World must pressure Israel over alarming crime rate: Pundit

Press TV has interviewed Mkhaimar Abusada, a professor at al-Azhar University in Gaza, to discuss Israeli crimes against Palestinians in the occupied territories.

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: First of all, give us your perception of the continued Israeli violence against Palestinians both in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as well.

Abusada: Well Israeli violence and Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people is not a new thing. Since the Palestinian catastrophe in 1948 and since the Israeli occupation [of] also the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem (al-Quds) in June 1967, Israel has maintained the policy of aggression against the Palestinians and a policy of violation of international humanitarian law and international conventions.

Since the beginning of the current Intifada, the third Palestinian Intifada, al-Quds Intifada, more than 200 Palestinians have been killed, many of them were executed in street like style executions and thousands of Palestinians have [been] injured as a result of the Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people. Also in addition to that, Israel has deported many Palestinian families from East Jerusalem into the West Bank and many Palestinian homes have been demolished as a result of the current Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people.

So Israeli aggression and Israeli violation of international law against the Palestinians have been continued for many, many years and the Israeli occupation of West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem is close to half a century next year, which commemorates the 50-year anniversary of Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories.

Press TV: Just earlier we spoke to our correspondent in Gaza; he pointed out a very interesting statistic and that was the alarming rate of how many children are being affected by the Israeli aggression specifically in the Gaza Strip. When will this issue be seen as alarming enough for the international community to step in?

Abusada: That is definitely a very important question. Let me say that targeting Palestinian children is part of the Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people. Today a Palestinian teenager was injured by Israeli gunfire.

Yesterday two Palestinian [siblings], a boy and a sister, were killed in an Israeli bombing of the north side of the Gaza Strip and when you look at the statistics which have been documented by many international organizations like UNRWA, UNICEF and OCHA which have documented the number of Israeli violations against the Palestinian children, [this] is definitely alarming and let me just mention that during the last Israeli offensive against Gaza in the summer of 2014, more than 530 Palestinian children were killed during the war, out of 2,300 which means that more than 25 percent of those Palestinians who were killed during the Israeli offensive, were Palestinian children under the age of 16 and that is definitely an alarming statistics which should bring the attention of the international community, the attention of the UN Security Council to pressure Israel to stop its aggression against the Palestinian people in general and Palestinian children in particular.  

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