Pakistan calls on the UN Security Council to pressure Israel on settlements in occupied Palestinian territory

Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Asim Iftikhar Ahmad, called for an end to the Israeli occupation of the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT), saying that “the ultimate goal is the end of the Israeli occupation of the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT).

“The establishment of an independent, sovereign and contiguous State of Palestine on the pre-1967 borders, with Al-Quds and Al-Sharif as its capital, remains the only guarantee of lasting peace in the region,” Ahmad said while addressing the UN Security Council meeting on the situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian issue.

“It is time for the Security Council to take a holistic assessment of the situation across the entire Occupied Palestinian Territory and address the obstacles to peace. First, the Council must compel Israel to immediately and completely cease all settlement activities, which constitute a flagrant violation of international law,” he said.

“Second, all attempts at land annexation, demolitions, forced evictions and displacements of Palestinians must be halted and reversed. The Palestinian population must be protected from settler violence and all perpetrators must be held fully accountable. The Council must reiterate its firm rejection of forced displacement,” the ambassador said.

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“Third, the council must put pressure on Israel, the occupying power, to release without further delay the revenues of the Palestinian Authority to deal with the deepening financial crisis. Fourth, the comprehensive plan to end the Gaza conflict and resolution 2803 must be fully implemented,” he added.

Referring to the humanitarian situation in Gaza, Iftikhar said: “In Gaza, while the Peace Council has monitored improvements in humanitarian conditions, the situation remains dire. Widespread hunger, severe shortages of clean water and medical treatment, inadequate sanitation and the uncontrolled spread of disease have left more than 90 percent of the population in catastrophic conditions.

Despite the ceasefire, 981 Palestinians, including women and children, have been killed. The recent report of the Independent Commission of Inquiry is a scathing indictment of the deliberate targeting and killing of Palestinian children by the Israeli occupation forces. There must be accountability for that”.

On developments in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, he said: “What we are witnessing in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) is not a series of isolated incidents, but a deliberate and systemic pattern. This is an ecosystem of occupation in which settlement expansion, annexation, demolitions, forced evictions can be mutually displaced, supplanted and replaced by mutual displacement, by both brutal military force and a legal juggernaut designed to legitimize the illegitimate.

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“This is not chaos; it is a calculated framework to entrench illegal Israeli occupation,” he said.

Highlighting the situation in the West Bank, Iftikhar said: “The West Bank is witnessing its largest and deadliest wave of settlement expansion and highest sustained levels of settler violence”.

The Secretary-General’s report documents that 4,750 housing units were brought forward or approved during the reporting period, including 34 settlements approved in a single cabinet decision – the highest to date,” he further added.