GUEST BLOG: Leslie Bravery – Will NZ do anything meaningful for Palestine on UN Council?

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FourMaps

Athe twenty-ninth session of the UN Human Rights Council on 3 July majority voted for the following resolution on: “Ensuring accountability and justice for all violations of international law in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem”. In its brutal assault on the blockaded population of the Gaza Strip last year, Israel killed over 2,200 Palestinians. Of these victims, 550 were children, 80 of whom were three years old or under. Photographic evidence shows block after block of houses destroyed in a blitz that annihilated entire families. The only way to bring an end to these recurring onslaughts and the daily injustices and cruelties suffered by the blockaded and occupied Palestinian people is to deny Israel the impunity that shelters it and make the Zionist state answerable to its victims and to the world.

The mainstream news media have failed to report on the UN Human Rights Council resolution which was adopted by a vote of 41 in favour, 1 against and 5 abstentions, a more than 80% majority for the resolution. The Human Rights Council vote supports the implementation of all the recommendations in the report of the Commission of Inquiry on the 2014 Gaza Conflict and calls upon everyone concerned to co-operate fully with the International Criminal Court. News media silence and the indifference of Western politicians encourage Israel to continue its human rights violations so that instead of making reparations, lifting the blockade and opening the Port of Gaza to the world, Israel continues its blockade, belligerent occupation, expansion of settlements and West Bank land-grabs. People made homeless, due to the Israeli bombing of Gazahave been driven to seek shelter in UNRWA schools but the Directoof the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), Robert Turnerwarns that 700 UNWRA schools are now in danger of closure, with over 250 of them threatened by Israel’s continuing blockade of the Gaza Strip. Israel, having destroyed the Gaza power plant during last summer’s blitz, now sees to it that electricity and water supplies in the Strip continue to remain desperately short.

The UNHRC resolution reminds us of the universal obligation of all UN member states to ensure the upholding of international humanitarian law, including sanctions where necessary to ensure compliance with human rights obligations. Most urgent is the need to bring to an end Israel’s almost half-century-long belligerent military occupation of Palestinian territory. The occupation deprives the Palestinian people of freedom of movement and of association, splits families asunder and brings ruin to the Palestinian economy and agriculture. This latest UNHRC resolution deplores Israel’s failure to co-operate with the United Nations Independent Commission of Inquiry into its 2014 Gaza assault and its refusal to grant access to, and work with, international human rights bodies seeking to investigate alleged violations of international law in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem. Israel’s evasive stance strikes many observers as tacit recognition of its own culpability.

Only one country voted against the resolution and that was Israel’s staunchest ally, the United States of America. Will New Zealand, at the Security Council, at last acknowledge the majority of world opinion? Or will the New Zealand Government continue to side with the powerful minority that continues to cover for Israel? The New Zealand Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully‘s support for the sterile so-called peace talks is indefensible; the ‘negotiations’ have achieved nothing but ever-growing misery for the captive and defenceless Palestinian people. McCully calls the process ‘dialogue’ but in reality it is a façadethat denies justice to the Palestinian people while allowing Israel toevade accountability.

The UN resolution emphasises that those responsible for violations of international humanitarian law and human rights law must be held to account and that all victims are entitled to not only effective remedy but also reparations. The world awaits the New Zealand Government’s response.

Leslie Bravery is a respected commentator on apartheid Israel and a human rights activist for Palestine.

11 COMMENTS

  1. The question, “Will New Zealand do anything for Palestine on the United Nations Security Council?” can probably unfortunately be answered thus:

    New Zealand will try, but the U.S. and Israel will steadfastly veto anything constructive.

    Netanyahu rather reminds me of Apartheid era South Africa or Montgomery Bus Boycott era U.S.A. Palestinians cannot ride on the same buses as Israeli’s was one of the more recent ridiculous ideas to flow from the mouth of Moshe Ya’alon, the Minister of Defence.

    Israel has its supporters here too. Erin Eldridge regularly writes in The Press in response to critics of Israeli policy, such as Lois Griffiths who has been to Palestine and Israel.

