INDONESIA CALLS FOR INVESTIGATION INTO GAZA KILLING BY ISRAELI SNIPERS by Fardah

           Jakarta, April 4, 2018 (Antara) - The Indonesian Government and Parliament have voiced their strong condemnations against Israel for killing 17 Palestinians and injuring over 1,500 others recently, and called for an immediate investigation into the attack.

         "Indonesia has strongly condemned the attack by Israeli soldiers on Palestinian people who were staging a demonstration along the border of Gaza and Israel, which has left dozens of Palestinians dead and hundreds other injured," Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on March 30.

          The people and the Government of Indonesia have expressed their deepest condolences and solidarity to the victims and their families following the Israeli attack.

          Indonesia has underlined that the Israel authority has a responsibility, under the international Human Rights Law, to protect any civilian.

          Moreover, the Indonesian Government has called for an immediate investigation following the use of excessive force by Israeli troops on the demonstrators.

         "The effect of violence and brutality of Israeli force continues to become a threat to the peace process in Palestine and the Middle East," the ministry asserted.

          UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has also called for an independent, transparent investigation into the deadly attack in Gaza.

         Another strong condemnation was also voiced by Indonesian lawmaker Abdul Kharis Almasyihari, who is concurrently the chairman of the Commission I of the House of Representatives.

         "The attacks committed by Israeli soldiers against thousands of Palestinian people, who staged a peaceful protest, are indeed inhuman," Almasyihari noted in a statement on April 1.

        The member of parliament expressed his solidarity and deepest condolences to the families of the victims.

         The politician of the Justice Prosperous Party (PKS) criticized the United States for turning a blind eye to the killing of Gaza's residents by Israeli forces.

         "The United States has turned a blind eye to the aggression shown by the Israeli soldiers, who fired live ammunition at the protestors," he remarked.

         He urged the Indonesian government to push the UN Security Council to hold an emergency meeting and set up an independent team to investigate the killings in Gaza and report the results of the investigation to the world.

          "The UN must conduct a comprehensive investigation and must not ignore the human rights violation in Gaza," he emphasized.

         Ali Taher Parasong, chairman of the Commission VIII of the Indonesian Parliament, noted that the violence against Palestinians by Israel's military must be stopped and Palestine must gain its independence.

         "Political lobby must be intensified to restore the independence of Palestine and to end the sufferings of the Palestinian people," he added.

        Since the colonization of Palestinian land by Israel in 1948, many Palestinians were expelled from their own county, he revealed.

         The politician from the National Mandate Party (PAN) reminded the US to not always support Israel, whose crimes against humanity are real.

       Meanwhile, Aljazeera reported that the United States had blocked a draft statement by the United Nations Security Council that called for an investigation into the killing of 17 unarmed Palestinian protesters and injuring more than 1,500 others near the Gaza Strip's eastern border.

          The statement, proposed by Kuwait, demanded an "independent and transparent investigation" under the international law into the bloody events on Friday's Land Day protests.

        The statement also expressed "grave concern at the situation at the border" and stressed "the right to peaceful protest."
  Aljazeera also reported that Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization Executive Committee, condemned the decision by the United States, describing the US and the UK as being complicit in Israel's persistent violations and violence.

         "The Israeli army used unbridled violence, unleashing more than 100 snipers and firing live ammunition, tear gas, and rubber-coated steel bullets against the protesters before the very eyes of the entire international community," Ashrawi noted in a statement on Saturday.

         "Yet, the UN Security Council has failed to agree on a statement condemning the egregious violations that occurred at the hands of Israel," she pointed out.

          "Such a counterproductive stance can render them (the UK and the US) complicit in Israel's military occupation and in its persistent violations and violence," she added.    
    Forty-two years ago on March 30, Israeli police shot and killed six Palestinian citizens of Israel as they were protesting the Israeli government's expropriation of thousands of donums of Palestinian land.

        Since then, March 30 has been known as Land Day. It has become a major commemorative date in the Palestinian political calendar and an important event in the Palestinian collective narrative - one that emphasizes Palestinian resistance to Israeli colonization and sumud (steadfastness).

         The 1976 protests were a result of mass collective action across historic Palestine, which saw Palestinian communities resisting not only the theft of land but also overall settler colonial policies of erasure.

         In Palestine, the colonisation and appropriation of land has been continuous since the establishment of Israel and today it is accelerating at an astonishing speed, wrote Yara Hawari in an editorial published by Aljazeera on March 30. ***2***
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(T.SYS/A/BESSR/F. Assegaf) 04-04-2018