ISLAMABAD: Palestinian leaders and activists at a conference held in Islamabad on Tuesday called on the global community, particularly Muslim nations, to take concrete actions to stop Israel’s military offensive in Gaza, ensure a ceasefire and hold leaders like Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to account under international laws.
The Palestine Conference, held on the occasion of International Human Rights Day, was jointly organized by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan and the Save Gaza Campaign, a civil society movement based in Pakistan. The forum was attended by a large number of Pakistanis, including politicians, rights activists, civil society members, journalists, and students.
The ongoing Israeli military campaign in Gaza has killed more than 43,000 people and injured thousands more since the Oct 7, 2023 attacks by Hamas in Isarel. Israel’s 13-month military campaign has displaced an estimated 1.9 million Palestinians, many of them multiple times. Bombings, movement restrictions and evacuations ordered by Israel’s military block access to health care and keep aid workers from reaching people in need, with aid organizations and charities repeatedly warning of crisis-level hunger affecting nearly two million people. A United Nations-backed assessment last month warned that famine is looming in northern Gaza due to a near-halt in food aid. Essential goods such as water, fresh produce, and medicines are also scarce.
Speaking to Arab News, Dr. Khalid Qaddoumi, a spokesperson and head of the West Asia Desk of the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas, said it was the responsibility of the international community to act on arrest warrants issued by the International Court of Justice (ICC) last month against Netanyahu for alleged crimes against humanity.
The Israeli premier was an “internationally recognized war criminal” and should be held accountable, Qaddoumi said, calling on global powers to stand by the laws which they had themselves drafted at the UN and other human rights forums.
“Unfortunately, those bottom lines of humanity ... have been violated continuously by the Israeli army and Israeli government, and with the green light from the world powers,” Qaddoumi said in an interview to Arab News on the sidelines of the conference.
However, Qaddoumi said Israel could not break the Palestinian people or their resistance.
“Today 2.4 million Palestinians are still in their homeland despite the Israelis, aggressions, operations, and crimes and they fail to impose the enforced displacement, even our people in the north, they are in their own destroyed houses without water,” he added.
The Hamas representative said while Pakistan was providing humanitarian assistance to Palestine, it also needed to employ diplomatic and political means to get the borders opened.
“If the borders are not open, those things [humanitarian aid] will not come as we get not more than 40 trucks a day, which is a joke at a time that the minimum need is more than 1,000 trucks a day,” he said.
“We were expecting for the last 47 years [but] nothing has come, unfortunately, except statements but now is the opportunity for the Muslim Ummah and countries like Pakistan to move forward and develop their action.”
Bilal Al Astal, a Palestinian journalist from Khan Younis and the director general of Friends of Palestine, an advocacy network that aims to raise awareness and foster international support for Palestine, said though Israel had destroyed nearly 88 percent of the Gaza Strip, including schools, hospitals, and all other infrastructure, there were reasons to be hopeful.
“We need to remain somewhat optimistic about the situation,” he said, adding that the current situation had put a spotlight on Israel, with more and more countries openly recognizing it as “real perpetrators of genocide.”
“Along with these sacrifices, we have seen some advantages, more countries including European nations are now recognizing Palestine,” Astal added.
Mushtaq Ahmad Khan, a former senator and the patron of the Save Gaza Campaign, demanded that the international community, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), and particularly the government of Pakistan “move beyond mere condemnations” and take “concrete actions to stop the Israeli genocide.”
“They [Muslim countries] should boycott Israel, halt trade, sever diplomatic relations, prevent Israel and its supporters from using air, sea, and land routes for communication, and employ oil as a strategic tool against Israel and its allies,” he added.
“As around 430 days have passed since the genocide of Palestinians by Israelis began, we demand human rights for Palestinians and urge the international community to take actionable steps.”
