Palestinians' armed struggle, resistance recognized under intl. law: Analyst

Palestinians’ resistance and armed struggle against Israel is recognized under international law, an analyst has said amid escalation in violence across occupied territories.

Arnold August, also an author and journalist, told Press TV on Saturday that armed struggle is “the only way” that help Palestinians to defend themselves saying that illegal occupation of Palestine makes resistance legitimate.

“It is the only way, … how else can Palestinians defend themselves if it is not for armed struggle,” August said.

“It is clear that al-Quds is occupied by Israel and according to all international laws and norms, occupied people have a right to resist,” he added.

By the adoption of Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions of 1949, in accordance with international humanitarian law, wars of national liberation have been expressly embraced as a protected and essential right of occupied people everywhere.

August also cited Friday's shooting operation outside a synagogue in the holy occupied city of al-Quds killing at least 7 illegal Israeli settlers as an example for Palestinians to stand up for their rights.

Anti-Israel Operations

Two Israelis injured in shooting attack in Silwan neighborhood around Old City of east al-Quds.

Similarly, Palestinian resistance groups hailed the Friday retaliatory operation as a “direct response” to the deadliest Israeli military raid in the occupied West Bank in years, including a recent Jenin massacre.

On Thursday, the Israeli regime's forces raided the city of Jenin and its neighboring refugee camp in the north of the Tel Aviv-occupied West Bank, gunning down nine Palestinians and injuring dozens.

“The main fact is that Israel, as an arm of the United States, has been carrying out its terrorist activities for decades and it is bound to erupt as it has in [al-Quds] today and who knows what will happen again,” August said.

Fra Hughes, author, and director of Palestine Aid Belfast, also took a swipe at the Israeli policy of collective punishment as Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his cabinet had decided to pursue sanctions against families of attackers of the Friday shooting operation.

The gunman, Khaire Alkam, was a 21-year-old Palestinian from East al-Quds. According to Reuters forty-two suspects, including the gunman’s family members were arrested following the retaliatory operation.

In the wake of the operation, Israeli media outlets have reported that the regime’s cabinet is considering a deportation law for the families of the attackers.

“It is the first time I have heard Israel threatens to deport families of the attackers which is likely a form of continued ethnic cleansing,” Hughes told Press TV on Saturday, calling the punishments an “extreme reaction.”

“If you keep crushing people, destroying their homes, stealing their futures, giving them nightmares instead of dreams of a peaceful future, people have nothing else to react with except their own lives, and if they are willing to submit their lives, to make a point and to break the oppressive illegal regime, ... I think that [retaliatory operations] are something that you'll see more of,” he concluded.

Report: Two Israeli settlers wounded in ‘shooting operation’ near al-Quds

Palestinian media say at least two Israeli settlers are shot and wounded outside the occupied Old City of al-Quds, in the latest retaliatory operation against the occupying regime’s fresh round of violence.

In July 2020, Michael Lynk, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian Territory called on Israel to immediately stop all actions amounting to collective punishment of the Palestinian people, with millions of innocent harmed daily and nothing achieved but deeper tensions and an atmosphere conducive to further violence.

Over the past months, Israel has ramped up attacks on Palestinian towns and cities throughout the occupied territories. As a result of these attacks, dozens of Palestinians have lost their lives and many others have been arrested.

Most of the raids have focused on Nablus and Jenin, where Israeli forces have been trying to stifle a growing Palestinian resistance in the occupied cities.

More than 170 Palestinians, including at least 30 children, were killed across the occupied West Bank and East al-Quds last year. In January 2023 alone, at least 38 Palestinians including five children have been killed.

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