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Sunday, 10 March 2019

UN report finds Israel intentionally shot children, journalists & the disabled during Gaza protests

Amy Goodman
Democracy Now!


Amy Goodman's guest is Sara Hossain, a member of the U.N. independent commission that led the Gaza investigation. 

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.


  AMY GOODMAN: A United Nations inquiry has found Israeli forces may have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity by targeting unarmed children, journalists and the disabled in Gaza. The report, released by the U.N. Human Rights Council Thursday, looked at Israel's bloody response to weekly Great March of Return demonstrations, launched by Palestinians in Gaza nearly a year ago, targeting Israel's heavily militarized separation barrier. The report found Israeli forces have killed 183 Palestinians, almost all of them with live ammunition. The dead included 35 children. Twenty-three thousand people were injured, including over 6,000 shot by live ammunition. Santiago Canton chaired the U.N. commission.
SANTIAGO CANTON: The commission has found reasonable grounds to believe that the Israeli security forces committed serious violations of human rights and international humanitarian law. These violations clearly warrant criminal investigation and prosecution, and we call on Israel to conduct meaningful investigations into these serious violations and to provide timely justice and reparations for those killed and injured.
AMY GOODMAN: Another member of the U.N. independent commission, Sara Hossain, described how Israeli forces targeted civilians and journalists in Gaza.
SARA HOSSAIN: We are saying that they have intentionally shot children, they have intentionally shot people with disabilities, they have intentionally shot journalists, knowing them to be children, people with disabilities and journalists. And some of the children-not all of the children are visibly children perhaps, but many of them are. As Commissioner Murungi just said, the journalists were all marked with press vests, that we investigated. And the people with disabilities, as I said, a double amputee in a wheelchair, a person using crutches, they were visibly that. And they've been shot at by snipers, who also have spotters available with them, who have very high-level technology available to see who is out there in the field.
AMY GOODMAN: The U.N. report called on nations to arrest, quote, "persons alleged to have committed, or ordered to have committed, the international crimes," unquote, or to seek their extradition. The U.N. also demanded Israel immediately lift the blockade on Gaza. Israel's acting foreign minister dismissed the report as "theater of the absurd." However, grieving Palestinians welcomed the report, including Raeda Ayoub, whose teenage son Mohammad was killed during the Gaza protests.
RAEDA AYOUB: [translated] We are happy that someone is supporting Gaza's children, and we are happy that they are supporting us to defend Gaza's children and youth in Gaza against the crimes committed by the occupation.
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