Gaza post-war phase will be solely Palestinian: Hamas official

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies + Al Mayadeen
22 Oct 2024 21:26

Osama Hamdan says "Israel" continues to tighten the complete blockade on northern Gaza with the aim of displacing and exterminating the Palestinian people.

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Osama Hamdan, a senior official with the Palestinian Hamas group, attends a conference of the International Union of Resistance Clerics, in Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, March 4, 2024. (AP)

Northern Gaza is witnessing systematic crimes that amount to acts of genocide, including field executions, deliberate killings of civilians, arrests, and forced evacuations at the hands of Israeli occupation forces, senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan indicated on Tuesday.

In a press conference, Hamdan said these atrocities come amid massacres and brutal shelling, starvation, blockades, attacks on hospitals, bombardment and destruction of homes, and the refusal to allow the entry of aid and fuel.

For the 18th consecutive day, the occupation entity continues to tighten the complete blockade on northern Gaza, especially in Jabalia and Beit Lahia, with the aim of displacing and exterminating the Palestinian people and creating a new geographical and demographic reality, as part of what has come to be known as the "Generals' Plan", Hamdan pointed out.

Over 700 people killed in 18 days

The Palestinian official said that "Israel" has rejected, for 18 days, all international calls and appeals to allow the entry of fuel for hospitals, food, and medicine, as well as requests to rescue those trapped under the rubble.

The bodies of martyrs and the wounded lie in the streets, while ambulances are fired upon to prevent them from reaching them, he added.

Hamdan indicated that this has led to the deaths of hundreds of patients and wounded individuals, creating inhumane and unprecedented conditions that threaten the lives of thousands and denying any chance of survival for about 150,000 citizens who remained in their homes, making them susceptible to a slow death.

The corridors extending from the North to the South of Gaza, which the occupation claims are safe, have turned into traps targeting people, including women and children, for field executions, detentions, or brutal torture, the Hamas official noted.

He highlighted that over 700 people have been killed during this period, excluding those under the rubble or those inaccessible to ambulances, adding that this figure is expected to rise as the Israeli occupation military continues to commit various forms of genocide and massacres.

The latest of these horrific massacres was the targeting of an UNRWA shelter in Jabalia camp and the targeting of displaced individuals in the streets of Beit Lahia, resulting in the martyrdom of more than 12 citizens, alongside brutal artillery and drone bombardments of the displaced, where approximately 50 people have been killed in Gaza since dawn Tuesday, Hamdan said.

US administration, some Western countries complicit in genocide

Hamdan viewed the genocide being perpetrated by the occupation in Gaza before the whole world as a disgrace "to all those who remain silent, complacent, and hesitant to act to stop it."

He also said that the continued silence regarding the support from the US administration and some Western countries to the occupation with money and weapons makes them complicit in the crime of genocide against the Palestinian people.

The Hamas official urged the international community and its institutions, primarily the Security Council and the International Criminal Court, to assume their role and responsibility in stopping the genocide against the Palestinian people, adding that these bodies' credibility is now at stake regarding the charters and values upon which they were founded.

Hamdan held the US administration and some Western countries responsible for supporting the repeated acts of genocide committed by the occupation entity across Gaza.

He pointed out that the US administration providing the occupation entity with a timeline to commit crimes without consequences deepens Washington's responsibility and full partnership in this aggression and war of genocide against the Palestinian people.

Touching on US Secretary of State Antony Blinken's most recent visit to the region, Hamdan expressed Hamas' stance, affirming that only the Palestinian people "have the right to make all their choices freely and independently and set the details and agendas for the post-war phase, which will be solely Palestinian and not dictated by Israeli measures or US desires."

Palestinian people to persist with their steadfastness, resistance

"Our people will persist with their steadfastness and resistance against this Zionist Nazi enemy until achieving their demands for an end to the aggression, a complete withdrawal from Gaza, breaking the siege, reconstruction, and a serious prisoner exchange deal," the Palestinian official underlined.

The Hamas official also called on Arab and Islamic countries to bear their responsibilities and "utilize our Ummah's capabilities to inflict pain on this enemy and curb its terror and aggressive schemes that will not stop at the borders of Palestine."

"The Arab and Islamic impotence to take practical and serious steps to halt the ongoing massacre against our people for an entire year, despite the volume of condemnation and denunciation statements issued, has emboldened the Zionist enemy to continue its war and aggression unabated," Hamdan emphasized.

He demanded that Arab and Islamic nations call for an urgent meeting of the Security Council and press for an international resolution to stop the aggression and protect the Palestinian people from the Israeli massacres.

The Palestinian official also urged the UN Secretary-General to issue an urgent call to stop the genocide in northern Gaza.

Hamdan reiterated his call to "the masses of our Arab and Islamic nation and all the free people worldwide to escalate and activate all forms of popular mobilization in all capitals and arenas."

He called for effective participation in pressuring the US administration and all countries supporting the Israeli occupation by besieging their embassies around the world in order to expose their support for the occupation and criminalize their policies.

"The world that stands in reverence at the mention of the Holocaust, which it has not witnessed, must today answer for its stance regarding the new Holocaust that it sees live," the Hamas official concluded.