End the continuing attack in Gaza
Statement of Costas Christodoulides, Head of the International and European Affairs Department of the C.C. of AKEL
AKEL C.C. Press Office, 24th July 2014, Nicosia
As AKEL, we welcome the decision of the United Nations Human Rights Council to launch an investigation into “possible war crimes committed by Israel” during the contin
uing attack in Gaza. The aerial attacks of the Israeli army and the ongoing ground invasion have caused the deaths of many hundreds of Palestinians, mostly civilians and children, the destruction of UN facilities, hospitals and the complete destruction of homes. This constitutes a deliberate collective punishment of the Palestinian people in Gaza.
The stand of the U.S. to vote against the relevant draft decision of the Human Rights Council of the UN is in line with the general policy of abetting Israel’s state terrorism against the Palestinian people. This is a hypocritical policy of double standards. This policy wants to render International Law inactive and in line with the interests of powerful states in the world, something that, apart from the question of Palestine, will also have a negative affect on the Cyprus problem too.
Equally negative is the position of abstention taken by the EU Member States, the EU which supposedly respects the principles and values upon which it was founded. When the EU with the greatest of ease decides to impose sanctions on Russia because of its position on Ukraine, or the European Parliament at every plenary approves resolutions on the situation of human rights in countries that are not EU members, then not seeing the war crimes Israel is committing in Gaza against civilians and infrastructures of the city is to say the least hypocritical.
AKEL once again calls on the Government to adopt an active position in favour of the termination of the war in Gaza and ending the Israeli open aggression. The Cyprus government should support the immediate holding of talks aimed at establishing the state of Palestine with East Jerusalem as its capital in the 1967 borders; a state living peacefully alongside Israel.
AKEL salutes the exemplary policy of the Communist Party of Israel which is organizing activities focused on expressing solidarity with the Palestinian people and peace between Arabs and Jews. We denounce the persecutions launched against the Party and its members by the Israeli establishment. We are in solidarity with their struggle.
