also thank uh the division for Palestinian rights for uh your hard work
1:50:12
in putting together uh today’s solom commemoration of the nakba and I also wish to most sincerely thank all the
1:50:20
panelists for uh your strong and insightful uh presentations uh it is truly regrettable
1:50:27
that 76 years on the question of the Palestinian refugees remain unresolved
1:50:33
and we even see now growing resistance to recognizing their basic rights and
1:50:39
their rights of return as exemplified among others with the massive push back and negative narratives against unra we
1:50:47
must not forget that the resolution of the Palestinian refugee status is linked
1:50:52
to the political resolution of the Israel Palestinian conflict and therefore we must continue to voice that
1:50:59
uh as you also recall just recently the general assembly through an emergency special session granted Palestine an
1:51:06
enhanced right of participation this is indeed a breakthrough and we must avoid
1:51:12
business as usual uh in addressing the issue of Palestine in this connection I
1:51:17
have a question for the panelists historical injustices and cultural identity
1:51:23
are important pillars to recognize the continuing plight of the Palestinian refugees am missst many attempts to
1:51:30
ignore the historical narratives and disconnect the Palestinian refugees from their inherent and inalienable rights
1:51:38
what can we do to safeguard their rights in order to Galvanize stronger support for the Palestinian refugees and the
1:51:44
Palestinian statehood thank you I thank the ambassador of uh
1:51:51
Indonesia I give the floor to Teya who will be followed by the league of Arab
1:51:57
states South Africa and Algeria T
1:52:02
here thank you Mr chair we thank the panelists for their powerful statements
1:52:08
this anniversary is an important occasion to highlight that uh the universal goals of justice and peace and
1:52:17
the right to life and dignity it is an occasion to rec recognize the reality
1:52:24
and the history of Palestinian people’s continuing plight and more importantly
1:52:30
to display our solidarity our determination to ensure the Fulfillment
1:52:36
of their inable rights Mr chair it is indeed a dark time for international
1:52:43
Justice and international law as you have rightfully stated a dark time in
1:52:48
which suffering of Palestinians continue before our our eyes in unprecedented
1:52:54
levels yet this only reinforces the determination of the International
1:53:00
Community to end the injustices and to remain on the right side of history in
1:53:07
this respect we are proud to have supported the UN General Assembly resolution to expand palestine’s rights
1:53:15
and privileges at the UN the resolution reaffirms the strong support of the
1:53:21
overwhelming Ma majority of the International Community for the right of the Palestinian people to a state of
1:53:29
their own we reiterate our calls for an immediate ceasefire and concrete steps
1:53:35
for recognition of Palestine as a full UN member Palestine deserves to be a full
1:53:42
member of the UN to be treated as an equal member of the International
1:53:48
Community as a member of of this uh important community and committee turkey
1:53:56
will work towards realizing the rights of the Palestinians and a political solution
1:54:02
based on the two-state vision I thank you Mr chair I thank tury I now give the floor
1:54:10
to ambassador abdalaziz of the league of Arab states you have the
1:54:20
floor thank you chair and thank you for organizing this important meeting we
1:54:25
would like to thank all of the speakers that have enriched our knowledge of the NABA I think that our primary Mission
1:54:32
currently is to prevent uh the new
1:54:41
NABA which aims to displace Palestinians out of Kaza into countries in the
1:54:47
region to do that we need to explore
1:54:53
mechanisms that can prevent it I would like to thank all of those
1:55:00
that voted for the admission of Palestine as a fully-fledged member of the United Nations the 143 states that
1:55:08
voted in favor of that draft resolution I call upon those countries
1:55:14
that abstained and that voted against or that did not uh vote to revisit their
1:55:22
POS positions particularly since the number of states that recognizes Palestine as a state has reached 144
1:55:30
States due inter Alia to the efforts of this Committee in Latin America in the
1:55:36
Caribbean region 33 States currently recognize
1:55:43
Palestine in that region and a state that is on the brink
1:55:49
of becoming a non-permanent member of the Security Council will probably join those
1:55:56
ranks and in that regard I would like to congratulate you Mr chairman for your efforts we would also like to thank all
1:56:03
of those who stood up in the
1:56:09
historic case at the icj we commend South Africa in
1:56:17
particular recently Libya and the Arab Republic of Egypt joined those
1:56:23
eff as well as the case before the international criminal
1:56:37
court calling for accountability for crimes against
1:56:42
humanity since the events of the 7th of
1:56:48
October we need to act in three areas firstly increasing the number of states
1:56:55
that recognize Palestine the state of Palestine secondly the honest
1:57:03
implementation of the resolutions of the security Council including the most
1:57:09
recent one 2728 that mentions a
1:57:14
ceasefire pushing Israel towards a ceasefire the occupying power towards a
1:57:19
ceasefire allowing the entrance of humanitarian Aid to stop using hunger as a weapon of
1:57:26
war or as a weapon to push Palestinians into Exodus an exodus that will be called
1:57:36
voluntary because of a lack of food or a lack of
1:57:45
medicines at the same time trying to create a situation where
1:57:51
there is no distinction between voluntary Exodus from Forced
1:57:58
Exodus we must strengthen Ana and create genuine peace
1:58:06
prospects through the holding of a conference as soon as
1:58:12
possible as president Mahmud abas has been calling for since at least 2016 the work in Manama in Bahrain has
1:58:19
just been concluded many documents have emerged from that Summit they will be submitted
1:58:27
to this committee we witnessed an excellent
1:58:32
statement by the Secretary General of the United Nations at the Arab Summit where he reiterated his extremely
1:58:39
firm position that he has occupied since the beginning of this conflict and here I would like to commend the Secretary
1:58:46
General and all Secretariat officials for these very honorable positions of
1:58:51
the United Nations the United Nations remains
1:58:57
alongside us along standing by our side until Palestine becomes a state with
1:59:02
Easter islamist capital thank you chair abdulaziz of the league of Arab states I
1:59:08
have two member states remaining on my list but I would like to inform for those members of the public in the
1:59:14
gallery that there is an opportunity for you to ask questions or make short
1:59:19
comments there is a microphone in the second last row of the wooden section
1:59:25
which is available for you and uh Security will be uh available uh to help
1:59:30
you reach it so let me move uh with the next speaker I give the floor to my
1:59:38
sister and friend mathu from South Africa Ambassador you have the floor thank
1:59:44
you thank you very much my brother Ambassador Nang and to the committee also for
1:59:51
organizing this commemoration of the nagba but I also truly want to thank the
1:59:59
speakers for sharing their insights their wisdom and their experiences with
2:00:05
us this morning and we commend the courage of their
2:00:12
convictions it is with the heaviest heart that South Africa has had to Mark nagba Day this year by having to return
2:00:20
to the icj yesterday to plea for the court to stop the
2:00:26
genocide which is knocking Gaza off the map and has shocked the conss of
2:00:33
humanity since the icj first ordered Israel to implement measures to prevent
2:00:39
genocidal act in February in January and in March Israel
2:00:47
has willfully continued its genocide aace and has just reached
2:00:52
a new horrific stage instead of complying with this courts decisions of January February and
2:00:59
March Israel has defied the court by trapping besieging and bombarding an
2:01:06
overcrowded Rafa exacerbating the security and the safety of of 1.5
2:01:14
million highly vulnerable Palestinians it has become increasingly
2:01:20
clear that Israel’s action in Rafa are part of the end game in which Gaza is
2:01:27
utterly destroyed and we’ve heard from our panelist this morning about this
2:01:34
plan the fact that Israel pushed more than 1 million Palestinians into Rafa
2:01:41
under the pretense of ensuring their safety and then carried out a full scale
2:01:47
bombardment of the province all while sealing It Off from
2:01:52
and exposing it to Fair mine is evidence of its genocidal
2:01:59
intent the evacuation zones that Israel has ordered to the people to go to are
2:02:07
basically the extermination zones Rafa is the last stage of the
2:02:14
total inhalation of Palestinian life without
2:02:19
Rafa the possibility to rebuild and reconstruct Palestinian life will be
2:02:25
lost forever South Africa is calling for an immediate
2:02:31
ceasefire and we did such yesterday at the
2:02:36
icj we also appreciate member states that are joining the case at the icj for
2:02:42
the Merit stage and will’ll appreciate and welcome more of member states to join us
2:02:52
and we thank you all for your support for your worth of
2:02:58
encouragement and we’ve had it also for the panel members this morning and it is
2:03:03
most deeply appreciated by the state of South Africa I thank
2:03:11
you thank you very much uh my dear sister matthu I would like to see this
2:03:16
opportunity to really thank uh South Africa and say how much you have made us proud of uh in uh taking that very
2:03:24
significant initiative to bring the question of Palestine uh before the icj
2:03:30
I think your courageous and principal action action underscore South Africa’s unwavering compliment to justice so we
2:03:37
are looking forward to positive developments following your very important initiative now I give the
2:03:43
floor to the last speaker okay you are no longer speaking thank you very much
2:03:48
okay now let’s move to uh any other the member uh of the public we have one who
2:03:55
I can see one maybe you can you can speak right away I can see your light
2:04:00
okay thank you uh thank you chair I’m David Wildman
2:04:06
uh with Global Ministries of the United Methodist Church and I’m also co-chair of the NGO working group on Israel Palestine and want to thank all the
2:04:12
panelists today um given the urgency that everyone has recognized in terms of
2:04:18
genocide right now and this uh continuing for not 7 months but over 76
2:04:24
years um I’d like to ask the committee and also the panelists for your comments on three things the urgent need for an
2:04:31
arms embargo the uh Human Rights Council adopted a resolution at the end of April
2:04:37
uh calling for an immediate end all member states to immediately end all sales and transfers and purchases of
2:04:45
arms relating to Israel and so I’d like some comments on that the second is that
2:04:50
banking sanctions were something that was very powerful uh being used in the anti-apartheid struggle which the UN
2:04:56
played a significant role in in relation to South Africa and our our colleagues from South Africa just have been taking
2:05:02
the lead here um what steps can uh be taken by the committee and the UN to
2:05:08
call for banking sanctions and the third is that given the lack of compliance uh
2:05:13
that we’ve seen just recently in international court of justice I’m wondering what the committee can do in
2:05:19
adopting a resolution here at the general assembly mandating that member states report on their steps to enforce
2:05:26
compliance of the icj rulings given the urgency of preventing genocide thank
2:05:32
you thank you very much is there anyone who want to take the
2:05:38
floor okay I can see you please press the button and then you can speak right away
2:06:08
yes yeah with the help of the Almighty I pray to the almighty to bestow upon me
2:06:13
his truth is wisdom that I may convey his message and so sanctify his name uh
2:06:19
we are here a delegation of rabbis uh some who are originally from
2:06:24
Palestine from Palestine many generations and uh I um from survivors
2:06:31
from the Holocaust from Europe from Poland and Hungary basically we are
2:06:36
coming here because we are Jews and as Jews we are suffering with the people of
2:06:44
Gaza with the people of Palestine uh the it’s an unjustice that
2:06:51
76 years ago a uh the United Nations
2:06:57
that was created to bring peace to the world ratified a creation of a state that was called the
2:07:06
state of Israel uh a Jewish State they refer to it meaning that it it’s
2:07:12
symbolic and that it represents Judaism as the religion of Judaism which that’s all Jew Jewish
2:07:19
State could possibly mean and in therefore they are uh automatically
2:07:27
subjugating the other PE uh inhabitants of the land the Muslims and the Christians that will be second class
2:07:34
citizens the Jewish community that was living there for hundreds of years was not accepting of this concept at all
2:07:42
because Judaism is simply a religion of 3,000 years to be subservient to God to
2:07:47
serve God and we’re even ironically forbidden since the destruction of the temple 2,000 years ago to create a
2:07:55
Jewish sovereignty even one centimeter or inch of Jewish sovereignty around the world and that was respected by the Jews
2:08:02
who practiced the religion and gave their lives for the religion for these 2,000 years of our Exile certainly not
2:08:08
by occupying another people or taking the land of another people certainly not of a people that was so friendly to the
2:08:15
Jews embraced us through our hundreds of years when there was the existence of Islam and when we were being uh uh
2:08:23
oppressed uh by the in Europe uh and tried to forcibly being converted into
2:08:30
Christianity was the Muslim and Arab countries that embraced us and we flourished amongst them without any
2:08:35
human rights groups or United Nations to protect us so it’s simply nothing to do
2:08:40
with a religious conflict Jews were always able to live amongst Arabs and Muslims and Judaism is is nothing to do
2:08:49
with a creation of a nationalist home simply it was a group of nationalists
2:08:54
100 odd years ago who used the facade of My Religion Judaism the religion that my
2:09:00
grandparents died in owitz with for and they’re using this religion in uh as a
2:09:07
stick as uh to uh to stifle to intimidate the people who are opposing
2:09:14
the stealing of the homes of the people of Palestine and when anybody dares to speak up they accuse them of being anti
2:09:21
Semitic that’s not totally not true it’s it’s really revolting and uh to to hear
2:09:26
that people who are so friendly to the Jews we lived together for hundreds and hundreds of years in peace and Harmony
2:09:32
and to accuse them these people who embraced us and gave us a new life for
2:09:38
hundreds of years to accuse these people of being haters of Jews because of our religion that is unacceptable and it’s
2:09:46
and it’s ungodly it’s not Jewish basically this concept when they just as
2:09:52
South Africa as an apartheid state even though it was accepted in this in this
2:09:57
uh distinguished United Nations that was created to bring peace to the world made a big mistake because everybody today
2:10:03
will admit that although it was tens of years that South Africa as an apartheid
2:10:09
state was accepted that was a flawed and terrible mistake of the world and today nobody will accept such a thing and the
2:10:16
ones who opposed them were called terrorists as Nelson Mandela 27 years in prison was called the terrorist it’s the
2:10:22
same thing is with Israel the yes United Nations did accept it they did ratify
2:10:27
the state but that even though it’s a distinguished body of the United Nations that does not legitimize when a group of
2:10:35
people come along and take the land away from another people and especially when they’re doing it in the name of a
2:10:42
religion of that 3,000 years that expressly States we are forbidden to have a land we are forbidden to steal
2:10:48
and with to show gratitude to gantas therefore we as Jews around the world who are true to our religion will never
2:10:56
will never accept this transformation of My Religion into this nationalism we
2:11:01
will never accept the uh uh oppression of the people of Palestine we cry and
2:11:06
hurt with the people of Gaza every single one who are dying and suffering
2:11:12
in Gaza is is is blood on our hearts we feel un hurt with them especially us
2:11:18
who’ve gone through Hitler and the Nazis we feel we hurt and we want the world to
2:11:23
know that one day as the almighty writes in his Torah that it says why are you
2:11:29
rebelling against me it will not be successful this occupation just as a partite ended this will totally end with
2:11:37
a God help a speedy and peaceful total removal of the occupation so that there
2:11:42
could be a free Palestine we can live in Freedom we can live together and serve God together in Freedom this is truth
2:11:50
this is Judaism and this inshah we hope to see soon noway of free Palestine
2:11:55
thank you very
2:12:03
much thank you very much sir for your positive message I don’t know whether there is anyone else wanting to take the
2:12:11
floor changing the same place sitting there okay there’s someone yes okay
2:12:17
please press the button and then you can you can speak thank you what number one can you hear
2:12:29
me wh there we go okay um thank you so
2:12:35
much for allowing uh the community to speak as well and
2:12:40
for hosting this and for allowing us to be here I am Lauren cyle I am Zena zam’s
2:12:47
niece my family uh lived in Palestine for 300 years um
2:12:55
