Palestinian civil society organizations urgently call on the President of the European Commission, Ursula von Der Leyen, and the President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, and the European Union’s (EU) leadership to demand Israel to comply with its obligations under international law, to stop its deliberate targeted attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure in Gaza, including with white phosphorus, to end all forms of collective punishment, to lift the 16-year-long illegal closure and blockade on Gaza, and to rescind the evacuation orders to over one million Palestinians. As a bare minimum, the EU must pressure Israel to facilitate the free passage of humanitarian consignments into Gaza for the immediate delivery of basic supplies necessary for the survival of the population, including food, water and medicine. The EU’s double standards and support of Israeli crimes against the Palestinian people must end now.
On 7 October 2023, Israel launched a full-fledged military offensive on the Gaza Strip, aimed at erasing and reducing the territory to rubble. Under international humanitarian law, “the only legitimate object which States should endeavor to accomplish during war is to weaken the military forces of the enemy”. In pursuing this aim, “the right of the Parties to the conflict to choose methods or means of warfare is not unlimited”.
The resounding silence of the EU leadership on Israeli atrocities committed in Gaza and their blind support for Israel signals that the EU is green-lighting, enabling and encouraging Israel’s military actions, which already may amount to war crimes, crimes against humanity, and incitement to commit genocide.
During a meeting of the Israeli government held on Saturday, 7th of October 2023, May Golan, Israel’s Minister for the Advancement of the Status of Women, announced that: “All of Gaza’s infrastructures must be destroyed to its foundation and their electricity cut off immediately. The war is not against Hamas but against the state of Gaza.” Later that evening, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu declared: “I say to the residents of Gaza: get out of there now, because we will act everywhere and with all the strength.”
These statements unequivocally underlie the intention—turned into action—to carpet bomb Gaza, one of the most densely populated areas in the world, treating the entirety of the territory as one single military objective in breach of sacrosanct principles of international humanitarian law. Palestinian civilians, including one million children, are trapped in Gaza, with no shelter, no food, no water, no electricity, and crippled infrastructure which may collapse at any moment.
And yet, despite blatant evidence of Israel’s intention to perpetrate serious international crimes against Palestinian civilians in Gaza, the response of the EU and the majority of its Member States has been one-sided—to the point of complicity in Israel’s international crimes. An unremitting international blind eye has been turned to the 2,215 Palestinians, including at least 724 children and 458 women, killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza, and to another 8,714 wounded with various injuries, including at least 2,450 children and 1,536 women. Entire Palestinian families have been wiped out. Dozens of bodies are still under the rubble and Israel has turned Gaza from an open-air prison into an open-air morgue.
President von der Leyen shared images of the Berlaymont building, which houses the headquarters of the European Commission, lit up with the colors of the Israeli flag, while announcing her support for the right of Israel to defend itself- “today and in the days to come” and that “[t]he European Union stands with Israel”. At the time of writing, President von der Leyen has not written a single statement calling on Israel to comply with its international legal obligations or denouncing the blatant international crimes committed by Israel in Gaza. Similar unilateral support was shown by the President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola and by several EU Member States.
On 9 October 2023, Yoav Gallant, Israel’s Minister of Defense, stated: "We are imposing a complete siege on [Gaza]. No electricity, no food, no water, no fuel – everything is closed. We are fighting human animals, and we act accordingly”. This statement, which includes genocidal language dehumanizing the Palestinian people as “human animals”, should put the international community on notice of Israel’s incitement to commit acts of genocide, and trigger a strong EU response in terms of its international law duty to prevent.
On 19 October 2022, while addressing the European Parliament, von der Leyen said: “Russia’s attacks against civilian infrastructure, especially electricity, are war crimes. Targeted attacks on civilian infrastructure, with the clear aim of cutting off men, women, children of water, electricity and heating with winter coming—these are acts of pure terror. And we have to call it as such”. No similar declarations were made with respect to Israel’s cutting off electricity, food, water, fuel, and medicine to Gaza. This stark disparity underscores the European leadership’s shameful double standards, which seemingly regards Palestinian lives as second-class, entrenching the apartheid reality.
On 13 October 2023—the same day Israel demanded over one million civilians in northern Gaza evacuate their homes towards areas south of Wadi Gaza—Ursula von der Leyen and Roberta Metsola met with the Israeli leadership. As thousands of Palestinians were forced to leave their homes, in what is the largest forced displacement since the 1948 Nakba, the EU leadership were photographed shaking hands with Israeli President, Isaac Herzog.
We recall that earlier this year, Ursula von der Leyen celebrated Israel’s independence day using racist tropes, denying the Palestinian Nakba, the mass ethnic cleansing of Palestinians which paved the foundation for the State of Israel. Yet again, as a present-day Nakba unfolds before our eyes, President von der Leyen is not just ignoring it, but facilitating it through her statements and presence in the region.
