“Over the past seven decades, Palestine has endured countless crimes, including massacre, ethnic cleansing, demographic change, systematic torture and arbitrary killing, in addition to all forms of war crimes, genocide, and crimes against humanity. It seems as though they have become Israel’s routine practice ever since the onset of its endless occupation [back in 1948],” Seyyed Mohammad Sadatinejad said at the Council’s 48th regular session on Saturday.
Sadatinejad, who is in charge of human rights affairs at Iran’s permanent mission to the UN office and other international organizations in Geneva, pointed to the inhumane treatment of hundreds of Palestinian children in Israeli-run prisons, saying the most common charge against the minors is stone-throwing.
The Iranian diplomat criticized the international community for its inability to force the apartheid Israeli regime to abide by international law, saying such a failure underlines the need for UN human rights mechanisms to take immediate, decisive and effective measures to help end Israeli crimes against Palestinians.
Sadatinejad said justice-seeking and accountability for crimes committed against Palestinians should be part of the international community’s demand for an end to the catastrophe unfolding in the Palestinian territories.
“Advocates of Israel, including the United States, European states and Canada, which provide financial, military and political support to the regime, should also be held accountable for encouragement of crimes against Palestinians and obstruction of justice,” he said.
'7,000 Palestinian children arrested since 2015'
Meanwhile, the Commission for Detainees and Ex-Detainees’ Affairs at the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) said Israeli forces had arrested more than 7,000 Palestinian children since the outbreak of a new wave protests in al-Quds in October 2015.
The commission said in a statement, issued on the 6th anniversary of the protests, that the number of Palestinian minors in Israeli detention centers had increased markedly.
It also pointed to the serious violations of Palestinian children’s rights, namely mass arrests, long prison sentences, and draconian punitive measures.
Since 2015, Israel has introduced regulations that would legalize long jail terms, and in some cases even life imprisonment for minors, the group said.
Head of the commission’s studies and documentation unit Abdul Nasser Farwana called on the United Nations Children’s Fund, UNICEF, and international groups to intervene immediately and put an end to the Israeli regime’s measures against Palestinian children.
Israeli prison authorities keep Palestinian inmates under deplorable conditions lacking proper hygienic standards. The prisoners have also been subjected to systematic torture, harassment and repression.
There are reportedly more than 7,000 Palestinians held at Israeli jails. Hundreds of the inmates have been apparently incarcerated under the practice of administrative detention.