my grandparents left in 48 with my father who was to and um I have been trying to be very
2:13:05
very active as active as I can with uh small businesses to take care of as well
2:13:10
and children to raise and um what I wanted to put out there for the
2:13:15
panelists is the following my entire feed on social media and everything that
2:13:22
I take in every day is about Gaza and activism and I saw yesterday
2:13:28
posts about what Israel is planning for the future of Gaza and for the
2:13:34
land and I would like to I think we need as activists to start putting out in the
2:13:41
world the discourse of who is go who is
2:13:46
going to lead Palestine who are the Palestinians that will lead Palestine uh after this ceasefire
2:13:53
this this it will end the violence will end and I think we need need to start
2:13:59
putting out there what the future looks like for Palestinians um and that I think has to
2:14:06
come from the diaspora rather than coming from Israel or its complicit United States um if you
2:14:15
all have ideas of what that’s going to look like or who’s handling that already I
2:14:21
think the world should know thank you thank you very much
2:14:27
ma’am I think uh okay we have another speaker please go
2:14:34
ahead do you hear me do you hear me asalam alaykum my name is Dr nidal
2:14:41
Jabor I’m a Palestinian doctor I’m here with my friend Dr Karam hawash she’s a
2:14:47
co-founder we are both co-founders of doctors against genocide so thank you for inviting us and giving us the
2:14:54
opportunity uh my question uh starts with the fact that uh I think the
2:15:00
International Community and the International System have failed the Palestinian people for the last 100
2:15:05
years it failed to recognize the nakba as such which was a crime of genocide
2:15:11
the reason we are going through a genocide now the Palestinian people the reason we have been going through a genocide for the last 100 years is
2:15:17
because the International Community never addressed the original
2:15:22
sin especially after the declassification of the Israeli archives we have ample evidence for a full intent
2:15:31
of genocide from all the Zionist leaders and the uh Israeli government officials
2:15:38
from Boran and all of them we have ample evidence that there was sufficient
2:15:44
organization and preparation for the genocide at least 10 years before 48 the
2:15:51
happened in 48 which is the same month that the United Nation recognized
2:15:57
genocide as an international crime but the world chose to turn a blind eye and
2:16:04
let it go because of the guilt regarding the Holocaust and the Palestinians have
2:16:10
to pay the price for all of this the only reason we are going through a genocide now is because the first
2:16:17
genocide has never been addressed if you go and study the the akba and many scholars did study the nakba and decided
2:16:24
that it was a genocide and actually it is category 7 genocide which is the
2:16:29
second highest on the scale of genocide and there is enough research and study
2:16:34
to prove that uh what’s going on in Gaza now is category 8 and instead of holding
2:16:41
the perpetrators accountable for their crime for their genocide the International Community recognized
2:16:46
Israel as a state rewarded them with multiple multiple failed attempts at
2:16:51
peace we know that genocide perpetrators never accept peace there you cannot make
2:16:59
peace with genocide perpetrators because they are not in this for peace they are in this for complete annihilation of the
2:17:06
native people my question is what does it take for the United Nations International Community now
2:17:12
to uh create a special body and an independent investigation team to
2:17:19
restudy the RBA reclassify theba as an act of genocide to uh put things uh
2:17:26
where they’re supposed to be to hold the perpetrators accountable and to strengthen the case of the genocide at
2:17:35
the icj now thank you thank you very much sir next
2:17:46
speaker good afternoon thank you very much to the committee as especially also to the division for Palestinian rights
2:17:54
my name is Joseph Cornelius donelly I have served here at the UN as an osak
2:17:59
representative for the last 25 years the first time I spoke in this building was
2:18:05
35 years ago during a session of the csw on Refugee women and children and during
2:18:12
that session there was incredible beautiful conversation about needs and hopes but the word Palestine and the
2:18:20
Palestinian children and refugees women was never mentioned and my voice was
2:18:25
suppressed until one woman from India said may we recognize the man whose hand
2:18:31
has been up for an hour and that’s when I began to get the courage to say speak up and sometimes maybe be respectful but
2:18:38
shout out loud and say what we know to be the truth so I’m here to say today to
2:18:44
say having spoken to Jerusalem hia and Gaza this morning morning before
2:18:51
coming here there are there are so many words we’ve heard especially during
2:18:56
these seven months the word we don’t hear and we need to say to the world and
2:19:02
underscore it’s evil it’s obscene and it’s immoral and
2:19:08
we need to bring a vocabulary of peace and Justice that confronts people’s
2:19:14
complacency and comfort and speak like that boy who says to his mother write my
2:19:20
name on your on your legs hear it as our poet here today said to us so memorably
2:19:28
thank you very much for this ex extremely moving panel today thank
2:19:36
you thank you very much sir for your intervention I think that was the last
2:19:43
uh speaker from the general public and I think we are now going to conclude very
2:19:49
soon uh uh questions have been raised some
2:19:55
questions have been leveled to the committee on that I would like just to comment that uh the committee has been
2:20:03
monitoring and following uh all developments related to the treatment on
2:20:08
the question of Palestine here at the UN and elsewhere and the committee will in due
2:20:16
time uh signal or Express
2:20:21
uh precise the steps the next steps uh related to the question of Palestine and
2:20:27
uh since excise of this uh uh uh interaction is to have our panelist
2:20:34
share their views and perspective I just want to leave the Limelight with them
2:20:39
and I will also invite them to to to if they want to make comments on the questions which have been raised
2:20:44
particularly by Mr David Wildman our long-standing friend they can do so they can also respond to other the questions
2:20:51
so right now I’ll invite our four panelists uh to comment on uh the
2:20:56
statements which have been made on the questions which have been raised and uh and then at the same time to make their
2:21:03
final statements their final concluding remarks and uh uh then after that I will
2:21:08
close the meeting so I will start uh with Mrs Zam I don’t know whether whether you want to make some comments
2:21:15
before I give the floor to the panelist um I can make it just a fews
2:21:23
yeah thank you for all your comments and questions um as a poet and as someone
2:21:30
who is so involved in culture Palestinian culture and Al also um I
2:21:37
think my my the the answer to uh what do we do um is to keep Palestine at the top
2:21:44
of the agenda to give to give opportunities for Palestinian voices um
2:21:51
in every on every level in education and diplomacy Etc um and to you know
2:21:58
especially Palestinian Arts we’re always so looking at Palestine as this you know
2:22:03
country of conflict but we there’s just so much more has a rich history has a rich uh culture and Heritage and so you
2:22:11
know we need to uplift the the tatri the the embroidery we need to uplift the
2:22:17
poetry and the dance and the music um and and the architecture and and so much
2:22:22
more so that would be my plea also is to keep paltin at the top of the agenda and
2:22:28
look at Palestinian humanity and and and culture as important and in doing
2:22:37
so thank you so much Mrs aam for your very inspiring words and for the
2:22:44
beautiful poems you read earlier uh now I’m going to turn to the three panelist
2:22:50
start by Professor ad MC and then professor kame and Mrs pH pH Ben so
2:22:56
please respond to what you have heard and also if you need to the question which have been raised Professor
2:23:03
M uh thank you very much for the questions and the opportunity to to sort
2:23:08
of wrap up I’ve told my students and a number of audiences that I’ve had the pleasure or
2:23:16
not to speak to over the past few months that we are now at an inflection point
2:23:21
in international relations in the history certainly modern history and
2:23:26
certainly The History of the United Nations an inflection point um that pits effectively the small
2:23:34
number of western states that carry on with a torch of neo-imperialism and so on and
2:23:41
we know who they are against everybody else the g77 the global South the former
2:23:47
colonized world we see this inflection point pointing up problems in the United
2:23:53
Nations system and in how we govern ourselves as Humanity on the planet and we are thankful again to those States
2:24:01
from the global South South Africa in particular Nicaragua and
2:24:07
others who are standing firm and fast on the promise of this organization as told
2:24:14
To Us by its Founders we were told in 1945 that the United Nations Charter
2:24:19
heralded a new New World Order a liberal order universal applications of Human
2:24:25
Rights regardless of the station or position of the individuals in question
2:24:30
the states in question and so on and there is a clear tension now before us
2:24:36
between those claims on the one hand and how they operate in fact on the ground
2:24:42
on the other some rights some states some peoples remain more equal than
2:24:51
others and so the challenge is before each and every one of us member states free women men people of the world of
2:24:59
conscience to do something about it so in answer to the first question of
2:25:06
Mr Wildman what to do he’d mentioned arms embargos and banking
2:25:12
sanctions and so on as an international lawyer I would just like to paint a broader picture all states have
2:25:20
obligations under various bodies of international law to universally apply those bodies let’s just take the
2:25:26
genocide convention for example there is a duty to prevent genocide as was
2:25:31
mentioned by Phyllis earlier of all states parties to the genocide convention and that Duty has
2:25:38
been triggered all parties to the genocide convention have been put on notice of a
2:25:43
real substantial risk of genocide taking place in Gaza at least since the 26th of
2:25:49
January 2024 the first provisional measures order issued by the principal judicial
2:25:56
organ of the United Nations now the question is whatever are
2:26:01
those States going to do states parties to the to the genocide convention to
2:26:06
prevent and there are a whole host of things that can and indeed must be done
2:26:12
to prevent I’ll get to those in a moment another body of law the law of armed
2:26:18
conflict anybody who deals with the question of Palestine will know that the Fourth
2:26:23
Geneva Convention relative to the protection of Civilian persons in time of War which continues to apply and has
2:26:30
never stopped applying in the occupied Palestinian territory since June
2:26:36
1967 has a common article one in it that imp that imposes a duty on all high
2:26:41
Contracting parties not only to respect the terms of the convention but to quote ensure their
2:26:48
respect that means when other states are violating the convention they have an independent obligation to ensure that
2:26:55
those States abide by their obligations under the convention of course the convention covers a great deal of what
2:27:01
is happening in the Gaza Strip and in the occupied Palestinian territory including willful prohibiting the willful killing settlement of an
2:27:07
occupied territory deportation of that territory and so on of its population and so on so there’s a great deal of
2:27:15
legal bases on which states can act what can they do
2:27:20
I would take a broad view economic cultural civil political and social any
2:27:30
International lawyer in here knows that those are the five heads of human rights in the system and those are five actions
2:27:37
five heads of action that can be pursued by member states to ensure in their bilateral relations and in their
2:27:44
multilateral relations that touch on Israel but in their bilateral relations in particular with Israel that the
2:27:49
messages made clear we will not stand for these actions because they violate
2:27:56
not only the international legality and the legal system whether under the genocide convention or the Fourth Geneva
2:28:02
Convention or what have you the aparte convention and so on but because they have they violate basic principles of
2:28:08
human morality basic principles of what makes us human and there the people must speak
2:28:14
in each of the territories of their countries but my message to you dear friends is is to send the message back
2:28:21
to your capitals that action is required not merely as a matter of Comedy but as
2:28:26
a matter of obligation of member states parties to the Geneva conventions parties to the genocide convention and
2:28:31
so on um I shall leave it there thank you very much for the
2:28:39
opportunity you very much Dr for your very profound and detailed response and
2:28:47
indications for the F for the way forward uh Professor qule do you have any
2:28:53
comments and your final words also yeah thank you um so we heard the word evil
2:29:00
uh and um I feel that our world and our
2:29:05
universe always tries to find good and I feel that what is happening now is that
2:29:13
we have a new paradigm for Our Generation to correct injustices together globally and we see that
2:29:20
Palestine is energizing many people who have never been activists including
2:29:26
myself and we are thriving to make this world more just more peaceful and to
2:29:33
provide more equity for everyone so the Civil Society has been engaged because of Palestine the students the different
2:29:40
professionals who have never done anything and the movement is growing and
2:29:46
I think it will make the world a m much better place for all of of us there has
2:29:51
been so many changes that we are proud of as as Humanity uh we have uh
2:29:58
rectified uh we we sanctioned slavery we sanctioned bullying we created gender
2:30:05
equality many positive changes that have happened because of people getting mobilized more so than just governments
2:30:13
people make their governments do things and I feel we are seeing a big movement
2:30:18
where the people are demanding change and they’re demanding a better world and
2:30:24
the governments have to oblige thank you thank you so very much
2:30:30
uh Mrs uh qule Professor querly now I’m going to give the floor to the uh last
2:30:37
uh speaker who was also the last panelist Mrs phis
2:30:42
benis thank you Mr chairman and thank you all for the questions and comments a
2:30:48
couple of thoughts about some of the earlier questions the ambassador of uh
2:30:53
Indonesia raised this question of the rights of refugees often too often being
2:30:58
forgotten being ignored and it does come back to the question of unra because I just would remind colleagues here remind
2:31:06
you all that the Mandate of unra is the only mandate in of any agency in the
2:31:12
United Nations that has the mandate to protect the rights of Palestinian
2:31:17
refugees that’s that’s the importance of it it Beyond it is the most important
2:31:22
provider of the basics of Life of water of food of medical care of Education of
2:31:29
shelter and of Rights those things can’t be separated so in answer to the
2:31:34
question of what can we do to support Refugee Rights the answer is do not allow the United States decision to pull
2:31:41
out its funding to mean that onra cannot survive make up the funding escalate the
2:31:48
funding take the place of those who criminally in my view are refusing to
2:31:53
pay their due share to the refugees uh of Palestine on
2:32:00
the questions that my colleague David has raised just a couple of thoughts on the question of the arms embargo which
2:32:06
is by far the most important part you know this is now part of the definition of a ceasefire right now it’s not enough
2:32:13
to just call a ceasefire there has to be action to make it happen and that means
2:32:19
stop sending weapons my government as you know is responsible for at least I think the
2:32:26
last figure was something like 65% I think it might be higher but at least 65% of the weapons that are that Israel
2:32:32
is using to kill Palestinians they have got to stop and we are working 247 to
2:32:39
make them stop but it isn’t only the United States the rest is being carried
2:32:44
out by other governments who are also buying from the Israeli military
2:32:50
uh companies surveillance equipment for example many of the of the countries
2:32:56
represented here in this room right now today are buying from Israeli companies stuff equipment things that I
2:33:04
have never understood and probably never will designed to watch over their own
2:33:10
citizens stop doing that for your own citizens sake and for the Israeli military economy it will help the
2:33:17
refugees in answer to that on the the question of the uh the the um
2:33:24
the need for an arms embargo there is a history of this not only in the context
2:33:30
of South African apartheid uh but going back to the Israeli annexation attempt
2:33:35
of the Syrian Golan Heights back in 1981 and 82 the first decision called for by
2:33:40
the general assembly at that time was to impose an arms embargo on Israel in
2:33:45
response to that it hasn’t ever been implemented but but there are models for
2:33:51
this this is not something new and different on the question that what is your niece’s name Lauren what Lauren
2:33:58
just raised about the future a critical question for Palestinians for those of
