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SvennoJ on 15 May 2024
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UNRWA headquarters faces ‘another arson attempt’ by Israelis

Israeli arsonists once again attacked the headquarters of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) in occupied East Jerusalem last night, according to the agency’s chief Philippe Lazzarini.

“Another arson attempt by Israeli children and young people on @UNRWA in #Jerusalem last night. This has got to stop,” he said in a post.

On May 9, Lazzarini announced the agency would temporarily close its headquarters after several arson attacks in recent weeks and growing threats of violence against UN staff.



ICC prosecutor faces demands for action against Israel at UN Security Council

The International Criminal Court’s prosecutor Karim Khan faced demands for swift action against Israeli leaders at the UN Security Council on Tuesday, the Associated Press news agency reports.

Libya’s UN ambassador, Taher El-Sonni, said genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity are being perpetrated by Israeli forces and the world expects the ICC “to be courageous and to issue arrest warrants against officials of the Israeli regime”.

“Don’t you see the threats against civilians, the potential threats against civilians in Rafah and the massacre that would happen at any time?”

Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia accused the ICC of accomplishing nothing since it began a preliminary examination of abuses in the Palestinian territories in 2015 and a formal investigation in 2021.

Algeria’s deputy UN ambassador, Nacim Gaouaoui, expressed hope the ICC would take “a serious approach” to its Palestinian investigations and “demonstrate that it is not a tool used by some members of the international community to threaten whoever they want.”

Khan responded by telling the council that he will not be swayed or intimidated as his team investigates possible war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza and the Palestinian territories as well as in Ukraine and elsewhere.


Relatives of Palestinians killed in Israeli attack mourn on May 14


UN envoy: Israel ‘creates illusion’ of civilian protection in Gaza where ‘everyone is killable’

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the human rights situation in the Palestinian territory, said sanitised jargon used by the Israeli military during its onslaught against civilians in Gaza is designed to “camouflage” killing.

Albanese said Israel’s use of terms from international humanitarian law – such as “evacuation orders” and “safe zones” – “create the illusion that its military operations ensure protection of civilians”.

The reality could not be further from the truth, she said in a post on social media.

“This ‘humanitarian camouflage’ has de facto turned Gaza into a place ‘without civilians’, where everything is destroyable & everyone is killable.”