For decades, our organizations have called on the EU to impose sanctions against Israel, pursuant to the EU Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime, for its for its accumulating crime against Palestinians, including wilful killing, arbitrary mass arrests, administrative detentions without due process, property appropriation, destruction, forcible transfer, settler transfer in, collective punishment, persecution, and apartheid amongst others. All our calls remain unheeded. Yet, less than 48 hours after the beginning of Israel’s onslaught in Gaza, EU Commissioner Varhelyi unilaterally and arbitrarily announced that the European Commission intended to cut its aid to the Palestinians living under Israeli military occupation in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. This statement was later retracted by HRVP Borrell. However, other EU Member States have individually decided to cut, review, or suspend aid—including Germany, Sweden, Denmark, and Austria.
We demand that the President of the European Commission, Ursula von Der Leyen, and the President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, fully denounce Israel’s indiscriminate military reprisals against Palestinian civilians and civilian objects in Gaza, and intervene to protect the Palestinian people against Israel’s incitement to genocide.
European leaders must firmly pressure Israel, the Occupying Power, to respect its obligations under international law, including ensuring the vital supply of water, gas, fuel, electricity and basic supplies to Palestinians in Gaza, and to cease any attack on civilians and civilian facilities. European leaders also have a duty to hold Israel accountable for its violations of international law and collective punishment against civilians, including by publicly and unconditionally supporting the current investigation carried out by the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court.
For violence to end, European leaders must address and eradicate the root causes of the ongoing violence, namely, Israel’s seven-decade long settler-colonial enterprise and oppression of the Palestinian people. The Israeli military must fully, unconditionally, and immediately withdraw from the occupied Palestinian territory, as mandated under numerous UN Security Council and UN General Assembly resolutions. The EU must intervene to ensure that Israel dismantles its discriminatory apartheid regime, including by rescinding all discriminatory laws and facilitating the right of return and to self-determination of the Palestinian people.
Signatories:
- Al Mezan Center for Human Rights
- The Palestinian Institute for Public Diplomacy (PIPD)
- The BDS (Boycotts, Divestment, Sanction) movement
- Bisan Center for Research and Development
- The Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy - MIFTAH
- Al-Haq, Law in the Service of Man
- Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC)
- Health Work Committees (HWC)
- Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association
- Defense for Children International – Palestine
- The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights
- The Jerusalem Human Rights Consortium:
- The Jerusalem Legal Aid and Human Rights Centre (JLAC)
- The Land Research Centre (LRC)
- The Society of Saint Yves
- The Women’s Centre for Legal Aid and Counselling (WCLAC)
Urgent Appeal to stop the ongoing Israeli Genocide and Sexual Violence in Gaza
Date posted: March 26, 2024
By MIFTAH
This is an urgent and repeated appeal to the world to immediately intervene, in light of the recent stories of rape and sexual violence against Palestinian women by Israeli occupation forces during Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Palestinian women are being displaced, tortured, killed and forcibly disappeared, while the world sits idle. Silence and inaction in the wake of these horrifying crimes amount to complicity.
Over the past few days, more horrifying testimonies and stories have emerged from Gaza of sadistic acts by Israeli soldiers, including torture, rape, and mass field executions at hospitals where civilians are seeking shelter, medical treatment and refuge.
Palestinian civil society and UN experts have sounded the alarm multiple times and reported cases of rape and sexual violence before and during this genocide. These reports continue to be deliberately and inexcusably ignored, including by prominent and otherwise vocal feminist organizations and figures.
The deafening silence of “Western” feminists and mainstream media in particular is deliberate and inexcusable, as opposed to their earlier outrage over Israeli allegations and misinformation, used to justify this genocide.
Many Palestinian women and girls who are survivors of rape and sexual violence are hesitant to come forward, due to the social stigma in a conservative society and the belief that Israel will not be held accountable for such crimes.
Israel is committing the most horrific war crimes, and weaponizing rape and sexual violence against Palestinians as part of its genocide in Gaza and assault on the Palestinian people as a whole, throughout all of Palestine. This is the result of decades of impunity, preferential treatment and lack of international accountability by the international community. Words are not enough to describe or stop this horror; action is needed.
We conclude this SOS appeal by reminding our sisters and allies around the world that our rights, our dignity, and our humanity are indivisible. Forsaking Palestinian victims now for political convenience would be an unforgivable betrayal to decades of sacrifice and feminist struggle.
We call for:
- The international community must employ all available tools of international accountability, including political and economic sanctions, to bring an immediate and lasting ceasefire and provision of unconditional humanitarian aid.
- States must immediately impose an arms embargo on Israel and honor their moral and legal obligations, including those pronounced in the Genocide Convention.
- States need to investigate and prosecute Israeli soldiers with dual citizenship implicated in these atrocities.
- The Special Representative of the Secretary General on Sexual Violence in Conflict must honor her mandate and launch an immediate investigation into the ongoing atrocities.
- Feminists around the world must sound the alarm globally on the unspeakable human rights violations taking place in Gaza, namely the sexual abuse and rape of Palestinian women and girls.
- Journalists and media outlets must do their due diligence in reporting on these stories through fair and unbiased coverage.