2:34:05
us who are not Palestinians it’s not our call it’s not up to us to say who should be running the Gaza Strip who are the
2:34:13
acceptable Palestinians as Lauren said it’s for the Palestinians in the diaspora and in the
2:34:21
refugee camps in the region and those inside 48 and those in the opt all of
2:34:27
them have that right which we don’t have so it’s not up to us to to make that
2:34:33
call finally just a couple of of closing thoughts one is that the United Nations
2:34:39
has a history of short-term decisions that can make it
2:34:44
side on the right side of History side with civil society side with with social
2:34:50
movements and I speak directly to the history of the runup to the war in Iraq
2:34:55
in the period in 2002 into 2003 the United Nations security Council as many
2:35:00
of you will remember was divided the United States and Britain were demanding
2:35:05
that every country there support a un endorsement of this coming War and the
2:35:11
uncommitted six countries that don’t necessarily have the the capacity to
2:35:17
stand up to the United States to to defy United States pressure stood up because
2:35:23
they stood together and because people all over the world in those six countries they were Angola Cameroon
2:35:30
Guinea Mexico chile is that six that’s six it was an
2:35:39
extraordinary moment for those countries they were the heroes of the the global
2:35:44
mobilization against War for standing up directly in this in the security Council
2:35:49
and they showed the way for what that can look like that there was the
2:35:55
understanding that the war might happen but if the UN said no that maybe it would not and many of you will remember
2:36:02
that on February 15th of 2003 the day the world said no to war there were
2:36:08
protests around the world in more than 800 cities in over 75 countries in every
2:36:14
continent including Antarctica where the scientists went out and tramped out a peace sign in the snow and stood in it
2:36:21
in their red parkas to have a picture taken from above it was an extraordinary moment and on that morning when the
2:36:27
whole world was saying no a very small group of us led by Archbishop Desmond
2:36:33
Tutu and Harry bellanti met with then Secretary General kopianan to say that
2:36:39
we were there on behalf of the people that were marching in at that moment we
2:36:44
thought 600 cities all around the world and to say that we’re here on behalf of
2:36:50
those people marching to say we claim the United Nations as our
2:36:56
own those were Bishop tutu’s words and it seems to me that
2:37:04
that’s very much the words we need to be keeping in mind today that the United Nations does not belong to the capitals
2:37:11
alone the United Nations does not belong to the corporations and the United Nations does certainly not belong to the
2:37:17
United States it belong belongs to the people of the world and when the people of the world are saying we need an
2:37:24
immediate ceasefire that will last that is permanent it’s up to the United Nations to be part of that mobilization
2:37:31
to make it happen thank
2:37:38
you thank you very much Mrs Bennis we have now come to the end of this event
2:37:44
today the commemoration of another year of the Palestinian NBAs nagba provides an important opportunity for reflection
2:37:52
and for mobilization in pursuit of a just solution that will underpin peace and
2:37:59
security for Palestinians Israelis and the region as a whole I thank you all
2:38:04
for your participation and your intervention have been really enlightening I would like to thank once
2:38:11
again the great and inspiring poets uh Zan aam our two eminent prophet
2:38:19
professors Professor IM and professor qule and our great militant tyus
2:38:26
militant for peace and Justice phis benis and uh it goes without saying that support from the International Community
2:38:33
uh to Palestinian rights is of crucial importance during these times of uh
2:38:39
intense suffering uh in Gaza but also in the other other parts of the opt uh
2:38:45
thank you for making the effort uh to be uh to be here as per usual practice the
2:38:51
chair summary of this conference will be posted on the website of the committee at
2:38:59
www.un.org and the video recording of this event will also be available on un
2:39:04
web TV and on the committee’s uh YouTube channel let me also remind you that you
2:39:10
can also follow the committee on our website at unipal do.org on X formally
2:39:16
Twitter Instagram and Facebook and we invite you in joining our mailing list
2:39:21
to receive the committee newsletter and to stay up to date with the committee’s activities for your information as part
2:39:29
of its efforts to contribute towards a just comprehensive and Lasting settle
2:39:34
ucation of palestin on the 1st of July the committee will organize in partnership with the OIC uh the annual
2:39:43
conference on the question of uh of Jerusalem uh this year uh the event will
2:39:48
be held at the o headquarters in jeda Saudi Arabia we look forward to your
2:39:54
ongoing engagement and to welcome you in our future events I thank you all this
2:40:01
meeting is adjourned can I um can I something yeah um yes um one
2:40:09
Announcement by the secretar just quickly um there will be a um a talk by
2:40:15
Professor R say can’t be heard
2:40:20
yes uh there will be a a book presentation of his latest book on some of the topics that he mentioned now in
2:40:26
the book shop at the UN in the first basement and it will start at 1 1:30 1:30 so you’re all welcome to to join
2:40:34
this event thank you
oooooo
- In 2025, the UN Palestinian Rights Committee commemorated the 77th anniversary of the Nakba pursuant to GA resolution A/RES/79/82. A Special Meeting was organized on 15 May at the UN Headquarters in New York. Commemorations continued with an exclusive screening of the documentary “From Ground Zero”. Created by 22 artists living under siege in the Gaza Strip, this powerful film offers a vital and deeply contextualized perspective beyond the brutal media live stream on Gaza.
Commemoration of the Nakba at the UN Headquarters
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1rByS2Vp8I)
“Palestinians are racialized as a security threat, because they — we — refuse to disappear,” the Palestinian Rights Committee heard on 15 May 2025 from a scholar who spoke at a special event remembering the seventy-seventh anniversary of the Nakba. The meeting was hosted by the United Nations Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. “Nakba” — an Arabic word that means “catastrophe” — refers to the displacement and dispossession of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in 1948.
5:36 Statement on behalf of the President of the General Assembly
9:31 Statement by Khaled Khiari, United Nations Assistant- Secretary-General
15:12 Statement by Ambassador Riyad Mansour of State of Palestine
26:40 Statement by Professor Noura Erakat
Transkripzioa:
0:30
Shall we begin? Morning.
0:37
Yes. Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen.
0:42
I am Ahmed Fisal Muhammad, vice chair of the committee on the exercise of the
0:47
inalienable rights of the Palestinian people and permanent representative of Malaysia to the United Nations. On
0:55
behalf of his excellency Kohysac, chair of the committee, I welcome all members
1:00
and observers to the 423rd meeting of the committee. The meeting is called to
1:08
order. The provisional program for this meeting
1:13
has been shared earlier. If there is no objection, the program is
1:20
adopted. Before giving the floor to the speakers, I would like to share some remarks on behalf of the committee.
1:29
Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, we are gathered here today on 15th May as
1:35
called by General Assembly Resolution 77/23
1:41
2022 reaffirmed in December 2024 to commemorate the 77th anniversary of the
1:48
Nakba, a massive forced displacement of over 750,000 Palestinians from their
1:55
ancestral homes in 1948. That is the Nagba or catastrophe which
2:02
marked the collective trauma of uprooting the entire Palestinian population and leaving them in an
2:09
endless struggle for a state to call their own. This struggle is still
2:14
ongoing 77 years later. Over 52,400 people have been killed in Gaza.
2:22
More than 118,000 injured and thousands remain trapped beneath the rubble. In
2:30
the West Bank, over 40,000 Palestinians have been killed and many have been
2:35
displaced amid deepening occupation. Rising settler violence and
2:40
military escalation. These are not mere statistics. They reflect a devastating
2:46
human tragedy. Since the collapse of the Gaza ceasefire on 18th March, illegal mass
2:53
evac evacuation orders have triggered widespread displacement and humanitarian
2:58
collapse. Communities have been wiped out. Access to food, water, and medical
3:04
aid has been systematically denied. Mounting evidence points to
3:11
patterns consistent with ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.
3:16
Force displacement must be unequivocally rejected. Humanitarian access must be
3:23
restored without restriction and the unlawful blockade on Gaza must be lifted
3:28
to allow life-saving aid to reach civilians. Since 1948, Palestine
3:34
refugees in the region have been supported by UNRA, which provided them a lifeline. The agency is now facing
3:41
tremendous challenges to its operations, leaving many children out of school.
3:46
UNRA is also facing financial shortcomings. We call on all UN member states to provide the necessary
3:53
political support and secure reliable funding to UNRA.
3:58
Palestinians have been enduring a prolonged Israeli occupation which has been determined to be illegal by the
4:06
International Court of Justice through its advisory opinion of 19th July
4:12
2024. The occupation has been enforced through displacement, evictions,
4:18
demolition of homes, parceling of the Palestinian territory and denial of
4:23
fundamental rights. This is the ongoing Nakba. Over the last 19 months,
4:31
Palestinians in Gaza have been victims of unprecedented attacks by Israel, the
4:36
occupying power, leaving over 52,400 Gazans dead, deemed by the ICG,
4:43
as plausible genocide. We call on the occuping occupying power
4:50
to lift the blockade, denying Palestinians in Gaza of basic humanitarian needs and urge the
4:57
implementation of an immediate and permanent ceasefire as called for in the
5:02
security council resolution 2735. Only the full recognition of a sovereign
5:07
and independence Palestinian state as a UN member is the just and lasting
5:13
solution for the future of millions of Palestinians. Thank
5:19
you. I now give the floor to Miss Blanca Montejo, Deputy Chief of Staff, Office
5:25
of the President of the General Assembly to deliver remarks on behalf of Mr.
5:30
Filimon Young. Miss Montejo, you have the floor.
5:38
Your excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, salam to all. I thank the organizers for the kind
5:46
invitation to join you today. One of the first main tasks of
5:52
the United Nations was to find a just solution to the question of Palestine.
5:58
For 77 years, the unresolved conflict has been on the agenda of the General
6:06
Assembly. This is far too long. We are seeing generation after
6:12
generation live through conflict and despair. Those who came before us
6:18
believed they would see the resolution of this conflict during their lifetime and that return to peace in the Middle
6:23
East. Yet here we are once again commemorating the displacement of
6:29
hundreds of thousands of Palestinians since 1948. We must do
6:36
more. The horrors we have witnessed in Gaza for more than 18 months are a stark
6:42
reminder that we urgently need to solve the Israeli Palestinian conflict. This
6:49
is a solution that cannot be brought about through endless war and occupation.
6:54
It is a solution that requires meaningful action by the international
6:59
community towards the realization of a two-state solution in accordance with
7:06
international law, the charter of the United Nations and relevant United
7:11
Nations resolutions. Your excellencies, as you
7:17
know, Nagba is an Arabic word that means catastrophe. a catastrophe that has been
7:23
unfolding for decades. It is time to recognize the pain and trauma this
7:29
catastrophe has brought to the Palestinian people. It is time to recognize that the
7:35
suffering of civilians on both sides will end only when Israelis and
7:42
Palestinians are able to live side by side in their own sovereign independent
7:48
states in peace, security, and dignity. As the General Assembly, we
7:55
must seize every chance to help chart the path towards the two-state solution.
8:00
the high level international conference for the peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine and the
8:06
implementation of the two-state solution in June to be chaired by France and Saudi Arabia will present a crucial
8:13
opportunity to set a political horizon. The General Assembly’s
8:19
commitment to the two-state solution and the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination has been firm.
8:27
The United Nations Charter is also clear. All people deserve to live free
8:32
from violence and intimidation. All deserve to fully enjoy their human rights. This includes
8:39
Palestinians and Israelis. Together, we must uphold the
8:44
charter, General Assembly resolutions, and international law. We must end the
8:50
catastrophe. We must build a brighter future for the young generations in both Palestine and
8:56
Israel. And I thank you. I thank Miss Montejo for delivering the
9:03
remarks by the president of the general assembly and I thank the president for his support for the Palestinian cause. I
9:10
believe that Mr. Montejo will have to leave the meeting momentarily for other engagements. Thank you for being with us
9:16
this morning. I now give the floor to Mr. Khaled Kerry, UN assistant secretary
9:23
general for political and peaceuilding affairs. Sir, you have the
9:30
floor. Thank you, Mr. Chair, excellencies, distinguished delegates,
9:35
ladies and gentlemen, through resolution 27/23 of 2022 reaffirmed in December
9:44
2024, the general assembly requested the UN Secretariat to commemorate the
9:49
anniversary of the Nagba, which led to the displacement and dispossession of
9:54
hundreds of thousands of Palestinian. Today, more than 5 million registered
10:00
Palestine refugees are spread across Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon,
10:06
and Syria. The Israeli Palestine conflict has led to the world’s longest refugee
10:13
crisis. It is a crisis that remains unresolved, shaping identity, lives, and
10:19
the enduring pursuit of justice and self-determination for the Palestinian people. This event demonstrates the
10:26
importance the international community attaches to the ongoing plight of Palestinian
10:33
refugees. Excellencies, the horrific situation we are witnessing today in Gaza is a catastrophe with no end in
10:41
sight. Since the atrocious terror attacks by Hamas on 7 October
10:46
2023 and continued holding of hostages, over 1.9 million Palestinians, more than
10:53
85% of Gaza’s population and almost 80% of them Palestinian refugees from
11:01
1948, have been forcibly displaced, many repeatedly, some 10 times or more. As
11:09
the secretary general has warned, Gaza has now become a humanitarian hellscape.
11:15
There is no safe place in the street. Force displacements must be
11:23
rejected and restricted humanitarian access must be ensured and the blockade
11:29
on Gaza lifted to allow the flow of lifesaving aid in order to prevent the
11:34
deepening of an already grave humanitarian crisis. International
11:39
matter and law requires the protection of civilians, UN personnel, humanitarian workers and journalists. Accountability
11:46
for violations is imperative. In parallel, since early
11:53
2025, over 40,000 Palestinians have been displaced in the occupied West Bank due
11:59
to Israeli military operations, most of them from Palestinian refugee camps in
12:05
northern West Bank. As affirmed by the International Court of Justice, in its
12:10
advisory opinion of 19th July 2024, Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian
12:16
territory, including East Jerusalem and of course Gaza, is unlawful and must
12:22
end. Excellencies, I echo the Secretary General’s call on the international
12:28
community to fully support peace, stability, and the inalienable rights of
12:34
the Palestinian people. International law must be upheld by all parties. The
12:39
Secretary General has called for an immediate, immediate, and durable ceasefire, the release of all hostages
12:45
without delay and the resumption of credible political negotiations. Steps must also be taken
12:52
to reverse the negative trends of violence, settlement expansion, and unilateral steps that undermine the
12:59
Palestinian Authority. I echo the secretary general’s own recent warning that the promise of a
13:06
two-state solution is at risk of dwindling to the point of disappearance. The upcoming general
13:14
assembly mandated international conference on the two-state solution in June 2025 offers an important
13:20
opportunity for member states to support a viable two-state solution before it is
13:26
too late. Peace will require tangible, irreversible, and permanent progress
13:32
toward the two-state solution and none to the occupation and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with
13:40
Gaza as integral part. A viable sovereign Palestinian state living side
13:45
by side in peace and security with Israel is critical to achieving peace in
13:50
the Middle East. Let us build political momentum toward that end. The United Nations
13:57
remain committed to a multilateral response encoded in human rights, dignity, international law, and shared
14:05
responsibility. History will judge our response. The suffering of the Palestinian people, including
14:12
generations of displaced and dispossessed, remains as a stark
14:17
reminder that the root causes of this conflict, have yet to be resolved.
