Israel Behind Palestinian Plight, Regional Crises

Iran's ambassador and permanent representative to the United Nations held the Israeli regime responsible for the desperate plight of the Palestinian nation and exacerbation of tensions in the Middle East.

"The illegal and brutal Israeli occupation continues and causes so much anguish to the Palestinian people and dangerously inflames tensions in the volatile regional situation. The Israeli regime continues to breach international law, including humanitarian and human rights. By doing so, it inflicts widespread suffering on civilians and deliberately destabilizes the situation, with far-reaching and serious consequences for peace and security in the Middle East and beyond," Gholamali Khoshrou stated in a Security Council Open Debate on "Situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian Question" on Wednesday, Press TV reported.

He lambasted the Tel Aviv regime's systematic violations of Palestinians' rights and international law, including house demolitions, forced displacement of civilians, detentions of minors and incessant provocations by illegal settlers and extremists at revered sites, particularly the al-Aqsa Mosque compound in the occupied East Beit-ul-Moqaddas. Khoshrou said the Israeli regime has continually intensified its illegal and oppressive measures against the defenseless Palestinian population over the past many years, killed and injured many civilians and deprived Palestinians of their right to protection.

  Disregard for Int'l Pacts

The Iranian diplomat then pointed to Israel's settlement expansion activities in the occupied West Bank, stating that they are in clear breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention, constitute war crimes under Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and demonstrate that Israel has never had any interest in peace with the Palestinians and its participation in the so-called peace process has only been aimed at covering up its policy of aggression.

Referring to Israel's blockade on the impoverished Gaza Strip, the Iranian UN envoy said the siege "is causing massive deprivation, hopelessness and a grave humanitarian crisis. The destructive impact of such Israeli violations is immense, as reflected in rising tensions and deteriorating socioeconomic conditions among the Palestinian civilian population."

Khoshrou also blamed illegal foreign intervention, extremism and violence for the ongoing conflicts in Libya, Iraq, Syria and Yemen.

"These problems have persisted and deepened because the international community has failed to do its part in dealing with the root causes and naive trans-regional players have taken erroneous actions," he said. In addition, Khoshrou mentioned Riyadh's aerial bombardment campaign against its crisis-hit southern neighbor, stressing that the airstrikes have killed or permanently maimed thousands of civilians, including women and children, displaced millions of people, and turned Yemen from a disadvantaged country into a devastated one.

"All these horrendous and heinous attacks, which display total disregard for human life and international law, are happening under the watch of UN Security Council, which has failed to take any action to stop them," he said. Saudi Arabia has been engaged in an atrocious campaign against Yemen since March 2015. The United Nations puts the death toll from the onslaught at about 10,000.