Daily Sabah – December 22, 2023
Security Council approves resolution urging more aid, humanitarian access to Gaza
The United Nations Security Council finally adopted a resolution urging the delivery of more humanitarian aid and access to Gaza, which has been devastated by ruthless Israeli attacks, after days of delays and negotiations.
The resolution calls for "urgent steps" to immediately allow "safe, unhindered, and expanded" humanitarian access to Gaza amid the ongoing Israeli offensive on the strip.
After several days of intense negotiations and nail-biting delays, the resolution submitted by the United Arab Emirates passed by a vote of 13-0, with the U.S. and Russia – both permanent council members – abstaining. Negotiations had dragged on all week amid Israel's U.S.-backed rejection of any explicit call for a cease-fire.
The resolution demands the parties to the conflict allow and facilitate the use of all available routes to and throughout the entire Gaza Strip, including border crossings, to ensure humanitarian personnel and assistance reach the civilian population in need.
The resolution requests that U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appoint a "senior humanitarian and reconstruction coordinator" to expedite the delivery of humanitarian assistance to the civilian population in Gaza.
The vote was especially notable in that since Oct. 7, a number of Security Council resolutions on the conflict failed to pass due to vetoes by its permanent members, leading some world leaders and observers to question the council's effectiveness.
Since Oct. 7, the Israeli army has been waging a destructive war on Gaza, resulting in 20,057 deaths and 53,320 wounded so far, most of them children and women. This has caused immense damage to infrastructure and an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe, according to Palestinian and international sources.
'Imminent risk of famine'
The entire population of Gaza faces "an imminent risk of famine", according to a U.N.-backed global hunger monitoring system.
The "deprivation and destruction" of much of the narrow territory of 2.4 million inhabitants "will only bring more hunger, disease and despair to the people of Gaza," U.N. humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths posted on X, formerly Twitter.
Russian aid
Russian President Vladimir Putin promised on Friday to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza and urged a peaceful resolution to the fighting.
"Russia will continue to supply the Gaza Strip with essential goods, including medicines and medical equipment," Putin told Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas during a telephone call, the Kremlin said.
https://www.dailysabah.com/world/mid-east/unsc-oks-resolution-urging-more-aid-humanitarian-access-to-gaza
Daily Sabah – December 22, 2023
Gaza death toll passes 20,000 as Israel's military faces rising scrutiny
In the grim aftermath of the Gaza conflict, health officials in the Hamas-controlled region reported a devastating toll, with over 20,000 Palestinians being killed by Israel.
This distressing figure, representing nearly 1% of the prewar population, highlights the profound human cost incurred during Israel's military offensive, intensifying calls to reevaluate the scale of the operation.
The profound impact of the conflict extends far beyond the casualty count, as 85% of Gaza's population has been displaced over the past 11 weeks, leaving wide expanses of the coastal enclave in ruins.
Gaza's Health Ministry documented 20,057 deaths.
Earlier statements indicated that roughly 70% of those killed were women or minors, with an additional 53,320 Palestinians wounded.
The latest flare-up of the Palestine-Israel conflict occurred on Oct. 7 when Hamas breached Israel's border, resulting in the deaths of around 1,200 people and the kidnapping of 240 others, prompting Israel to declare war.
Israel's response, marked by thousands of indiscriminate airstrikes, missile bombardments and a ground offensive, aims to dismantle Hamas' military capabilities.
Despite Israeli officials claiming to have eliminated approximately 7,000 Hamas members, no concrete evidence has been presented to substantiate this assertion.
Tragically, the toll on civilians persists, exemplified by the recent killing of a woman working at Al-Awda Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip.
The hospital, under siege by the Israeli army, faces severe challenges, with occupants denied access to essential resources such as water, food and medicine.
The Health Ministry in Gaza said the Israeli army has converted Al-Awda Hospital into a "military barracks," emphasizing the dire conditions faced by its 240 occupants, including 80 medical staff, 40 patients and 120 displaced individuals.
Movement between hospital units is restricted, exacerbating an already dire humanitarian situation.
Anadolu Agency – December 21, 2023
Israeli forces arrest 25 more Palestinians in West Bank, bringing tally to 4,655 since Oct. 7
Heightened tensions grip West Bank as Israeli assaults on Gaza Strip persist
The Israeli forces detained 25 more Palestinians in the West Bank on Thursday, taking the tally since Oct. 7 to 4,655, according to prisoners' affairs groups.
The new arrests took place in the cities of Nablus, Tulkarm, Ramallah, and Hebron across the occupied West Bank, the Commission for Detainees and Ex-Prisoners' Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoner Society said in a joint statement.
The figure of detainees does not include those arrested by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip, the statement said.
“The arrests were marked by harassment, severe beatings, and threats against detainees and their families, along with acts of sabotage and destruction in the homes of Palestinians,” the statement added.
Tensions have been running high across the West Bank amid an Israeli military offensive on the Gaza Strip following a cross-border attack by Hamas on Oct. 7.
At least 302 Palestinians have been killed and more than 3,100 others injured in the occupied territory since then, according to Palestinian figures.
Daily Sabah – December 21, 2023
Court convicts 5 Serbs for murdering Bosnian civilians in 1992
Bosnian court convicted five Serbs for killing dozens of Muslim Bosnians, including women and children in 1992. The perpetrators were sentenced to between 5 and 20 years in prison.
The Bosnian State Court sentenced Ilija Zoric to a maximum of twenty years behind bars after he was found guilty of participating in the massacre of 29 women and children who had taken refuge in a house in the village of Zecovi near the northwestern town of Prijedor.
Six out of eleven former military and police officers who were on trial since 2015 were acquitted and none of them was present when the verdict was read out at first instance, according to an AFP journalist.
The massacre in the village of Zecovi was committed on July 25, 1992, on the third day of a "clean-up" operation in the village, in which at least 150 inhabitants were murdered, according to the prosecutor's office.
The remains of thirty-two civilians killed were never found, Judge Saban Maksumic said.
After the women and children had "orderly" left the house, "Ilija Zoric and several other people mowed them down with a hail of bullets," the judge explained.
"Only one 15-year-old child, who had hidden in a nearby house, survived", he added.
This survivor, Zijad Bacic, now 46, testified in the trial.
His 10-year-old sister, his two brothers aged 12 and 16, and his mother were killed.
"To be honest, I'm partly happy with this verdict. I saw this criminal Ilija Zoric and I'm pleased that the court has accepted my testimony," Bacic told reporters after the verdict was read.
The commander of a company of Serbian forces in this area, Dusan Milunic, was sentenced to 12 years in prison.
He was found guilty of having organized "the operation to clean up the village," together with the head of a reserve police unit, Radomir Stojnic, who died in 2022.
Three other members of the units involved in the operation were sentenced to 5, 8 and 14 years in prison for the murders of four other civilians.
Fikret Bacic, whose 6-year-old daughter, 12-year-old son and 32-year-old wife were killed in the shooting, is "bitter" as he is still searching for their remains.
"This verdict means nothing to me. I expected the prosecutor's office and the court to find out about the mass graves", he said.
The Bosnian war (1992-1995) claimed almost 100,000 lives. The remains of 7,600 victims are still being sought.
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