14:23
The United Nations Charter calls on us to end this conflict and uphold the principles of our
14:30
organization. Let’s act with clarity, determination, and conviction. Thank
14:35
you, Mr. Chair. I thank Assistant Secretary General
14:40
Kyrie for participating in this meeting and for delivering important remarks
14:46
stressing the secretary’s commitment to finding peaceful solution to the Palestinian question. I now have the
14:53
honor to give the floor to his excellency Minister Riyad Mansu, permanent observer of the state of
14:59
Palestine to the United Nations. Excellency, the floor is yours.
15:06
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
15:13
Uh today we are commemorating the Nakba day for the
15:20
first time since the general assembly mandated through a resolution that my
15:27
brother Khari referred to to commemorate
15:32
this occasion after 76 years annually
15:38
through a mandate from the general General Assembly. We are grateful for those who voted for that resolution and
15:45
we are grateful for all of you who are with us in this room and those who are
15:51
watching us in all corners of the globe to commemorate the Nakba of the
15:57
Palestinian people after 76 years and to
16:02
commemorate the ongoing Nakba as we see it in the genocidal war against our
16:08
people in the Gaza Strip. I have the honor and privileged to read
16:15
in Arabic the statement of President Mahmud Abbas in this occasion. Of course, we
16:23
have it in English and also in Arabic and we will put it in the hands of the
16:29
secretariat of the division of Palestinian rights to circulate it to everyone.
16:39
Mahmud Abbas statement by his excellency Mr. Mahmud Abbas at the United Nations on the
16:47
anniversary of the Nakba. Ladies and gentlemen, may the peace, mercy, and
16:53
blessings of God be upon you. At the outset, I extend my gratitude and
16:59
appreciation to you for the historic decision to commemorate the Palestinian
17:05
Nakba as we mark the passing of its 77th year. This has happened in 1948.
17:14
The NECBA represented a catastrophe of disasters, the mass murders of Palestinian children, women, and men in
17:22
more than 50 documented massacres, and the forced displacement
17:28
by the violence of iron and fire of over half of the Palestinian people from
17:33
their homeland. Crimes which were perpetrated by the Israeli occupying forces against the Palestinian people in
17:41
1948. This day, the 15th of May of each year,
17:48
marks the anniversary of the Nagba, this painful occasion that is
17:54
still present after being ignored for so many years
18:00
past. The series of Israeli crimes against our pal our Palestinian people
18:06
has not stopped. After the catastrophe of the Nakba in
18:11
1948 and the confiscation of 78% of the land of historic
18:18
Palestine, the occupation disaster came in
18:23
1967 with the seizure of the remaining territory of Palestine in East
18:28
Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and the continuation of its
18:34
settlement colonization campaign and the and theft particularly in the West Bank
18:41
including Jerusalem to this very day. Today is very similar to
18:51
yesterday. What the Israeli occupying forces have been doing for 19 months in
18:56
full view of the whole world are crimes of genocide, destruction, and starvation
19:02
with the aim of displacing our people from the Gaza Strip. In addition to the
19:10
crime of the continued theft of the land of the state of Palestine in the West Bank and East
19:17
Jerusalem, the number of Palestinian refugees inside Palestine, the
19:23
neighboring countries, and across the world has reached more than 7 million
19:29
Palestinian refugees, and their suffering continues, especially in the refugee
19:34
camps in Gaza, the West Bank, including each Jerusalem, Jordan, Lebanon, and
19:46
Syria. What has made the suffering more severe over the past two years is the targeting of
19:52
ENROA, the United Nations Relief Agency for the Palestinian refugees, and the
19:57
obstruction of its activities within occupied Palestine. This is a grave violation of international law,
20:04
depriving our people of basic services such as education and health that cannot
20:11
be replaced, as well as other essentials of life in
20:16
Gaza, which are absolutely vital for their survival.
20:22
The continued denial of the crimes of Zionism and the Israeli occupying forces
20:28
against our Palestinian people will be of no use. It will not cancel the truth or
20:36
erase the memory. History is indelible and justice is not time bound. Today we
20:43
stand before you not only to commemorate the somber anniversary, but to renew the
20:50
pledge that the Nakba was not and will not be the permanent and inevitable
20:56
faith of our people and that the right of return, the right to self-determination and the independence
21:02
of the Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital are steady and
21:08
inalienable rights guaranteed by the international law and UN resolutions and
21:14
will not be forsaken by our people and all who stand in solidarity with them
21:20
throughout history and to the present day. Ladies and gentlemen, the time has
21:27
come for real and effective international action to stop this historic injustice and ongoing tragedy
21:35
which have become a disgrace to humanity. The war that Israel has been waging on the Gaza Strip for 19 months,
21:45
which has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of civilians, the majority of
21:50
whom are women and children and destroyed their homes and infrastructure
21:57
and forcibly repeatedly displaced more than 1.9 million Palestinians within
22:03
this trip. This war is merely a continuation of the
22:08
chapters of a catastrophe of a Nakba that has continued unabated since 1948.
22:16
We stress from this rostrm that we stand ready to undertake our full national
22:21
responsibilities in the Gaza Strip as in the West Bank by the assumption of the
22:27
state of Palestine of its political, economic, social, civil and security
22:34
responsibilities, ensuring the delivery of humanitarian assistance and the return of the displaced to their areas,
22:41
consolidating them on their land implementing the early recovery and
22:47
reconstruction plan without displacement from Gaza and mobilizing the necessary
22:53
international funding at the reconstruction conference in Cairo once a ceasefire is
23:00
achieved. Above all, we must emphasize the ne the need for the complete
23:06
withdrawal of the Israeli occupying forces from the Gaza Strip and the establishment of a comprehensive
23:11
ceasefire ceasefire across the occupied Palestinian territory as well as the
23:18
need to embark on a political process to implement the two-state solution and
23:23
establish an independent state of Palestine with East Jerusalem as its capital while realizing the inalienable
23:30
rights of our people foremost to live as a free and dignified people in their
23:36
homeland. Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, the international community
23:41
represented by this United or United Nations organization and while working
23:47
for an immediate stop of the aggression against our people, their land and their sanctities, their holy places is
23:55
required today more than ever to take concrete steps to provide them with
24:00
international protection. And in this regard, we look forward with great
24:06
interest to the convening of the international peace conference this coming June in New York to implement the
24:13
two-state solution in accordance with the international with resolutions of international legitimacy and mobilizing
24:20
efforts to ensure international recognition of the state of Palestine while also obtaining full membership in
24:26
the United Nations and bringing an end to the to the illegal Israeli occupation
24:31
of the territory o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o occupied since 1967, including East
24:38
Jerusalem. We also call upon you to continue firmly supporting Anua and
24:44
providing it with the necessary funding as well as confronting the deceitful
24:51
attempts to undermine its role as per its general assembly mandate. Honor
24:56
represents a lifeline for millions of our refugees, a living witness to the
25:02
Nakba of our people. It is a political responsibility and legal and humanitarian reference for the
25:09
Palestinian refugee question until a just solution is achieved for them in
25:15
line with resolution 194. In closing, and on
25:21
behalf of the steadfast Palestinian people and on behalf of more than 15
25:27
million Palestinians, including 7 million refugees, we renew our pre
25:32
pledge that we will remain adherent to our rights and will
25:39
continue our legitimate struggle for freedom and independence until they are
25:45
realized. We will also continue knocking on the doors of justice, until accountability is realized for all the
25:51
crimes perpetrated against our people until the day of freedom arrives for Palestine, until the legitimate rights
25:58
are restored to their rightful owners, and until peace, stability, and prosperity are achieved for all across
26:04
the region. May the peace, mercy, and blessings of God be upon you, President Mahmud Abbas, and I thank you very much,
26:11
Mr. Chairman. We thank his excellency Minister Ry
26:16
Mansour for delivering the important remarks. We now turn to our last speaker, Miss Nora Iraq, a Palestinian
26:25
American scholar and professor of African studies and criminal justice at
26:31
Ruckus University. She will share her thoughts on the current situation from a civil society perspective. Mrs. Miss
26:38
Rakat, you have the floor. Thank you.
26:45
Today is day 585 of genocide and every day we witness
26:52
unprecedented atrocities. Two days ago we saw a baby
26:57
in a red onesie not yet one years old have both of her tiny legs amputated.
27:05
We witnessed a missile rip through a hospital to kill a renowned journalist
27:12
receiving treatment and learned of the assassination of a 12-year-old boy who
27:17
witnessed the massacre of 15 paramedics and their burial in a mass grave.
27:24
Israel has destroyed 92% of Gaza’s residential buildings,
27:31
incapacitated its 36 hospitals, and prevented the entry of food and basic
27:37
goods. In doing so, it is not only killing Palestinians now, but
27:43
threatening the possibility of a Palestinian future. A campaign that seeks to obliterate the
27:50
future of a people is a genocide. Yet, despite these chilling statistics and an
27:57
ICJ decision indicating its plausibility, there remains controversy
28:02
as to this basic fact. Why? The most pervasive talking point is
28:09
that Israel is not targeting Palestinians as a people, but only targeting Hamas. Putting aside
28:16
significant issues in law and fact that militate against this point, let me just share with you some
28:22
statistics. What we know so far is that 2% of Palestinians in Gaza have been
28:28
killed, including over 20,000 children buried and disappeared. The names of
28:35
those under the age of one fill the first 14 pages of a 649page document. So far, 1,200 entire
28:44
families have been erased forever from the civil registry. 3 months into the
28:51
war, the UN humanitarian chief described Gaza as
28:57
uninhabitable, and since then, the situation has only gotten worse. This
29:03
certainly exceeds Hamas militants. According to Israel, these
29:09
horrifying numbers are irrelevant because they are the result, they say, of deliberate human shielding by Hamas.
29:16
Again, putting aside significant issues of law and fact, let me just share with
29:23
you the tactics of the army itself. It has sniped children twice
29:29
above the waist. It has used quadcopters to spray and kill children
29:36
who are sprawled and injured on the floor. It has destroyed the largest in
29:42
vitro fertility clinic, including 4,000 embryos. It has executed patients with
29:48
their hands zip tied and thrown into mass graves. They have sexually
29:54
assaulted detainees captured without charge or trial. Bombed safe routes
29:59
where Palestinians were ordered to flee. Bombed safe zones where Palestinians were ordered to shelter. Tortured
30:06
medical doctors to death. destroyed more than half of Gaza’s desalination plants,
30:12
undermining access to clean water, leveled all four major universities,
30:17
attacked factories, libraries, bakeries, heritage sites, 247 mosques, three
30:23
churches, and bulldozed 16 cemeteries. As put by professor Shireen
30:31
Seali, any honest observer of this war understands that the target of Israeli
30:37
force and US supplied weapons is the Palestinian civilian. Hamas is the collateral
30:45
damage. The purpose of this campaign is the destruction of a the Palestinian people
30:53
for the sake of achieving long-term Israeli security. What I term nekba peace, a violent oxymoron that
31:01
predicates Jewish Israeli safety on the elimination of Palestinians. In pursuit
31:07
of its territorial ambitions to achieve unchecked Zionist settler sovereignty,
31:12
Israel has removed Palestinians for 77 years and counting. It has imposed a
31:18
permanent military occupation on the West Bank in Gaza for 58 years and counting. And it has besieged 2.3
31:25
million Palestinians who are now possibly only two million because of this past 19 months.
31:32
besieged them for 17 years and counting. What we have been witnessing for the
31:38
past 585 days is the crulest and most violent
31:43
episode of the ongoing nekba. This did not start on October
31:50
7th, nor was it a response to October 7th that provided a useful cover in
31:55
order to accelerate this massive removal. On October 12th, 2023,
32:01
Agricultural Minister Avi Darur told us plainly, “This is NECBA
32:07
2023.” A campaign that is evidenced across Palestinian geographies,
32:12
including in the northern West Bank, where some 40,000 Palestinians have been removed just this year. The Trump
32:19
administration has adopted this goal in its current build bid to build a Gaza
32:24
Riviera to remove Palestinians to the Sudan, Somalia, or Syria. And most
32:31
recently, on May 4th, 2025, the Israeli cabinet unanimously voted to reoccupy
32:38
all of Gaza and ethnically cleanse its remaining inhabitants. This is why the return of more than
32:46
300,000 Palestinians to their homes in North Gaza in early 2025 was so
32:52
incredible. It was the first time in nearly eight decades of ongoing Nekba
32:58
that we witnessed the return of Palestinians in mass. A return that
33:05
embodies the national aspirations of the Palestinian people. As chronicled by
33:10
Ahmed Abuima, who marched home on that day, I walked as I had never walked
33:16
before, about 15 kilometers non-stop. I entered Gaza City, a dream long
33:22
cherished during the days of war now realized.
33:27
Despite unprecedented cruelty, Palestinians refused to surrender and
33:33
marched home by foot. This is precisely why Palestinians are racialized as a
33:39
security threat because they we refuse to disappear. The NEBA is ongoing and so
33:47
is Palestinian resistance to our elimination. There is sufficient law to end the
33:54
genocide, to lift the blockade, to end the occupation, and to realize Palestinian
34:00
self-determination. Had international law ever been enough, however, Palestinian refugees would be growing
34:07
their families and their gardens on their original lands rather than searching for the remains of flesh of
34:13
their babies beneath the rubble. Remarkably, the time of genocide has
34:18
also been a moment of significant judicial strides, furthering Palestinian liberation. In January 2024, the
34:26
International Court of Justice determined that Israel’s campaign was plausible genocide. In May 2024, it
34:33
issued an other provisional measure ordering the withdrawal from Rafa.
34:38
That same month, the International Criminal Court finally issued arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav
34:44
Galant. In July 2024, the ICJ issued an advisory opinion determining that
34:50
Israel’s presence in the West Bank and Gaza is unlawful, ordering it to
34:55
withdraw its settlers and military from the territory and to provide reparations for the Palestinian people. Last month,
35:03
the ICJ heard an argument on the legality of banning UNRWa. the UN refugee agency responsible for
35:10
humanitarian relief and now banned amid a starvation campaign that has killed 57
35:16
children in two months. This is not a legal controversy.
35:22
It is a political one. The United States, among other states, has rung its
35:28
hands behind judicial rulings, but this is selective difference to the court. In its last days of office, the Biden admin
35:35
administration recognized there’s a genocide of the Masalite ethnic tribe in Darur by the rapid support forces. When
35:42
asked whether they can use the same standards to make that decision to adjudicate Israel’s campaign in Gaza,
35:48
the US ambassador at large for global criminal justice said, quote, “It will ultimately be for the ICJ judges to
35:55
decide with zero irony that they did not have to submit their evidence on the
36:01
Sudan before the ICJ. This is not a legal controversy.
