Egyptian, Arab and international human rights organizations condemned the Israeli military machine's crimes against the unarmed Palestinian civilians, confirming that these crimes are grave violations of the Geneva Conventions. The Arab Center for the Independence of the Judiciary called on the UN Secretary-General to form an international fact-finding commission, and on the Security Council to refer the crimes in Gaza to the International Criminal Court, as happened in the case of Darfur, so as the perpetrators would not get away unpunished. In a statement yesterday, the center said these are war crimes according to the international conventions, particularly the Fourth Geneva Convention on the Protection of Civilians in Times of War that was signed on August 12, 1949, and the Rome Statute that established the International Criminal Court. The statement also called on the Palestinian human rights organizations, especially those operating in the Gaza Strip, to quickly document these crimes, count the victims and collect information on the Israeli military leaders who took part in them, and provide it to the UN Secretary-General should Israel obstruct the prosecution of those involved in these crimes. The Egyptian Center for Development and Democracy Studies called on the international community and all international human rights organizations to move to bring the Israeli officials to the International Criminal Court, as happened in Bosnia and Serbia, and Rwanda and Darfur. It also called for the formation of an international commission to investigate the massacres, stressing the need to speedily provide international protection for the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank, and lift the siege on Gaza immediately to enable the Palestinians to get humanitarian and medical assistance. The Confront Extremism Organization condemned the Israeli killing of a poor and weak people, and called for bringing the perpetrators to trial for mass murder and crimes against humanity. The Sawaseya Human Rights Center said the war revealed the Nazi face of Israel. It said the aggression was aimed at police stations, an NGO working for prisoners and the Islamic University stadium, where there are 18,000 students. It also said that the air raids began at 11:00 a.m. in all parts of the Gaza Strip, which shows a clear intention of causing maximum casualties during that peak hour.
The center also said that the official Arab position has not lived up to the position of one person, namely the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in the Palestinian territories, Jewish American Professor Richard Falk, who said earlier this month that the practices against the Palestinians are a crime against humanity.