  2. It is desirable to hold Israel to account for human rights violations, but it is equally important to hold Hamas and other terrorist factions in the occupied territories to the same standard. This blog frequently ignores that important fact.

  3. I suggest you research site “Tools for freedom.com The Rothschilds Own Israel” and you will discover that this dark family is directing the genocidal policy against the Palestinian people.

    The Zionist Black Ops are known to lob shells from Palestine into Israel as a pretense for a massive retaliatory strike. And they have their own techniques for persuading their victims to act as suicide bombers. The end justifies the means, seems to be their motto.

    The Rothschilds own the NZ Reserve Bank, the high street banks, ins companies, etc. etc.We owe the Rothschilds our National Debt. So….no….I don’t think our P.M. will stand in the light and speak for the Palestinian people.

    The last great statesman who called for peace with Palestine was an Israeli Prime Minister – and he was shot.

    Wake up people of the world – we can stand together in the light!!!

    • Helena, you might want to check some of your facts.

      1) Israel is in fact a democratic state in which residents (Arabs, Jews, atheists…) own their freehold property, vote freely for any party they desire (including minority and Arab and secular parties), can travel freely, and where the rule of law has a relatively strong presence (Israel is not owned by the Rothschilds, nor is it controlled by the Rothschilds – it is controlled by a democratic Parliament that gains legitimacy from the residents of Israel through UN monitored elections).

      2) the Rothschilds do not own the Reserve Bank of New Zealand. The Reserve Bank of New Zealand is subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of Parliament, which is a representative assembly that is elected by the residents of New Zealand during monitored and transparent elections (some of the most robust in the entire world I might add). The Reserve Bank has very significant transparency and accountability mechanisms and contrary to your ill-informed view – it is not arbitrarily controlled by International Jewry.

      3) You might not want to believe it Helena, but there are some bad people in Gaza. If you do a bit of your own independent research Helena, you might actually find that there are terrorists in Gaza who do commit terrorist attacks against the civilian populations of Israel.

      Helena – I suggest you are not in the light – you are well and truly in the dark. I would be very surprised if even the authors of this blog agree with your extremist and possibly even racist views.

      Take off your tinfoil hat Helena, open your mind a little and do some independent research – because your beliefs belong in 1930’s Germany.

  4. Hi Steve – thanks for reply.
    Please click on NZ National Debt Clock ….. doesn’t it make your eyes water to watch the interest ticking up in seconds.
    Now click on NZ Gold Bullion Reserve. Nothing!
    Money has got to come from somewhere, Steve, Where’s it coming from? Please don’t suggest it comes from what NZ generates here and elsewhere because those are the pennies juggled by Bill English in his Budget.

    You didn’t look at “Tools for Freedom.com Rothchilds Own Israel” as I suggested. If you had followed up, you would not have made the above comments.

    Look at the facts presented by Leslie Bravery. A war of genocide is being waged against the people of Palestine. And no, our P.M. will not stand in the light and call for an end to it because he, you and me have been bought and paid for by the Spider in the web – Rothschild.

    ‘GIVE ME CONTROL OF A NATION’S MONEY AND I CARE NOT WHO MAKES THE LAWS’. Mayer Amschel Rothschild

    You stand up and take the spotlight, Steve.

  5. Thanks 😀
    But what about the Palestinians dying in their thousands? Do we turn a blind eye? Or, do we stand up and tell our Government to open its eyes and do something on the Security Council?

    • In case you haven’t noticed, New Zealand has made peace talks between Israel and Palestine a top priority for it’s UNSC tenure.

  6. Murray McCully! What an absolutely useless foreign affairs minister. Funny thing is, anybody could already see, just by looking at him, how useless he is. Seemingly lacking any form of an independent spirit. A yes man through and through.
    I suppose that’s why they gave him the job.

  7. Yep. Lived in NYC worked at UN and yes indeed “important topics” discussed and discussed and than resolutions voted on, paper generated and filed ……. and then they all went out for drinks. And doesn’t our rep have great pad for his drinks party!!! (Adding to our national debt no doubt)

Comments are closed.