Four Palestinian human rights organizations on Wednesday accused high-ranking Israeli civilians and military officials of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem.
The accusation came in the fourth substantive communication submitted jointly by the Palestinian Center for Human Rights al-Mezan Center and al-Haq and al-Dameer organizations to the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC).
Director of al-Haq Sha’wan Jabarin who together with human rights lawyer Nada Kiswanson submitted the communication said that the 700-page communication provides a reasonable basis for the prosecutor to open an investigation into crimes committed against the Palestinian people in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
During a joint press conference held simultaneously in Gaza and The Hague on Wednesday Jabarin stated that Palestinians over the past fifty years have been subjected to an occupation that deprives them of their basic rights. “The communication we filed to ICC brings hope that anyone who commits crimes against Palestinians will be held to account” he added.
For his part Director of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights Raji al-Sourani said that transferring Israeli settlers to the occupied Palestinian territories constitutes an unprecedented war crime accompanied by the confiscation of large areas of Palestinian lands and the demolition of Palestinian property.
Esam Younis the director of al-Mezan Center affirmed that Israel has been undermining the Palestinian territorial integrity since 1967. Younis pointed out that the blockade imposed on the Gaza Strip in addition to the regular and large-scale military assaults waged against the coastal enclave will eventually enable Israel to tighten its grip over the whole occupied Palestinian territory denying Palestinians their internationally recognized right to self-determination.
This communication is the fourth to be filed by the four Palestinian organizations. The first three were related to crimes committed in the Gaza Strip including the ones committed during the 2014 Israeli war on the besieged enclave.
The ICC prosecutor is currently conducting a preliminary examination into the situation in Palestine.
The communication addresses the repressive Israeli measures aimed at altering the demographic reality in the occupied Palestinian territories and the forcible transfer of the protected Palestinian population from their lands.
It also provides supportive evidence on the Israeli confiscation policies targeting the Palestinian citizens’ lands and property the deliberate killing of 300 Palestinians by Israeli soldiers since 13th June 2014 and the shoot-to-kill policy pursued against Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian territories since 2015.