36:08
This is a political one. The selective deference to the ICJ on the question of genocide of Palestinians is an attempt
36:16
to deflect responsibility and the ongoing counterrevolution against activists globally is an attempt to
36:23
revise a history of the present. Since 2020, an emerging
36:29
consensus among le leg legacy human rights organizations and the world court have defined Israel as an apartheid
36:36
regime. Rather than boycott, divest from and sanction apartheid Israel, the
36:42
global community has attempted to normalize it. Five years later, we see the danger
36:49
of allowing that exception. Apartheid and genocide are on
36:54
the same continuum. The three spec of of the specific acts conducted to maintain apartheid are
37:01
identical to the acts committed to commit genocide. In the former for apartheid
37:07
they are done for the purpose of dominate of domination. In the latter they are done with the intent to
37:13
destroy. Genocide is the logical outcome of any project to conquer and settle the
37:20
land upon which and other people live unless it is checked. Many of you here,
37:28
many of you have either survived colonialism or are the ancestors of
37:33
those who have survived colonialism and you are painfully aware of its legacies.
37:40
That’s why in 1974 this body firmly resolved that Palestinians are a jeritical people.
37:49
Palestinians exist and deserve to exist. By relegating Palestine to a bilateral
37:57
bilateral political issue beyond the reach of international norms, you have
38:03
steadily normalized occupation. By failing to apply
38:08
sanctions and engage in boycott, many of you have normalized aparthide. And now
38:15
by failing to act, you are at risk of normalizing genocide.
38:20
But if you normalize genocide, you will have nothing left.
38:26
it. If it is permissible to deny a people
38:31
exist, to cage them, to subject them to systematic warfare, then to use AI
38:38
technology to bomb them at unprecedented rates in their homes, to burn them alive
38:45
in tents, to experiment on them with suicide drones, to deny them medical
38:50
care, to allow premature babies to rot in NICU units and mamas be denied denied
38:56
anesthetic to have C-sections to starve them while their food decays in miles of
39:02
a trucks all without consequence and worse while insisting that their lives
39:08
are secondary if not altogether insignificant relative to Zionist settler sovereignty then I promise you
39:16
that no one is safe as put by Colombian President Gustavo Petro Gaza is a
39:23
rehearsal for the rest of the world Israeli Finance Minister Bezal Smootrich
39:28
recently said that the victory in the war would mean the full destruction of Gaza and the displacement of its
39:33
residents. He has also boasted that Israelis quote are finally going to conquer the Gaza Strip. We are no longer
39:41
afraid of the word occupation. Smotri’s audacity is our
39:47
failure. You must make it impossible for Smootrich and anyone else to boast of
39:55
conquest through genocide in the 21st century. Make those who speak it have to
40:01
say it in hushed whispers in closed rooms rather than boast about that
40:07
conquest. But let us speak honestly. Most of you fear US
40:12
retribution. The genocide in Gaza is one of the major
40:18
atrocities of our time and most people in the world are against it. Our
40:24
inability to stop it reflects an int international system where the equality of nation states remains an aspirational
40:33
principle. It might be good for us to remember the United States is an empire
40:39
but the United States is not the world. In this precise moment, US lawmakers
40:45
welcome the international war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu into the White House. US lawmakers and
40:52
universities welcome Minister of National Security Beng who is disqualified for military service
40:59
because of his affiliation with the Kahan movement declared a terrorist organization by the US and Israel. Can
41:06
you imagine being so extreme that you cannot serve in the Israeli army? The
41:12
same army that sprays five and a halfyear-old girls with 335 bullets and
41:18
executes 15 paramedics and buries them along with their ambulances in a mass grave. The Israeli army wouldn’t have
41:26
Bengir, but US lawmakers and several US universities embraced him just as they
41:32
colluded to kidnap, disappear, and deport students. Do not look west for moral or
41:40
political leadership. The United States has long absconded on that position.
41:48
Do not let the United States and Israel append the global system. In its defense
41:55
of Israel, the United States threatens the entire legal structure established since the Second World War. In just 19
42:03
months, the US has vetoed five ceasefire resolutions to end this genocide despite
42:09
the extraordinary invocation of article 99 by the UN Secretary General and two invocations of uniting for peace
42:16
resolutions. Both the Biden and Trump administration have denigrated the ICJ.
42:22
US National Security Spokesman John Kirby described the ICJ case on genocide
42:28
on the genocide convention as quote meritless counterproductive and completely without any basis in fact
42:35
whatsoever. Our world court is being denigrated. The primary judicial organ
42:41
of this body is being deni denigrated by those who claim global leadership. The
42:47
US is not even a signatory to the Rome statute which established the international criminal court. But the
42:53
Trump administration has passed an executive order to place sanctions on the prosecutor and anyone who cooperates
42:59
with the court. In October 2024, 107 members of Congress threatened to cease
43:05
financial support to the UN if it unseated Israel. Literally threatening
43:11
its budget for doing your job. What is the purpose of the UN if it cannot stop
43:18
a genocide and prevent the calculated starvation of 2 million people? The
43:24
international community has failed many times before and at great cost. One of the most significant times was in 1936
43:31
when the League of Nations allowed Mussolini’s fascist Italy to invade Ethiopia, an independent member state of
43:38
the League. Then the League imposed cosmetic sanctions rather than an oil embargo to stop the war. It tolerated
43:46
Israel’s Italy’s use, excuse me, of chemical weapons and described
43:51
Ethiopia’s people’s war as human shielding. The consequence of racist
43:56
imperialism was ultimately the dissolution of the League of Nations. The UN was born of this failure. It was
44:05
born of the commitment to not let atrocities of genocide from Namibia to
44:11
the Armenian genocide to the Holocaust happen again. It is that commitment that
44:17
is at stake today. If you do not stand up and speak out, this very system will
44:25
be a casualty of the USIsrael genocidal war on Palestine and the Palestinian
44:31
people. Today, we do not need the United Nations to be a powerful symbol of international
44:38
cooperation. We need your collective action to simply be
44:44
powerful. In this moment, we have many choices. We can acknowledge Israel’s
44:49
campaign as genocide and impose an arms embargo. block the ports, sever
44:55
diplomatic ties, sever all civilian and military trade, impose cultural and academic boycott, and unseat Israel for
45:02
its obstinate transgressions. If genocide is too much, you can confront
45:08
this atrocity as a war. Specifically, a colonial war against a racist regime and
45:14
alien occupation. Regulated with the additional protocols and customary laws of war that recognize the captives as
45:21
PSWs, ensure them humane treatment, recognize Palestinian militants as combatants, permit third party
45:28
intervention. We can use the law to protect hospitals and schools and shelters to protect the journalists and
45:34
doctors and aid workers to forcibly open the humanitarian corridors and abide by
45:40
the ICC arrest warrants to arrest Netanyahu and Galant upon arrival. If war is too much, you can
45:50
confront this atrocity as a humanitarian tragedy and you can send in a
45:55
peacekeeping mission to protect Palestinians who have been denied the right to self-defense for nearly eight
46:03
decades. And if humanitarian tragedy is too much, you can find a way to have
46:09
mercy on the Palestinian children, the ones who have been pulled from the rubble with two limbs and no family, and
46:17
find themselves in a cage without food or water. Do not sit in the seat of power
46:25
and do nothing. The United States is an empire, but the United States is not the world.
46:33
You are the world. Each and every one of you has the capacity to halt this
46:41
charade to fulfill the minimal mandate of protecting a people’s right to exist
46:47
individually. You are each someone’s ancestor and you will be an ancestor to
46:54
someone. Our time on this earth is ephemeral and I implore you to give it
46:59
meaning. As the Palestinian poet Mahmud Dwish reminds us, we are not the most
47:05
chosen people in the world, but no one is more chosen than us. You cannot abandon Palestine without
47:13
betraying your legacy, your progeny, and yourself. May we transform this world
47:19
into a place worthy of our children. May you be protected. May you
47:25
be strong. May we be victorious. Free Palestine. and may Palestine free us
47:30
all. Thank [Applause]
47:42
you. We thank Miss Arakat for sharing her very clear, powerful, and extremely
47:49
compelling, critical insights on the plight of the Palestinian people. Thank you.
47:56
This concludes our list of presenters. I now open the floor for interventions by
48:01
member states. There is no pre-inscribed speakers list. Please indicate your
48:07
interest to intervene by pressing the microphone button. First I see on the list is
48:15
Egypt. I invite the distinguished representative of Egypt to take the floor.
48:23
Thank you, Mr. chair Dr. Ryad Mansour my brother ASG
48:29
Kayari I greet you all I thank Dr. Nura Rakat for this
48:34
uh excellent presentation and a realistic depiction
48:41
of the reality. Egypt values the efforts of the committee on the exercise of the
48:47
inalienable rights of the Palestinian people and its continued support for these rights and reminding that there is
48:56
a Palestinian people, a proud Palestinian people that have rights and
49:02
the rights will be restored. We commemorate the NKBA which is a very
49:10
painful memory not just for Palestinians, for all Arabs, for all Muslims and for every human being with a
49:17
conscience. And on this uh painful occasion, we reiterate before all of you
49:24
the principal positions positions of Egypt, the leadership and the government and the people of Egypt in support of
49:30
the Palestinian people to attain the rights and to liberate their state and
49:35
for Palestine to be a full-fledged member of the United Nations as any other nation in the world. Mr. share
49:43
Egypt since the early days of the Nekba and to date to lift the historical
49:51
injustice against the Palestinian people and to create a political horizon to end
49:58
the occupation and to liberate the territory of Palestine on the 4th of
50:03
June borders with East Jerusalem as its border. Egypt has provided political and
50:11
humanitarian support to the brotherly people of Palestine and we have led the efforts to end the aggression and as we
50:18
speak we are part of the mediation to end the brutal war by the occupying
50:24
power Israel against the defenseless Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.
50:29
Egypt since the first day of the brutal war on October 7
50:37
towards an immediate ceasefire and the delivery of humanitarian aid and receiving
50:44
critical medical cases and as we speak we are working to for the release of the
50:50
hostages and detinees and we are in coordination with Palestine working on a
50:58
recovery plan and the reconstruction of Gaza, a plan that was adopted by the League of Arab States and the OIC. And
51:04
very soon once there is a ceasefire, we will host a conference to mobilize funds and for
51:12
pledging towards the Arab and Islamic recovery and reconstruction plan. And we
51:18
look forward to the two-state solution conference co-chared by France and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in coordination
51:24
with Palestine. We stress the rights of Palestine and the Palestinian people until all the rights are restored. I
51:31
thank you. I thank the permanent representative of Egypt. Next, I invite the permanent
51:40
representative of Jordan.
51:50
Mr. Chair, I would like to thank you. I thank the members of the committee for holding this annual commemoration that
51:58
reminds us all of what befell the Palestinian people since
52:03
1948 and the NEBA of the Palestinian people due to the force displacement of
52:10
the Palestinian people and the exercise of all forms and acts of torture, killing and
52:19
displacement in a violation of the Palestinian people rights to self-determination. After so many
52:26
decades, the international community needs to find its unity to support the
52:31
right of the Palestinian people to self-determination and to establish its
52:37
state on their national land with East Jerusalem as its
52:42
capital. This is one of the simplest rights for the Palestinian people. their
52:48
right to live, their right to have their dignity fulfilled and we all need
52:56
to support this goal and its achievement. The UN and for decades
53:03
has supported the cause of the Palestinian people. However, the means
53:09
of implementation do not exist. Unfortunately, this is a reality and we need to change this reality. The
53:14
security council so far has failed despite many resolutions on the
53:21
question of Palestine has failed to implement any of its resolutions even partially and we need to look into other
53:29
mechanisms for implementation so that we can see the aspirations of the
53:36
Palestinian people met to establish the independent state on their national land
53:42
with East Jerusalem as its capital and Jordan will continue to support this right as we have con always done and we
53:51
will make every effort to make this a reality God willing we support you we
53:59
support the committee and Palestine to achieve its aspirations and the most important and the first issue to address
54:06
is the recognition of the Palestinian state by all the member states of the United Nations and the general assembly
54:13
needs to grant Palestine full-fledged membership. There are procedures that
54:19
need to be taken in the near future. This includes the two-state solution
54:25
conference that will be held next June co-chared by the Kingdom of Saudi
54:32
Arabia and France. We need to send a clear message during this conference on how to realize
54:40
all these aspirations. I thank you. I thank the permanent representative of
54:45
Jordan. Next, I invite the distinguished representative of
54:53
China. Chair, I thank the committee on the exercise of the inel rights of the
55:00
Palestinian people for organizing today’s commemoration. 77 years ago, more than half of the
55:05
Palestinian people were expelled or fled from their homes during the Arab-Israeli war. And they have since embarked on the
55:12
arduous journey of striving for their legitimate rights and interests. Today, 77 years later, the historical
55:18
injustices suffered by the Palestinian people have not only remained unaddressed, but have worsened.
55:24
The war in Gaza has raged on for 19 months, claiming the lives of more than 53,000 Gazans and leaving the once
55:31
beautiful cities and towns in ruins. Israel’s escalating siege on Gaza
55:37
has led to an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe for 2 million people who
55:42
face the threat of forced relocation. The continued expansion of settlements
55:47
in the West Bank and the intensifying settler violence have relentlessly squeezed the space for the Palestinian
55:54
people and eroded the basis of the two-state solution. The question of Palestine at
56:01
the core of the Middle East is important to the region’s peace, stability, and long-term security. The implementation
56:08
of the two-state solution is the only viable way to resolve the question. The
56:13
imperative now is to immediately realize a lasting ceasefire in Gaza and alleviate the humanitarian disaster.
56:21
Israel must implement the Security Council and the GA resolutions, comply with the ICJ’s provisional measures and
56:28
advisory opinion immediately, seize all military attacks and violations of
56:34
international law, especially IHL, lift the blockade of Gaza, stop settlement
56:40
activities in the West Bank, and curb settler violence.
56:46
The major powers with significant influence over the parties concerned should uphold an impartial and objective
56:52
position take tangible action to calm the fighting in Gaza and ease tensions in the West Bank.
57:00
Chair, on the question of Palestine, China upholding fairness and justice remains steadfast in its support for the
57:06
just cause of the Palestinian people to restore their legitimate national rights, for the early establishment of a
57:12
fully sovereign and independent state of Palestine based on 1967 borders with
57:17
East Jerusalem as its capital and for the early admission of the state of Palestine as a full member of the UN.
57:25
China supports the Gaza recovery and reconstruction plan jointly launched by Egypt and Arab countries and looks
57:31
forward to the high level conference on the two-state solution to be held by France and Saudi Arabia in June which
57:37
will give new impetus to its implementation. China will continue to work tirelessly with all peaceloving
57:43
countries to promote the implementation of the two-state solution and to realize a comprehensive, just and lasting
57:49
solution to the question of Palestine at an early date so that Nakba day will
57:54
forever remain in the past. Thank you, chair. I thank the distinguished representative
58:01
of China. Now I invite the permanent representative of Guyana to take the
58:07
floor. Mr. Chair, thank you for convening
58:12
today’s commemoration and my appreciation to all the speakers in this
58:18
opening session. Chair, the Nagbore remains one of the most profound markers in history
58:25
of loss, injustice, and violence. However, a greater tragedy is the fact
58:32
that the illegalities of the Nagba have been unadressed close to eight decades.
