RAMALLAH, Wednesday, July 13, 2022 (WAFA) – The Department of Human Rights and Civil Society in the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) today called on the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, in light of his annual report on “Children and Armed Conflict”, to take actual steps to hold the Israeli occupation authority accountable for its crimes against Palestinian children.
In his report, Guterres said the Israeli occupation forces killed 78 Palestinian children, maimed another 982, and detained 637 in 2021.
The UN chief said he was “shocked by the killing and injuring of Palestinian children by Israeli forces in airstrikes on densely populated areas, through the use of live ammunition, and at the continued lack of accountability for these violations,” adding, “Should the situation repeat itself in 2022, without meaningful improvement, Israel should be listed.”
The head of the PLO’s Human Rights Department, Ahmad Tamimi, said in a statement that the recognition by the UN Secretary-General of the existence of crimes committed by the Israeli occupation army against the Palestinian children “requires taking legal measures in accordance with the laws, treaties and international conventions to prosecute them in international courts as war criminals.”
Tamimi added, “The reports issued by the Secretary-General of the United Nations have no meaning or value if they are not dealt with in accordance with the legal requirement, which stipulates that the occupation be blacklisted, its leaders are tried as war criminals, and end its occupation of the Palestinian and Arab lands.”
