NOVANEWS
Swedish Social Democratic Party
The Religious Social Democrats of Sweden welcomes the UN decision to investigate war crimes committed during the Israeli military offensive “Protective edge” in Gaza. We ask for an
increased presence of the United Nations and the support of its Security Council in order to protect civilians.
We demand an immediate cease-fire – from both parties – and that the army of Israel leaves Gaza. We also demand that Israel stops the occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and ends
the blockade of Gaza. Also Israel must abandon its politics of settlements and wall-building. Instead it should use its military and economic capacity to bring peace rather than conflict with their neighbouring people, with whom they share their future.
What we are witnessing is a flagrant crime against international law and it is correct when the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon “condemn these heinous acts.” Israel’s on-going massacre in Gaza is not part of it’s right to self-defence. The conflict between Israel and Palestine is
asymmetric: One is militarily strong and the other weak. For every Israeli victim in this conflict there are 20 Palestinian victims.
Gaza will remember Sunday, 20 July as Bloody Sunday. It is the worst day since the Israeli invasion five years ago. More than 100 were reported dead in a single day. In the last two weeks
of escalating violence, about 650 Palestinians have been killed, mostly civilians, many of them children. The number of injured is many times more. In Israel, the losses have already exceeded
those who were killed during the entire operation Cast Lead in 2008-2009. So far during“Protective edge” a total of about 30 Israeli soldiers and two civilians have been killed.
What we are witnessing today is a greater threat to Israel’s future than it is to Palestine’s future. Israel does not exist with any historical, biblical or military right. Israel as a Jewish state is the
result of a decision by the UN to give the Jewish people a homeland, following the horrible treatment that Jews suffered in Europe during World War II.
The fact that the UN decision took land from Palestinians to make the Jewish state possible, make us all co-responsible in the present conflict. A united world community has accepted that
Israel in the 1948 war took more land than what was intended in the UN partition plan from 1947, but the world does not accept Israel’s occupation after the Six Day War in 1967.