58:39
Equally tragic is that these very il illegalities continue to be perpetrated
58:45
even today as the Palestinian people experience dispossession and
58:50
displacement on a daily basis characterized by demolition of property,
58:56
attacks on civilians, and evictions from their own land. In the face of this
59:02
ongoing injustice, the international community, including the United Nations,
59:08
must continue its strong advocacy to end the Israeli occupation of Palestine in
59:14
accordance with the July 2024 advisory opinion of the International Court of
59:20
Justice and relevant resolutions adopted by the United Nations. That occupation, as in all
59:28
situations where people’s right to self-determination has been denied, has
59:33
frozen the Palestinian people’s right to live in peace and dignity in their
59:39
independent state. The occupation remains an affront to all that the
59:44
United Nations was built on and Guyana urges her collective efforts to end this
59:50
system that has held an entire nation hostage for close to eight decades.
59:56
Allow me to underscore three critical steps that we must pursue at this juncture with the objective of ending
1:00:04
the Nagba once and for all. First, the ongoing violations and of international
1:00:09
law must no longer be carried out with impunity. We must ensure full
1:00:15
accountability. The international system will continue to be eroded and even risks collapse if there continues to be
1:00:23
an uneven application of the legal norms and standards that we have collectively
1:00:29
developed. We take this opportunity to call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza
1:00:34
and for the end of Israel’s hostilities in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem. Second, there must be
1:00:41
redress for all the wrongs perpetrated against the Palestinian people. Redress
1:00:47
begins with the exercise of the right to return and Israel’s withdrawal to the
1:00:52
pre-1967 lines. Third, we can no longer delay the establishment of the
1:00:59
independent state of Palestine. The majority of member states have recognized the state of Palestine and
1:01:06
were prepared to admit it as a full UN member state last year. It is highly
1:01:11
regrettable that the will of the majority did not prevail. But we must not give up. We must never give up.
1:01:18
Guyana therefore looks forward to the June conference for clear actions towards the two-state solution. Guyana
1:01:26
remains in full solidarity with the Palestinian people and support their just cause. I thank
1:01:33
you. I thank the permanent representative of Guyana. Next, I invite
1:01:39
the distinguished representative of Bolivia to take the floor.
1:01:46
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, the Pluran National State of Bolivia joins this
1:01:52
commemoration of the anniversary of the Nakba, which marked the beginning of the forced displacement and dispossession of
1:01:59
the Palestinian people in 1948. Now, today, 76 years later, more than 7
1:02:06
million Palestinian refugees continue to be deprived of their right to to return,
1:02:12
and the suffering of the Palestinian people continues under occupation, blockade, violence, and denial of their
1:02:19
fundamental rights. The Nakba is not simply a memory of the past. It is an open wound of the
1:02:27
pres in the present. It is the cries of a a mother who’s lost her her ch her her
1:02:33
house. It is the youth living in the rubble. It manifests in each illegal uh
1:02:41
settlement that is built in each demolished house and in each right that is denied
1:02:48
to an entire people. Bolivia strongly condemns these crimes and reiterates its
1:02:54
unconditional support for the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination and to live in a
1:03:01
free, sovereign and independent state. Justice cannot be the privilege
1:03:06
of the of some and impunity cannot uh be a
1:03:13
punishment of the for the weak. Nakba is at the heart of the suffering of the Palestinian people. demands that we act
1:03:19
with humanity and not to look away. We cannot allow for the pain of an entire
1:03:24
people to continue to be silenced by the indifference of the world. Bolivia through the voice of its people and the
1:03:31
memory of its own combat will continue to raise the voice for Palestine for true peace and for justice that heals
1:03:39
and for the dignity of the entire Palestinian people. Thank you. I thank the distinguished representative of
1:03:45
Bolivia. Next, I invite the distinguished representative of Turkey
1:03:51
to take the floor. Thank you, chair. I also thank the speakers for their
1:03:56
remarks. Today, we gather in solemn recognition of Nagba, the catastrophe,
1:04:02
marking the mass displacement pal of Palestinians in 1948 and the enduring
1:04:07
trauma that has followed generations since. We stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people and support them in
1:04:13
their search for accountability, justice, equality, and peace. The Nagba
1:04:19
is not a moment in history confined to the past. Its impacts are ongoing, felt
1:04:25
through continued displacement and the struggle for justice and self-determination. Since October 7, we
1:04:32
have often heard that the Palestinians are going through another Nakba. The Israeli Palestinian conflict has entered
1:04:39
its most severe phase in decades, causing unprecedented human loss and hindering the pursuit of a two-state
1:04:46
solution. The international community must act urgently to enforce a ceasefire in Gaza, ensure unimpeded humanitarian
1:04:53
access, support, and back reconstruction efforts in coordination with the Arab plan.
1:05:00
After decades of efforts, it is evident that the two-state solution remains the only viable path to achieving peace,
1:05:06
justice, and lasting stability in the region. In this context, the upcoming
1:05:12
June conference offers a unique and timely opportunity to pursue a just and comprehensive resolution to the
1:05:17
conflict. We place our trust in the leadership of Saudi Arabia and France in guiding this process and we call on the
1:05:24
international community to reaffirm its commitment to the two-state solution and to take meaningful concrete steps to
1:05:31
help bring this vision to life. Turkey will continue to work towards a political solution based on the
1:05:36
two-state vision. Thank you. I thank the distinguished representative
1:05:42
of Turkey. Next, I invite the permanent representative of Saudi Arabia to take
1:05:49
the floor. Excellency, in the name of Allah, most gracious,
1:05:55
most merciful, Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen, I would like at the outset to
1:06:02
extend my sincere thanks to the committee on the exercise of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian
1:06:08
people for holding this special occasion and
1:06:15
meeting which marks a painful memory in the conscience of humanity and marks the
1:06:22
beginning of continuing suffering of the Palestinian people since 194. 48. This
1:06:29
memory is not just confined to reminding us of a painful point in history, but
1:06:37
it’s a constant reminder of the constant suffering of the Palestinian people for more than 70 years. The Nakba resulted
1:06:45
in mass displacement and disposition of Palestinians who are deprived of their
1:06:51
basic rights including the right of return and living in dignity on their
1:06:56
land. This catastrophe is vivid as we see today and
1:07:02
the Palestinian people are undergoing political and economic and humanitarian challenges.
1:07:10
Commemorating the NKBA highlights the need to work tirelessly towards the solution
1:07:17
to restore the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people. The kingdom stresses
1:07:22
the need for the international community to shoulder its responsibilities and to support the efforts towards ending this
1:07:29
prolonged conflict to guarantee security and stability in the region. Mr. Chair
1:07:35
the position of the kingdom visav the question of Palestine has been principled and steadfast and has not
1:07:40
changed. It is the central question for the kingdom and the Arab and Islamic worlds. It is one of the most longest
1:07:48
conflicts in modern history. the Palestinian people have been violated in a compre on a comprehensive level that
1:07:54
included blockade, continued aggression and displacement and the
1:08:02
current suffering in the Gaza Strip which has led to a catastrophic
1:08:07
unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe. In this regard, the kingdom expresses its
1:08:14
concern about the continued Israeli aggression in Gaza, which has led to the killing of more than 52,000
1:08:20
Palestinians, mostly women and children, and tens of thousands who have been injured, and the almost full destruction
1:08:27
of the civilian infrastructure, including hospital, schools, and shelter.
1:08:33
The kingdom also condemns the continued illegal settlement activity in East
1:08:39
Jerus Jerusalem and the plans for force displacement which is a violation of
1:08:44
international law and undermines the chances of peace intentionally. Here we
1:08:49
work in cooperation with the Republic of France to organize an international conference next June
1:08:56
to work towards peace and the two-state solution in accordance with the
1:09:02
resolutions of international legitimacy. We stress that the comprehensive and lasting peace requires addressing the
1:09:09
root causes of the conflict and bringing justice for the Palestinian people through ending conflict and violations
1:09:15
and supporting international effort to bring peace and stability in the region. In closing, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
1:09:22
reiterates that it will continue to support the legitimate rights of the
1:09:27
Palestinian people and the establishment of their independent state on the 1967
1:09:33
borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. And we call for concerted international effort towards just and
1:09:38
lasting peace and peace, security, and stability in the region. I thank you, Mr. Chief.
1:09:47
I thank the distinguished uh permanent representative of Saudi Arabia. Next, I
1:09:53
invite the distinguished representative of Malaysia.
1:09:59
Thank you, Mr. Chair, for giving me the floor. Thank you as well to Miss Nora for her powerful briefing. Mr. Chair,
1:10:07
today marks the 77th anniversary of the 1948 Nagba.
1:10:12
Instead of commemorating a dark chapter in the past, the Palestinian people are
1:10:18
being forced to go through this horrific episode today. The UN special committee to
1:10:25
investigate Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people and other Arabs of the occupied
1:10:31
territories of which you, Mr. There is AR member recently published an end of
1:10:38
mission statement following a visit to Aman which stated that and I quote,
1:10:43
“Israel continues to inflict unimaginable suffering on the people living under its occupation whilst
1:10:51
rapidly expending confiscation of land as part of its wider colonial
1:10:56
aspirations.” unquote. And I quote again, “What we are witnessing could very well be another
1:11:06
Nagba.” It is evidently clear that Israel seeks to erase Palestine by
1:11:13
dehumanizing Palestinians, forcibly displacing them from their homes and appropriating their
1:11:20
land. Its leaders unashamedly call for a second Nagba of the Palestinians.
1:11:26
Its government is actively dismantling UNRA, a UN agency mandated by the
1:11:32
General Assembly and witness to the plight of the Palestinian refugees. Its
1:11:37
military is brazenly violating humanit international humanitarian law by
1:11:42
murdering humanitarians and targeting whatever remaining civilian in
1:11:47
infrastructure providing life-saving services to Palestinians. Yet the
1:11:53
international community appears to only be able to watch helplessly as the
1:11:58
genocide against Palestinians unfold before our eyes. Holding Israel accountable for its
1:12:05
viable grave violations of international law is long overdue. Enough evidence has been
1:12:11
gathered and presented for all of us to see. The question before us now is what is
1:12:19
the international community’s decisive response to prevent another Nagba of the
1:12:24
Palestinian people and stop the genocidal actions of Israel. In the
1:12:30
absence of punitive actions imposed by the Security Council, states in their
1:12:35
individual capacity or collectively can also undertake measures to pressure Israel to cease its atrocities against
1:12:43
Palestinians. and to pursue a path of peace. These should include, but are not
1:12:50
limited to, the sessation of exports and imports of arms, munitions, and weapons
1:12:56
systems to and from Israel, severing all economic relations with the settlement
1:13:02
enterprise, and imposing sanctions against settlers and the settlement regime as a whole. Mr. Chair, the
1:13:10
situation on the ground in the occupied Palestinian territory warrants our immediate attention and action. The high
1:13:17
level international conference for the peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine and the implementation of the
1:13:22
two-state solution this June can and must be a pivotal point to reverse the
1:13:28
attempts by Israel to alter the status quo on the ground. Malaysia will
1:13:34
continue to speak in defense of the inalable rights of the Palestinian people to
1:13:39
self-determination and will work closely with other members of the committee and the wider UN membership towards
1:13:45
achieving the independence of the state of Palestine. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I thank the distinguished representative
1:13:52
of Malaysia. Next, I invite the distinguished representative of Namibia
1:13:57
to take the floor. Thank you for giving Namibia the floor
1:14:04
to address this gathering during a critical moment in the lives of the Palestinian people as they continue to
1:14:11
fight for their basic rights. Today, as we reflect on the theme, international
1:14:17
action towards ending Nagba and realizing the inalienable rights of the Palestinian
1:14:23
people, we are reminded that the Nagba is a continuing reality.
1:14:29
The force displacement, dispossession, and occupation has continued for 77
1:14:35
years. For the Palestinian people, the Nagbis live daily as they endure military brutality through the
1:14:42
disproportionate use of force, killing of civilians, the use of starvation as a
1:14:47
method of warfare, the demolition of homes and civilian infrastructure, the
1:14:53
ensuing humanitarian crisis, and the persistent denial of their fundamental
1:14:58
human rights. Namibia knows the cost of injustice. We have emerged from our own
1:15:04
long struggle against colonial domination and apartheite. It is from
1:15:09
this history that we derive our engagement on the Palestinian question.
1:15:15
The people of Palestine have suffered for far too long and they deserve peace.
1:15:20
Their rights must be upheld alongside those of the Israelis. We therefore call
1:15:26
for sustained political will from Israel and all polit member states to revive a
1:15:33
credible peace process that has at its core the fundamental rights of the people of Palestine. We further call for
1:15:41
an immediate ceasefire in the current 19-monthlong conflict to end the untold
1:15:47
suffering. The upcoming June 2025 high level international conference on
1:15:52
Palestine offers such an opportunity to restore justice and peace for the
1:15:57
Palestinian people. I thank you. I thank the distinguished representative
1:16:03
of Namibia. Next, I invite the distinguished representative of Venezuela.
1:16:10
[Music]
1:16:16
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. We are grateful for the convening of this
1:16:22
meeting to commemorate uh yet another anniversary of the disaster that for
1:16:27
over 77 years has been suffered by the heroic Palestinian people who’s been
1:16:32
displaced and uh uh and uh uh uprooted
1:16:39
from their uh homeland since 1948. We also are grateful for all the
1:16:44
interventions who uh of those who spoke in the opening segment of this meeting.
1:16:50
Mr. Chairman, 77 years have uh have elapsed since hundreds of millions of
1:16:56
Palestinians were uprooted from their ancestral lands, their homes destroyed, and their communities destroyed. For the
1:17:02
Palestinian people, the Nagba is not only a historical moment, but rather a
1:17:07
daily reality of exile, occupation, and systemic injustice.
1:17:13
It is the daily experience of millions of men, women, and children who continue
1:17:19
to be denied their most basic rights, including the right of return, the right
1:17:26
to free determination, and the right to live in peace and with dignity.
1:17:33
With this in mind, allow me to reiterate the firm support and
1:17:39
unshakable solidarity of the people and government of Venezuela uh for the just Palestinian cause.
1:17:47
Guided by the most elementary principles of international law, human rights, and the dignity of all peoples, we would
1:17:54
like to reiterate our wholehearted support for the inalienable rights of Palestine and its legitimate aspiration
1:18:02
to establish an independent and sovereign state with East Jerusalem as
1:18:07
its capital within the pre967 borders.
1:18:13
The fight of the Palestinian people is a fight for humanity.
1:18:19
This is why we would like to express the hope so that the uh upcoming
1:18:24
international high level conference under the opaces of the general assembly moves us closer to that goal in that
1:18:31
direction and makes it possible to make a reality once and for all uh the
1:18:36
legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people based on the two-state solution and uh the uh
1:18:44
definitive integration of Palestine as a fullyfledged member of the United Nations. Mr.