Signatories:
- American Federation of Ramallah Palestine
- Association of women’s Action
- AWMR Italia - Donne della Regione Mediterranea
- Bisan Center for Research and Development
- Community Development and Media Center
- Cultura è libertà una campagna per la Palestina
- Enjaz Foundation for development
- Filastiniyat
- Human Rights and Democracy Media Center SHAMS
- Institute of Women's Studies
- Not to forget women society
- Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA)
- Palestinian Women's Action committee
- Rete Femminista Marche Molto+di194
- Rural Women Development Society
- Sinal do Vale
- Singola
- Teaching Palestine: Pedagogical Praxis and the Indivisibility of Justice
- The center for defense of liberties and civil rights “Hurryyat”
- The Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy - MIFTAH
- The Palestinian Working Woman Society for Development-PWWSD
- The Regional Coalition for Women Human Rights Defenders in Southwest Asia and North Africa (WHRDMENA)
- Union of Palestinian Women Committees
- Wattan media network
- Women Media and Development
- Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
- رابطة المرأة العراقية
- شبكة المستقبل الديمقراطية العراقية
Where are the rights of Palestinian Women on International Women’s Day?
Date posted: March 07, 2024
By Palestinian NGO Forum to Combat Violence against Women
We, at the Palestinian NGO Forum to Combat Violence against Women and all Arab women’s and rights organizations raise our voices loud and clear on the eve of March 8, to say: “Stop the onslaught and crimes against women and children in Gaza. Stop the crime of genocide, the crime of starvation and forced displacement”. So far, this aggression has resulted in the killing of 31,000 Palestinians, over 70% of whom are women and children. Two women are killed every hour , in addition to many others still under the rubble. There are women whose fate is unknown, after being taken away by occupation forces.
Who will restore normalcy for us Palestinian women after these atrocities?
We have always held activities on March 8. We had a long list of rights we demanded and others we were able to achieve. However today, as the women of Gaza are being annihilated, we stand the length and breadth of our homeland and our Arab nations, angry, in a state of revolution and in deep mourning. Our demand today is to halt the genocide in the Gaza Strip and to halt the reproductive genocide against our women. We declare this day the day of Palestinian women, as they stand hungry in long queues, waiting for insufficient aid, terrified of the skies above them, filled with missiles of death. This is for the women whose bodies are exhausted, in camps for the displaced and in shelter centers, for those raped in prison and for their naked bodies stripped at checkpoints. It is for the menstruating women who cannot find sanitary products and for those with high-risk pregnancies who are starving, displaced and bombed. It is for the women whose wombs may be removed for the simplest of medical complications and those whose privacy has been violated because of overcrowded tents and displacement. It is for the mothers who could die at any moment and for all women whose Palestinianism has crucified humanity at the altar, amid deafening Arab silence, boundless American support and the complicity of several European countries.
Nevertheless, we continue to appreciate all forms of Arab and international support and solidarity with the Palestinian cause, which shows respect for our people’s dignity. Widening this solidarity will further reaffirm the justness of our cause. Hence, we await more action and movements in solidarity of our right to demand an immediate end to the genocide in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and Jerusalem, to forge our way forward towards freedom, self-determination and the establishment of an independent and fully-sovereign Palestinian state.
Today, we Palestinian and Arab women, reaffirm the following on March 8 and every day forward:
- To put pressure on Israel to immediately halt its aggression and to hold its leaders accountable for their crimes in violation of international law, the Fourth Geneva Convention and all international laws and treaties, towards delegitimizing this occupying entity.
- To open the Rafah Crossing and all crossings to allow aid in and the wounded out for treatment
- To dismantle the land corridor linking Israel with some Arab countries supplying it with goods
Long Live Palestinian Women, who stand steadfast and resistant in the face of the Zionist aggression We speak in the voices of Gaza’s women and say:
Halt the genocide…halt the onslaught immediately!
MIFTAH calls for international accountability for heinous Israeli crimes
Date posted: February 22, 2024
By MIFTAH
In a recent statement, nearly five months into the Israeli genocide in Gaza, several UN experts confirmed the various reports and testimonies that have been coming from Palestinian women and human rights organizations for months now. In Gaza, women have been kidnapped and forcibly disappeared and placed in dire conditions in undisclosed locations. In the occupied West Bank, released prisoners testified on the horrific realities inside Israeli prisons and the widespread torture and ill-treatment where sexual violence is used as a weapon employed against both women and men. The targeting of women and girls with such atrocious crimes is targeting the most vulnerable, in an attempt to break and degrade the society as a whole.
The inaction and failure of the international community to stop Israeli crimes, namely the ongoing genocide in Gaza, and other heinous crimes all across Palestine for decades now has emboldened Israel to act with impunity. This allows Israel to continue committing horrific crimes against Palestinian women and girls, namely rape and other forms of sexual violence and torture.
The silence of “Western” feminists has also been appalling, given their earlier outrage about unsubstantiated Israeli allegations which were used to justify and commit the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
First and foremost, we demand an immediate ceasefire and the unconditional provision of humanitarian aid. In order to put an end to such heinous crimes and impunity, we reiterate the need for an independent international investigation into all crimes, especially sexual violence, followed by international accountability for the perpetrators.
