appello delle organizzazioni dei diritti umani della Palestina

[alcinoo.cannizzaro@tiscali.it]

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invio un appello delle organizzazioni dei diritti umani della Palestina.
fonte: http://www.alternativenews.org/
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Tuesday, April 2nd, 2002  
Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, Palestinian Independent Commission for
Citizen Rights  
The Israeli Occupation Forces have devastated Ramallah, the ?untouchable
city?, invaded on Thursday night, 28 March 2002. when Arafat?s compound
was surrounded and battered by tanks allegedly in response to a suicide
bombing in Netanya, Israel . Since then, Arafat has been confined to one
room of his office building in which electricity and water have been cut
as well as all contact with the outside world. Despite assurances that Arafat
would not be harmed, there are legitimate reasons to fear for his life and
safety.

Israeli forces have placed Ramallah under total curfew continuing into today
causing extreme hardship to the residents of the town. Israeli soldiers
have surrounded the entrance to apartment buildings. People are prohibited
from leaving their homes to buy basic supplies including food, water, and
medicines. The electricity has been cut as have the mobile phone lines in
certain cases making it nearly impossible to contact emergency medical services
such as the Palestine Red Crescent Society or local hospitals and clinics.
Ambulances and emergency medical personnel are prohibited from entering
the city under any circumstances.

Although contact with people living inside the city has been severely limited,
one person was able to get through by telephone and describe the situation
as ?miserable? and ?inhuman?. ?We have no food, no milk, no water; we cannot
even move to the balconies of our homes to ask the soldiers for help without
risking being shot.?

The city streets of Ramallah are empty and torn up. All schools and businesses
are closed and in many cases the IDF forces have caused significant damage
to them as well as to local banks. Cars have been crushed by bulldozers
and tanks; In fact, not a single vacant car in Ramallah has been left undamaged.
Garbage has been strewn about everywhere. A number of buildings have been
burned including the Natshe Building , the Darqhmah Building , and the building
hosting the former British Council. Israeli forces have occupied local TV
and Radio stations including Amwaj and Watan and have, on two separate occasions,
broadcast pornographic films to the surrounding community. 

Local hospitals lack sufficient blood supplies, oxygen, medicines, and contact
with the outside world. In some cases both electricity and water supplies
to the hospitals have been cut. There are so many dead coming into the hospitals
that the morgues are full causing hospital staff to have to set up rooms
with fans run by electricity generators to keep the bodies from rotting
completely. The risk of disease and contamination is serious and worsening.

IDF forces entered local hospitals and private clinics and rounded up injured
men. In one instance 62 members of the International Solidarity Group threatened
to lie down in front of the army jeeps and tanks to prevent soldiers from
entering Ramallah?s central hospital. They have so far been successful in
preventing similar actions in this hospital as a result. 

As of Friday morning, 29 March 2002, approximately 500 men ranging from
age 15 ? 50 have been rounded up by the Israeli Occupation Forces and taken
to a school in El-Bireh were they have faced continuous interrogation. They
are tied up, blindfolded, handcuffed, kicked, and cursed. According to recent
reports the situation has worsened since Sunday night.

A female journalist from Al-Jazeera has been subjected to repeated taunts
by Israeli soldiers, mocking her voice and calling her to ?come see what
we?re doing? when they start shooting.

In a particularly ominous development, Joseph Pouvet of the French Farmer?s
Union and a number of accompanying activists went in to see president Arafat.
When they left the compound, IDF sources accused them of smuggling wanted
persons along with them claiming that a larger number came out of the compound
than went in. Pouvet and 12 others have been arrested.

We expect that every city and refugee camp in the West Bank will face similar
treatment in the coming days, especially as Ariel Sharon has promised to
extend his ?war? into the rest of the West Bank and possibly the Gaza Strip,
currently under complete lockdown.

We call upon the international community to take immediate action to halt
these war crimes and to allow international monitors in to protect the Palestinian
people. We believe that the global civil society is especially relevant
in calling a halt to these actions by pressuring their governments and humanitarian
organizations to intervene immediately. Silence in the face of these on-going
crimes amounts to complicity. We cannot express the gravity and urgency
of this situation strongly enough and appeal to all people of conscience
to take action
 




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