1:18:49
Chairman, the Nagba reminds us of the urgent need to move towards a much
1:18:57
needed process of accountability to put an end to the prevailing cycle of
1:19:03
impunity. Justice cannot be postponed and should not be compromised. This
1:19:09
historic moment calls for us uh to reflect and reminds us of the moral
1:19:15
responsibility of the international community to defend the principles enshrined in the United Nations Charter
1:19:21
and to demand that those who violate its precepts be judged for their
1:19:27
actions even uh when they especially when this is
1:19:33
part of a clear policy of aggression geared towards exterminating an entire people. We’d like to reiterate our
1:19:40
rejection of the policies of occupation, settlement, and apartheid that continue to aggravate day after day the suffering
1:19:46
of the Palestinian people. We denounce the illegal expansion of settlements, the blockade of Gaza, the displacement
1:19:52
of families, and of all the forms of collective punishment that violate international humanitarian law.
1:20:00
Today, as we honor the memory of the Nakba together with the Palestinian people in its continued uh combat, we
1:20:08
would like to make an appeal to all nations to uh step up their efforts in the search for a just and lasting peace.
1:20:16
A peace rooted in dignity, sovereignty, and their right to self-determination.
1:20:21
The Palestinian cause is the cause of free peoples. It is a cause that
1:20:27
responds to the universal yearning for freedom, justice, and a future in which
1:20:34
no people lives under occupation, oppression, or domination. Mr.
1:20:40
Chairman, I conclude by reaffirming the historic comp commitment of the
1:20:46
Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela uh to the noble Palestinian people. We will
1:20:52
continue raising our voice in all international forms until justice prevails, until the Nagba uh ceases to
1:20:59
be a reality in the present and becomes a memory superseded by peace, dignity
1:21:04
and freedom. Thank you very much. I thank the distinguished representative of
1:21:10
Venezuela. Next, I invite the distinguished representative of Brazil.
1:21:17
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Uh, Minister Mansour,
1:21:23
colleagues, today we remember the pain and injustice imposed on generations of
1:21:28
Palestinians. As others have said, the Nagba is much more than a tragic historical event. It
1:21:36
is an ongoing catastrophe. Not only are its consequences still felt
1:21:41
today by millions, but also Palestinians continue to be forcely displaced
1:21:46
throughout the occupied territory of the Palestinian state. In Gaza, repeated
1:21:52
evacuation orders, including the latest and most sweeping one in Gaza City,
1:21:58
often affect the effect affect the same people over and over again. It is a
1:22:04
present- day unending Nakba. In the West Bank, tens of thousands have been
1:22:09
progressively displaced over the years and especially in recent months. Brazil
1:22:15
strongly condemns all forms of force displacement of Palestinians from their lands. It is illegal and severely
1:22:24
undermines prospects for sustainable peace and threaten the viability of this two-state solution which is paramount to
1:22:32
bring lasting peace for both Palestinians and Israelis and for the entire region as well. The scale of
1:22:39
suffering, destruction, and forced displacement witnessed in recent months must not be malized or accepted.
1:22:47
The conflict and the persistent violation of the inelainable rights of the Palestinian people, particularly the
1:22:54
right to self-determination, must end. For this to happen, the international
1:23:00
community must act with much more resolve, effectiveness, and urgency in
1:23:06
complying with its obligation not to recognize as legal the situation arising
1:23:11
from the unlawful presence of Israel in the occupied territory of the Palestinian state, promoting the
1:23:18
realization of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, and ensuring
1:23:23
accountability for crimes committed against the Palestinian people. Brazil is committed to actively
1:23:29
contributing to the success of the upcoming high level international conference for the peaceful settlement
1:23:34
of the question of Palestine and the implementation of the two-state solution. It constitutes a timely and
1:23:41
crucial opportunity to reaffirm the international consensus around the two-state solution and to take
1:23:48
meaningful and concrete steps towards its implementation. With that in mind, Brazil reaffirms its
1:23:55
unwavering support for the two-state solution based on the 1967 borders with
1:24:01
Israel and Palestine living side by side in peace and security and with East Jerusalem as the capital of a sovereign,
1:24:08
independent, and viable state of Palestine. I thank you.
1:24:13
I thank the distinguished representative of Brazil. Next I invite the
1:24:18
distinguished representative of Pakistan.
1:24:23
Thank you Mr. Chair. We also thank the distinguished speakers for their remarks. Excellencies, dear colleagues,
1:24:30
today we solemnly commemorate the 77th anniversary of the Nakba, the
1:24:35
catastrophic event that marks the mass displacement and dispossession of the Palestinian people.
1:24:41
This day is a painful reminder of the enduring injustice suffered by generations of Palestinians and a solemn
1:24:48
occasion to reaffirm our collective commitment to the realization of their inalienable rights. The Nagba was not a
1:24:55
singular event. It marked the beginning of a deliberate and systematic campaign to erase a people from their land,
1:25:03
culture, and history. Palestinians were forcibly expelled from their homes.
1:25:09
Villages were destroyed or depopulated and an entire nation was scattered across refugee camps and
1:25:16
exiled. This historic injustice remains unresolved with millions of Palestinian
1:25:22
refugees today still awaiting the justice promised to them by the international
1:25:27
community. Even as we gather today, the Nagba remains an ongoing reality. In the
1:25:34
West Bank, over 40,000 Palestinians have been uprooted since January, the largest
1:25:40
such displacement since 1967. This silent Nagba is marked by
1:25:46
escalating settler violence, military raids, and a relentless expansion of
1:25:51
illegal settlements. Israel’s annexation policies, now extended even to Gaza, demonstrate a
1:26:00
clear intent to erase Palestinian identity and severe any Romanian any
1:26:06
remaining territorial integrity and contiguity in flagrant defiance and
1:26:11
violation of international law. In Gaza, the suffering has reached
1:26:16
catastrophic proportions. More than 52,000 people have perished since
1:26:22
October 2023 after more than nine weeks of total blockade, indiscriminate bombardment
1:26:30
from air, land, and sea and a devastating escalation of ground operations. The territory lies in ruins.
1:26:38
Mr. Chair, Pakistan emphasizes that a permanent and unconditional ceasefire is
1:26:44
essential. Resolution 2735 of the Security Council
1:26:49
must be fully implemented across the occupied Palestinian territory, including the West Bank. Unimpeded,
1:26:57
impartial and unconditional humanitarian aid must be allowed in. These are not
1:27:04
privileges. These are preconditions, basic preconditions for surv survival of human life.
1:27:12
History has shown that ending the violence without ending the occupation only invites future cycles of conflict.
1:27:21
The Palestinian people deserve a credible, irreversible political path forward toward a sovereign, independent,
1:27:29
contiguous and a viable state of Palestine based on the 1967 borders will
1:27:35
with alkud al- Sharif as its capital. In this context, the upcoming June
1:27:41
conference on the realization of the two-state solution co-chared by France and Saudi Arabia represents a critical
1:27:48
opportunity. It must deliver tangible outcomes. A clear timeline for Palestinian statethood, a freeze and
1:27:55
reversal of settlement expansion, concrete measures to protect civilians and holy sites, and full equal and
1:28:03
rightful membership of Palestine in the United Nations. Mr. Chair Pakistan firmly
1:28:10
believes that sustainable peace in Middle East cannot be built on the normalization of
1:28:15
occupation. More than 75 years of failure have shown one immutable truth.
1:28:21
Peace cannot exist with occupation. Justice cannot thrive under
1:28:27
apartheide. And stability cannot take root where millions remain
1:28:32
stateless. The world knows what must be done. We know the ultimate path to peace. Having endorsed the framework for
1:28:39
a just settlement of a Palestinian question in numerous resolutions over the
1:28:45
decades. Mr. Chair, Pakistan stands in unwavering solidarity with the
1:28:50
Palestinian people. We reaffirm our commitment to their struggle for freedom, justice, and dignity. The
1:28:56
international community must not merely acknowledge the Palestinian tragedy, but
1:29:02
actively work to rectify it. As long as injustice prevails, our solidarity must
1:29:09
remain steadfast for the cause of Palestine is a cause of humanity and
1:29:14
universal justice. I thank you. I thank the distinguished
1:29:20
representative of Pakistan. Next, I invite the distinguished representative
1:29:25
of Kuba. Senor President, Mr.
1:29:32
Chairman, we’re grateful for convening of this important meeting.
1:29:39
We uh commemorate another anniversary of the Palestinian Nagba when in
1:29:44
1948 hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were displaced by force
1:29:49
from their homes and their lands. An extermination that continues
1:29:55
today under Israeli bombs. This monumental
1:30:01
injustice has counted on the complicity and the financial, political and
1:30:07
military and logistical support of the government of the United States, which
1:30:14
seeks to force the uh exit of the Palestinians from their lands with the
1:30:20
clear goal of usering those lands indefinitely. This is clearly unacceptable. We would like to express
1:30:27
our strongest condemnation for the force displacement
1:30:32
of the Palestinian population from the territory that belongs to them. We
1:30:41
condemn in the strongest terms the killing of civilians
1:30:46
especially of children, women and humanitarian workers of the United
1:30:53
Nations system. indiscriminate bombing, including
1:30:58
against refugee camps, the destruction of h housing, hospitals, and civilian
1:31:05
infrastructure, as well as the deprivation of basic services,
1:31:12
water, electricity, and fuel to the Palestinian people, which significantly
1:31:18
uh compound the precarious humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip. 50
1:31:26
2,928 Palestinians have been killed by Israel. Half a million
1:31:32
uh are on the verge of famine due to the Israeli blockade of humanitarian aid.
1:31:39
71,000 children younger than 5 years old are at risk of suffering acute
1:31:46
malnutrition. There can be no doubt about genocide. We reiterate the uh
1:31:53
urgent need for a broad uh just and
1:31:58
lasting solution to Israeli Palestinian conflict on the basis of uh two-state
1:32:05
solution that allows the Palestinian people to exercise their right to free
1:32:10
determination and to uh obtain an independent and sovereign state within
1:32:17
the pre967 border. ers with East Jerusalem
1:32:23
as their capital and that also guarantees the right of return of
1:32:30
refugees. We reiterate the appeal for an immediate ceasefire as a urgent
1:32:36
priority. The Security Council must act without further delay.
1:32:43
Palestine must be admitted immediately as a fullyfledged member of the United
1:32:50
Nations. Humanitarian aid must reach those in need. The humanitarian blockade
1:32:57
must be lifted unconditionally. With this in mind, we
1:33:03
reiterate the support for the work of ANRA, which has been essential in
1:33:09
providing assistance to the Palestinian people. The international community must
1:33:14
to take concrete steps to achieve these goals. The international conference in
1:33:21
June is an opportunity for the international
1:33:27
community to take concrete steps aimed at putting at stopping the genocide and
1:33:33
the attempts at annexation. an opportunity to advocate for an end to Israeli occupation and for independence
1:33:40
and full sovereignty of the Palestinian state and to implement the two-state
1:33:46
solution which means advocating for peace, security and prosperity of human
1:33:54
humanity. We hope that our dreams for the Palestinian people do not end once
1:34:00
again diluted wind up diluted. Cuba would like to reiterate its solidarity with
1:34:06
Palestine. Our position is clear and has has in has never changed. Thank you very
1:34:12
much. I thank the distinguished representative of Kuba. Next, I invite the
1:34:19
distinguished permanent representative of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Thank you. You have the
1:34:25
floorman. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Nba day was indeed a disastrous
1:34:31
catastrophe that befell not just Palestine but the whole world and
1:34:37
humanity. Palestinian people were un uprooted on that day from their
1:34:43
ancestral homes for simply displaced persecuted collectively denied of their
1:34:50
fundamental right including those as the rightful owners of their own land. Yet
1:34:56
that was not the end of catastrophe, but unfortunately just the beginning. From
1:35:02
that day up until now, the Palestinian people have constantly been victimized,
1:35:08
persecuted, deprived of their homeland, and suffered immense and unspeakable
1:35:14
injustice. The Nakbad day did not stop, but has exacerbated over decades. Nakba
1:35:21
days is ongoing forever. 77 years now. The current catastrophic
1:35:27
situation in Palestine is self-evident and needs no elaboration as the world is
1:35:34
well cognizant of the magnitude of appalling brutality of the Israeli
1:35:40
regime committing atrocious crime including genocide on war
1:35:46
crimes. As we are convened in this meeting, the Israeli regime with the aid and assistance of United States is
1:35:54
deliberately targeting hospitals, schools, women, children, UN staff, journalists and so forth, which has led
1:36:02
to death of 60,000 of people and much higher number injured, missing and still
1:36:09
under robels. Evidence of egregious crime of the regime are abundant and
1:36:15
undeniable. The International Court of Justice and other relevant courts are
1:36:20
fully aware of the extent of savagery of the regime. Mr. share. Not withstanding
1:36:28
throughout these decades and even nowadays Palestinian people have been
1:36:33
enduring another form of grave injustice and that is a false narrative propagated
1:36:40
by Israeli regime and its supporters especially the United States that the aim to change the place of victims and
1:36:49
culprit to hypocritically call for the peace in the region but in fact expand
1:36:55
the scale of genocide and aggression to claim the importance of human rights but
1:37:01
actually grossly violate such rights of Palestinians to claim freedom of speech
1:37:07
but eventually suppressing innocent people who call for ending the carnage
1:37:13
to claim freedom of information but in reality whitewash the horrendous crimes
1:37:21
of the Israeli regime. That is exactly why Nakba day should be remembered. It
1:37:27
should be commemorated to bear the mind that the Israel which has been implanted
1:37:33
on the basis of occupation, apartheid and terror would only plague the region
1:37:39
and the world with death and destruction as we witness in plain slide today. to
1:37:47
reaffirm that the true and rightful honors of the Palestinian or the Palestinian people as a whole respective
1:37:55
of their religion and that they should return to their homeland. At the end, I
1:38:02
say the opportunity to remember the day once again, some barely in the name of
1:38:07
all Palestinians who lost their lives in defending their beloved Palestine and to
1:38:13
retrade continued solidarity of the Islamic Republic of Iran with the Palestinian people. I thank you.
1:38:20
I thank the distinguished permanent representative of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
1:38:26
Next, I invite the distinguished representative of Tunisia,
1:38:32
Shukran. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the briefers and the committee.
1:38:39
Once again, we support your work. Mr. chair. The 77th commemoration of the
1:38:46
Nakba is an opportunity to remember the uh courage of the Palestinian people in
1:38:53
fighting the injustice for decades to achieve their legitimate demands to live
1:39:00
in an independent and sovereign state on the Palestinian territory. This
1:39:06
commemoration is held as the genocide continues and the oppression blockade on
1:39:13
Gaza continue. Israel continues to target all the basic life services to Palestinians
1:39:21
without any accountability in a blatant violation and unprecedented violations of all
1:39:28
international instruments and legal uh operations. We stand in solidarity
1:39:36
with the Palestinian people which is fighting alone the oppression of the
1:39:41
occupation and the violence of its military while the international community stands idly by. This brotherly
1:39:50
people is going through another massacre that is unprecedented in its continued
1:39:55
plight to restore its land and its legitimate historic rights.
