The head of the HRW urged countries like the United States, Germany, and Britain to end their provision of weapons to Israel to get Tel Aviv to stop its war in Gaza and Lebanon.
The Executive Director of Human Rights Watch (HRW), Tirana Hassan, said on Friday that countries providing weapons to Israel despite evidence of violations of international law in Gaza and Lebanon, are enabling “belligerents elsewhere”, Reuters news agency reported.
In an interview with Reuters, Hassan said that if Western governments “know that these weapons are being used in the commission of war crimes, then that should be enough for weapons sales and transfers to stop”.
The head of the HRW urged countries like the United States, Germany, and Britain to end their provision of weapons to Israel to get Tel Aviv to stop its war in Gaza and Lebanon.
“At this stage, the parties that could have some sort of influence and curb the behavior of the warring parties, when it comes to Israel, it’s the U.S, it’s the UK, and it’s Germany, and it’s through weapons sales and transfers,” Hassan told the news agency.
‘No Justification’
Hassan noted that the absence of accountability for violations of human rights will encourage Israel to continue its aggression.
Countries furnishing Tel Aviv with arms are not only undermining their own credibility as “defenders of international law” but also the credibility of the “international system,” she said.
Hassan also slammed the West for its hypocrisy and selectiveness in applying human rights and accountability in ongoing conflicts around the world.
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“It sends a message that these rules apply differently to us and our allies as they do to others, and that has really serious consequences,” she said.
Furthermore, Hassan commented on a recently released United Nations report, which indicates that 70 percent of “verified fatalities” in Israel’s genocide on the Gaza Strip are Palestinian women and children.
“This should now motivate the world into action. There is really no justification for the killing of children,” Hassan stressed to Reuters.
Genocide Continues
Flouting a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire, Israel has faced international condemnation amid its continued brutal offensive on Gaza.
Currently on trial before the International Court of Justice for genocide against Palestinians, Israel has been waging a devastating war on Gaza since October 7.
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 43,508 Palestinians have been killed, and 102,684 wounded in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza starting on October 7, 2023.
Moreover, at least 11,000 people are unaccounted for, presumed dead under the rubble of their homes throughout the Strip.
Israel says that 1,200 soldiers and civilians were killed during the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation on October 7. Israeli media published reports suggesting that many Israelis were killed on that day by ‘friendly fire’.
Palestinian and international organizations say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.
The Israeli war has resulted in an acute famine, mostly in northern Gaza, resulting in the death of many Palestinians, mostly children.
The Israeli aggression has also resulted in the forceful displacement of nearly two million people from all over the Gaza Strip, with the vast majority of the displaced forced into the densely crowded southern city of Rafah near the border with Egypt – in what has become Palestine’s largest mass exodus since the 1948 Nakba.
Later in the war, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians began moving from the south to central Gaza in a constant search for safety.
(PC, Reuters)
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