Public Comment

According to Human Rights Watch, the only option remaining for Palestinians is to seek International Criminal Court jurisdiction over potential war crimes committed on and from Palestinian territory. The former, U.N. special rapporteur, on human rights in the Palestinian territories and emeritus professor of international law at the University of Leiden, in the Netherlands, Dugard, concurs. “Given the fact that Gaza is an occupied territory, it means that Israel’s present assault is simply a way of enforcing the continuation of the occupation, "and the response of the Palestinian militants should be seen as the response of an occupied people that wishes to resist the occupation." After all early settlers in the ‘land of the free, home of the brave’ were accused of ‘terrorism’ - resisting the oppression of the British crown. Dugard sees an exact parallel between apartheid South Africa and Israel. Tragically we have been complicit in Israel’s crimes by supplying it with massive uninterrupted supply of weapons.  

When Obama said “enough” after the UN building was bombed, Israel stopped its assault. How many lives could have been saved had Obama shouted “enough” sooner? According to HRW, eyewitnesses reported the Israel military shot and killed fleeing civilians – yet another blatant war crime. Israeli ambassador’s claim that Israel “deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for its extraordinary restraint” is an abomination.