1:40:02
We would like to express our solidarity to the Palestinian people in their fight
1:40:08
uh to uh enjoy their inalienable rights. We reaffirm our position towards the uh
1:40:16
Palestinian brothers and sisters to ensure their self-determination and recover their legitimate rights while
1:40:22
establishing their state with Alkot A Sharif as its capital. My country will
1:40:29
continue to fight for international and humanitarian legitimacy and we will continue to fight for the Palestinian
1:40:36
cause and providing uh support to every initiative to reach a just and
1:40:42
comprehensive solution that will restore the rights to their bearers and achieve stability and security in the region.
1:40:48
Thank you, Mr. Chair. The distinguished representative of Tunisia. Next, I invite the distinguished representative
1:40:55
of Qatar. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Uh, at the outset,
1:41:00
allow me to express on behalf of the state of Qatar our sincere appreciation to the committee on the exercise of the neil rights of the Palestinian people
1:41:06
for convening this important meeting to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Palestinian Nekba. We commend the
1:41:12
tireless efforts of the committee and the secretariat and keeping the just cause of the Palestinian people at the center of the international agenda. The
1:41:19
state of Qatar reiterates his firm and unwavering support for the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people,
1:41:24
including the right to self-determination, the establish the establishment of their independent state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem
1:41:32
as its capital, and the return of refugees in accordance with international law and relevant UN resolutions. Since the tragic events of
1:41:39
October 7, the state of Qatar has actively engaged in mediation efforts to deescalate tensions, facilitate
1:41:45
humanitarian access, and advocate for the protection of civilians. Uh, as stated by his
1:41:51
excellency, the Prime Minister, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Qatar has consistently emphasized the importance of an immediate ceasefire, stopping
1:41:57
bloodshed, protecting civilians, and preventing the expansion of the conflict. Qatar has worked closely with
1:42:02
international partners, including Egypt and the United States, to achieve these objectives. Looking ahead, the state of
1:42:08
Qatar will co-chair one of the working groups at the upcoming international conference on the two-state solution, which will be co-chared by France and
1:42:14
the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and held in June in New York. This conference aims to revitalize collective efforts toward
1:42:20
the realization of a just and lasting peace. Qatar further reaffirms its call
1:42:25
for the for the international community to shoulder it responsibility to end the Israeli occupation and deleate the
1:42:31
suffering of the Palestinian people. Finally, we express our hope that this commemoration will serve as a powerful
1:42:36
reminder of the international community’s responsibility to pursue a just, comprehensive, and lasting peace
1:42:42
in the region. Thank you. I thank the distinguished representative of Qatar.
1:42:48
Next, I invite the distinguished representative of the League of Arab States.
1:42:55
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Allow me to uh thank the general
1:43:01
assembly for holding this meeting to commemorate the Nakba. I would like to
1:43:06
thank the speakers and the briefers, Mr. Khaled Kayari, Mr. Riyad Mansour and Mr.
1:43:14
Ricard for her exceptional uh statement. We have a number of challenges in the
1:43:20
current phase that for example with the Palestinian question. Most importantly
1:43:25
the ceasefire ensuring the delivery of humanitarian assistance ending the
1:43:30
genocide ensuring the implementation of the ICJ advisory
1:43:36
opinions and the ICC uh orders.
1:43:42
improving the recognition of Palestine and ensuring full membership of
1:43:47
Palestine at the UN in light of Israel’s
1:43:53
extremist government’s insistence on refusing to implement the ceasefire and
1:43:59
stopping to implement the agreement mediated by the United States Qatar and
1:44:05
Egypt. The most important thing at this
1:44:11
phase is to start
1:44:17
implementing given UN activities. Israel
1:44:23
has worked with impunity in this organization.
1:44:29
From this basis, the League of Arab States believes that the conference on
1:44:34
the two stateates solution, which will be held in June, is a great opportunity
1:44:41
to stress our international will and to stress that we will continue to work
1:44:47
during the conference to adopt tangible actions that support the
1:44:56
implementation of the two-state solution financially, politically, economically, logistically and in any other way. We
1:45:03
must implement the uh will of the international community, namely the
1:45:09
two-state solution. The two-state solution alliance include includes around 140 states.
1:45:17
There are many references such as the land for peace initiative. We have the Oslo Accords, the Madrid agreements and
1:45:24
others. All of this is a basis for a number of measures that we could take to
1:45:32
implement the two-state solution effectively and this is something that needs to be adopted during this
1:45:38
conference. We look forward to the participation of member states uh
1:45:45
in the preparatory meeting and we look forward to innovative proposals and clear commitments during the
1:45:52
consultations that will be held early until the holding of the
1:45:58
conference. We must move from slogans to action to
1:46:04
end the occupation. And we must support an independent Palestinian state that
1:46:11
has been established since the adoption of the 19 of the 194 resolution. We have
1:46:16
to see it as an active member of the United Nations. This is the letter that
1:46:21
was adopted by the council of ministers at the League of Arab
1:46:28
States and this will be adopted on Saturday 17 May and this
1:46:35
message is a message that was repeated by the OIC and the non-aligned movement.
1:46:41
There are also other groups and organizations that have adopted this uh
1:46:46
uh message or part
1:46:52
thereof. For example, the EU is playing a vital role in this with other
1:46:58
international partners and we are happy that they are supporting the Palestinian question in order to reach these
1:47:05
objectives. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I thank the distinguished representative of the League of Arab States. I now
1:47:12
invite the distinguished representative of Sagal to take the
1:47:18
floor Merc. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Sagal would like to take this
1:47:25
opportunity to reiterate its active and permanent solidarity with the brother
1:47:30
people of Palestine. Mr. chairman, what is happening in Palestine, what has been
1:47:36
happening for the last 70 years and what is getting worse day by day before our
1:47:42
eyes cannot be described in words. Inhuman acts which
1:47:49
unfortunately seem for some people to have become the
1:47:55
norm. Beyond words and slogans, we must act. We must act very
1:48:01
quickly to bring an end to this tragedy so that very
1:48:09
soon when we celebrate the Nakba, we would be celebrating in joy the national
1:48:17
holiday of a state of Palestine, a state of Palestine that has become a fullyfledged member of the United
1:48:23
Nations, a state of Palestine that is peaceful and prosperous.
1:48:28
In order to achieve that the high level international
1:48:35
conference on the peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine and the implementation of the two-state solution
1:48:41
which is supposed to be held in June under the co-presidentidencies of France
1:48:47
and Saudi Arabia needs to be more than just a conference.
1:48:54
It has to be a turning point that is actionoriented and which allows for the
1:49:01
for for strict respect for the rights of Palestinians. With that goal in
1:49:08
mind, rest assured that Seneagal provides its constant
1:49:14
support to this more than just cause of Palestine which as you know remains a
1:49:23
fundamental pillar of our foreign policy. Thank you. I thank the distinguished representative
1:49:30
of Sagal. Next I invite the distinguished representative of South
1:49:39
Africa. Thank you very much uh chairperson. Um at the outset let us
1:49:45
thank the committee on the exercise of the ina rights of the Palestinian people
1:49:51
for organizing this meeting. We also want to thank the speakers for their
1:49:57
remarks. Chairperson, the 77th anniversary of the
1:50:02
Nagba that took place in 1948 is commemorating while the
1:50:08
International Court of Justice has pronounced that a plausible genocide is
1:50:13
being committed against the Palestinian people. Heralding a second and possibly
1:50:20
more destructive iteration of the Nagba with blatant disregard for international
1:50:27
law. the scale of the barbaric and unrelenting
1:50:33
bombardments, the displacement of thousands of Palestinians, the targeting of
1:50:39
humanitarian personnel, United Nations and civilian
1:50:45
infrastructure, the ongoing settlement activities, the hindering of
1:50:51
humanitarian aid and denial of basic services, food,
1:50:58
Water as a weapon of war are particularly poant reminders of the 1948
1:51:06
catastrophe preceding decades long oppression.
1:51:12
South Africa condemns the illegal acts by Israel as the occupying power and
1:51:19
calls for accountability for all the atrocities, the ongoing genocide,
1:51:26
violation of human rights and war crimes committed against the Palestinian
1:51:31
people. Israel’s continued impunity for its actions which show blatant disregard for
1:51:39
international law undermines the credibility of the international system
1:51:45
and international law particularly given the grave nature
1:51:50
of the violations being committed. The obligation to prevent and punish the
1:51:57
crime of genocide is an egonorm obligation that is owed to the
1:52:03
international community as a whole and was a primary motivator in South
1:52:09
Africa’s decision to bring the case of genocide before the international court
1:52:14
of justice. We must be decisive in our resolve to
1:52:20
hold those responsible for the violations of international law,
1:52:25
including international humanitarian law and international human rights law
1:52:31
accountable without exception. South Africa has submitted two dosias to
1:52:38
the United Nations Security Council detailing violations of international
1:52:44
law in Gaza under documents number
1:52:51
s202419 and S/2025130.
1:52:58
Israel’s activities in Gaza are manifest violations of international law and are
1:53:04
in direct defiance of the International Court of Justice’s provisional measures
1:53:10
orders. We call for an immediate ceasefire for full and unhindered access
1:53:17
for humanitarian aid which is desperately needed and the implementation of the
1:53:24
provisional measures granted by the International Court of Justice. The
1:53:29
implementation of resolutions adopted by both the United Nations Security Council
1:53:35
and General Assembly. failure to implement resolutions and
1:53:40
decisions emanating from the principal organs of the United Nations which are indispensable in
1:53:48
safeguarding the very existence of the Palestinian people undermines the purposes and
1:53:55
principles of the UN charter. South Africa will not tire in its
1:54:01
support for the Palestinians quest for self-determination and an independent
1:54:08
contiguous Palestinian state existing side by side with the state of Israel
1:54:14
along the 1967 borders. We stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people
1:54:21
and remain committed to their just cause. We have a responsibility to act
1:54:26
as an international community. South Africa will continue its effort aimed at
1:54:32
realizing a Palestinian state which will enjoy equality among all other nations
1:54:38
of the world. I thank you. I thank the distinguished representative
1:54:44
of South Africa. Next, I invite the distinguished permanent representative
1:54:50
of Nicaragua to take the floor.
1:54:57
Thank you. Distinguished
1:55:03
chairman, before beginning I would like to hail the
1:55:10
heroic Palestinian people in its uh permanent fight for
1:55:16
their freedom. 77 years uh uh since the the permanent
1:55:25
Nagba really of permanent pain
1:55:32
of dismemberment of Palestinian families of this disaster that led to
1:55:40
the violent expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes and that
1:55:47
today today it is the duty of the international community to assume its
1:55:53
responsibility in the face of this injustice by providing
1:55:58
protection and taking practical measures to implement the decisions of international
1:56:04
legitimacy to put a stop to the genocide. Nicaragua denounces the
1:56:10
atrocities that are being committed on palis on occupied Palestinian territories by Israel in particular in
1:56:18
Gaza which has imposed a total blockade since March without a uh delivery of
1:56:23
humanitarian aid and which has constantly inflicted the civilian population with unending
1:56:31
bombing. 70% of the of fatalities are women and children.
1:56:37
Now, the government of Israel has publicly announced its intention of permanently occupying the
1:56:45
Gaza Strip and expel the Palestinian people of more than 2 million people.
1:56:52
Once again, Israel has made public its
1:56:58
intention to continue with its war crimes, genocide, and other violations
1:57:05
of the relevant norms of international law. the states that uh still continue
1:57:11
to support the these crimes cannot deny their knowledge of
1:57:17
the grave illegality of Israel’s conduct and that this generates
1:57:23
obligations pursuant to international law. Nicaragua would like to make an
1:57:28
appeal to all countries that are in clear violations of their vi obligations
1:57:34
under international law. Continue to support the Israeli government politically, financially, and
1:57:40
militarily. We make an appeal to comply with the
1:57:46
relevant norms of international law, including the duty not to recognize
1:57:54
as legitimate the situation created by the legal actions of Israel as confirmed
1:58:00
by the International Court of Justice in its advisory opinion July 2024.
1:58:08
Likewise, in its uh order in April of 2024, the court considered a
1:58:14
particularly important to remind all countries of their international obligations with regard to the transfer
1:58:20
of weapons to an armed conflict. In order to avoid the risk of these uh uh
1:58:27
weapons being used to violate the Geneva Convention and the Convention on Genocide, it is essential to put a stop
1:58:33
to the genocide to apartheid and to war crimes in Palestine. Nicaragua also
1:58:40
wants makes an appeal to the international community to take all concrete and practical
1:58:49
steps in line with what was stated by the international court of justice and the resolutions adopted by the general
1:58:56
assembly. Nicaragua will continue to take all action that we consider
1:59:03
necessary to fulfill our international obligations. The government of national
1:59:08
unity and reconciliation of Nicaragua reaffirms its firm commitment and constant solidarity with
1:59:16
the Palestinian people uh with their right to return to their
1:59:21
freedom, their self-determination, our commitment to a
1:59:28
Palestinian state and their right to be a fullyfledged member of the United Nations. The pain of Palestine is a pain
1:59:35
felt by all peoples around the world and freedom of Palestine is a historic
1:59:40
responsibility to be fulfilled. Thank you very much. I thank the distinguished
1:59:46
permanent representative of Nicaragua. I see no other requests from
1:59:52
member states for the floor. Before closing, I would like to invite
1:59:57
all of you to attend the viewing of a documentary entitled From Ground Zero.
2:00:04
Filmed by 22 artists living under siege in the Gaza Strip, this powerful film
2:00:10
offers a vital and deeply contextualized perspective beyond the brutal live
2:00:16
stream of the war. The screening will take place in this hall at 1:15 p.m. I
2:00:22
invite all of you to join us for the screening of the documentary. Following the screening of
2:00:28
the documentary, uh we also invite you to participate in the committee’s consultations with civil society
2:00:36
organizations. Uh it will be convened also here in the Equosoft Chamber at 300
2:00:42
p.m. today. If there is no other matter to be discussed, the meeting is agend. Thank
2:00:50
you. Okay. Thank you.
2:00:55
Thank you.
oooooo
Geure herriari, Euskal Herriari dagokionez, hona hemen gure apustu bakarra:
We Basques do need a real Basque independent State in the Western Pyrenees, just a democratic lay or secular state, with all the formal characteristics of any independent State: Central Bank, Treasury,
proper currency1, out of the European Distopia and faraway from NATO, being a BRICS partner…
Euskal Herriaren independentzia eta Mikel Torka
eta
Esadazu arren, zer da gu euskaldunok egiten ari garena eta zer egingo dugun
gehi
MTM: Zipriztinak (2), 2025: Warren Mosler
(Pinturak: Mikel Torka)
Gehigarriak:
MTM klase borrokarik gabe, kontabilitate hutsa
Anthony Anastosi: Estatu dirua, Klase borroka
1 This way, our new Basque government will have infinite money to deal with. (Gogoratzekoa: Moneta jaulkitzaileko kasu guztietan, Gobernuak infinitu diru dauka.)
