Radio interview with Vera Polycarpou, Head of AKEL’s International Relations and European Policy, member of the Central Committee of AKEL

 

13 October 2023, ‘Astra’

ASTRA – It seems that Israel is not backing down and many people are talking about what is about to happen as genocide of the Palestinians if – as Israel is considering – Gaza is completely destroyed to the ground. How do you view what’s happening?

VERA POLYCARPOU – The first thing we must say is that the death of every human being is a human life. This for all of us is something that has to stop. One crime does not justify another crime being committed which may in dimensions too be much bigger in scale. It is a crime that has been going on for many, many decades. So the first thing we need to say is that the war must stop here and now. It must stop.

If the international community really believes in this demand and believes in people, we all have to work to stop what is going on.

As I said previously, one crime does not justify another crime being committed. What we are hearing from Palestine is that national cleansing is taking place. There are mass and blind killings with these strikes on the civilian population. We have seen this happening repeatedly. It’s not the first time.

Unfortunately, all that the children see and have grown up seeing on TV, in Gaza, but also in the West Bank and East Jerusalem too, especially the children in Gaza, are the four walls of a dilapidated house in ruins. Nothing else, without any perspective whatsoever in their lives. This has to stop.

ASTRA – On Monday when we hosted the Ambassador of Palestine on the program he told us something to illustrate how difficult and inhumane the situation in the Gaza Strip is. One child he said was so desperate that he dived into the water to swim to Greece. Of course he says it is clear what his fate would have been. He died…

VP – Unfortunately that’s what we see. What cannot be tolerated is the policy of double standards. We cannot have international law, UN resolutions and humanitarian law being applied for something, which is what we are also demanding should be applied in Cyprus too – international law, implementation of UN resolutions, ending the occupation – and elsewhere none of all this is applied. We have seen in the very recent past that this is something that a very large section of the international community is actually doing in line with the principle of these double standards.

That’s precisely why I think that we, and those people throughout the world who believe in the future of this planet, must work in every way possible to stop this war.

To reach a two state solution on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as the capital so that they can live.

For a Palestinian state to exist alongside the state of Israel so that both peoples, but also all the peoples of the region, can live in peace.

Because what we are seeing is taking on dimensions that will be out of control. We saw on the news that Israel has also attacked two airports in Syria. There are several exchanges of fire with drones…

ASTRA – …Let me give you a press headline that Netanyahu has contacted British Prime Minister Sunak about deploying British forces in the eastern Mediterranean. The Americans are sending what they are sending. Others are now saying that “what Hamas is doing is murder so what are you talking about, Israel has the right to defend itself”. These voices exist too.

VP – Those voices are being heard and are always heard by one side. Unfortunately, since the beginning of the year over 250 Palestinians, mostly young people, have been murdered by the State of Israel, its military forces and by the settlers. Colonalisation is ongoing in the occupied Palestinian territories. We shouldn’t forget this here in Cyprus…

Do they have the right to enter and engage in pogroms? Recently there has been a pogrom waged three times in a village called Huwara.

I didn’t hear these very same people outraged and up in arms …so let’s not be hypocritical and shed crocodile tears.

We must always be principled in our position. Every person who is lost is a human being.

Today – and not only today – this game has been played out for years, but lately it has been played extremely intensely. In Al Aqsa, which is a holy place for Muslims, the provocation is indeed immense. Some people do not even know – or do not want to know – that among the Palestinians there are many, many Christians. Don’t certain forces and circles who are playing the game and want this conflict to become a religious one, want to know about this fact? This is not a religious conflict.

The conflict is about the territories. It’s about what these lands hide. And about what the sea of Gaza is hiding because there’s natural gas there too.

Do they want to force everyone out [of Gaza]?

Don’t they want Palestine to exist?

Don’t they want us to share the wealth and prosper together?

Or are we forgetting that there are nuclear weapons in Israel?

Israel is a nuclear power – however much it may not admit it. Perish the thought if anything bad were to happen…

We need the forces of peace across the world to rise up and support the peace-loving forces both among the Palestinians and inside Israel too in order to put an end to this massacre that is taking place at the moment and to solve the problem because there is no way war will not return without the solution of this problem.

If you go back historically in 2021, 2014, 2018 and in 2008-2009, how many thousands of people were killed?

How many times should the trade of arms and weapons win in this region?

You know it’s been reported that there have been weapons that have been found in the hands of Hamas which are being given to Ukraine because this arms smuggling is circulating weapons all over the world. Some circles always win from all this. The guns used in the attack on the French newspaper “Charlie Hebdo” in Paris were weapons that were sent from Bosnia to Iraq and subsequently made their way back to Europe.

This vicious circle must stop. People will be killed and not just Palestinians any more. We here in Cyprus must fight for peace.

ASTRA – As we said before, Cyprus is a victim of invasion and occupation. Israel has sent a message and is telling the people in the Gaza Strip that you have 24 hours to leave. We have an intervention by the UN saying to Israel, “cancel this decision”. Israel says to the UN “what you are saying is disgraceful” so when Israel says to the UN “your reaction is shameful” –

VP: – Right now I’m watching live pictures from Gaza on TV and the people there are saying “And even if we wanted to leave where could we go? We don’t have the means to leave. There are no roads. There is no fuel. There are no trains, no buses to take us.” How to move and where to go?

ASTRA – And live where to return? It’s unbelievable what’s happening…

VP – And the question is where to go? Move to the Sinai desert? Who will accommodate them? Throw them into the desert to die? They have no electricity, water and fuel, no food, no medical care anyway. We are talking about thousands of patients and wounded people in the courtyards of hospitals still partially standing.

It is a humanitarian drama that must stop. War brings no solutions for anyone.

ASTRA – And there’s no categorizing in human life.

VP – Exactly.