GAZA (PIC)– The international campaign for freeing kidnapped Palestinian MPs called on the incoming new chief prosecutor of the international criminal court Fatou Bensouda to address the issue of Palestinian lawmakers frequently kidnapped by Israel.
Member states of the international criminal court elected Gambia’s Fatou Bensouda as their next chief prosecutor on Monday partly to counter growing African and Middle Eastern criticism against the outgoing chief Luis Moreno-Ocampo.
In a press release the campaign urged Bensouda to table the issue of the kidnapped MPs at the court as a prelude to taking legal action against Israel as an occupation force for arbitrarily arresting Palestinian lawmakers elected democratically by their own people.
The campaign denounced the criminal court’s silence on Israel’s crimes as unacceptable complicity and noted that the kidnapping of Palestinian lawmakers violates international law and the fourth Geneva convention.
The campaign also pointed out that an Israeli court sentenced MP Ayman Daraghmeh to six months in administrative detention and also extended administratively the imprisonment of MP Khalil Al-Rabaee to other six months.
20 Palestinian lawmakers affiliated with Hamas Movement are locked up in Israeli jails most of these MPS were kidnapped many times before.
