Indonesia calls for international support to resolve Israel-Palestine crisis

JAKARTA, MAY 17: Indonesia has reiterated its call for international leaders' support to end violence during and ahead of international forums that seek to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"Indonesia strongly condemns Israel’s attacks, which have resulted in the loss of hundreds of lives, including women and children. Israel's aggression must be put to a stop," President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo said on Twitter on Saturday.

Jokowi has been urging the United Nations Security Council, which was due to meet on Sunday, to take measures against what he described as repeated violations carried out by Israel, saying on Monday that Indonesia would continue to stand with the people of Palestine.

Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi attended an emergency meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) on Sunday evening, in which she tried to push the OIC to have a stronger stance on ending the violence.

“We are focusing on gaining international support so we can put huge pressure on Israel to stop the violence,” Abdul Kadir Jailani, director general for Asia Pacific and Africa, who accompanied Retno at the OIC meeting, told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.

The tensions between Israel and Palestine drew international outcry after the severe escalation of violence in Gaza and East Jerusalem. Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip killed eight children and demolished a building housing media offices, sparking international outcry.

Before the OIC meeting, Retno reached out to several counterparts, such as the foreign ministers of Egypt, Malaysia and Brunei, regarding this issue.

At the OIC meetings, Indonesia proposed three key points to resolve the conflict, including the need to unite support for Palestinian independence.  Retno also suggested that each country use its influence to encourage a ceasefire and that the OIC has to work harder to restart credible multilateral negotiations. “Together we have to act now. The Palestinian people deserve justice. And I emphasize that Indonesia will continue to support the Palestinian struggle,” she told a press conference on the sidelines of the OIC meeting.

If the UNSC fails to take action, the UN General Assembly must hold an emergency meeting, Retno said, adding that the OIC would urge it to implement international protection to protect Palestinians and the Al Aqsa Mosque area. “The OIC calls on the international community to stop the ongoing Israeli settlement colonization of occupied Palestinian land, and reaffirms its position in supporting Palestinian independence,” Retno told the press. Later on Sunday, in a statement issued after the emergency meeting, the OIC condemned "in the strongest terms Israel's brutal aggression" against the Palestinian people.

The statement, carried by Saudi state media, called for an immediate halt to the attacks on civilians, saying they were "a violation of international law and the UN resolutions", Reuters reported. Sunday's UNSC meeting is set to take place after Israel ally Washington, which has been criticized for not doing enough to stem the bloodshed, blocked another meeting scheduled for Friday. Several days earlier, Retno also sent out messages to foreign ministers from Vietnam, India and Norway, all of which are UN security council nonpermanent members. “We have been communicating with India, with Norway, and some members of the UNSC. We have conveyed our hopes to the members of the Security Council who have similar concerns,” Kadir said. “We expect the Security Council to take firm action regarding Israeli aggression even though we know this will not be easy."

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres was "dismayed" by civilian casualties in Gaza and "deeply disturbed" by Israel's strike on the tower housing news bureaus, a spokesperson said Saturday as reported by AFP. Guterres "reminds all sides that any indiscriminate targeting of civilian and media structures violates international law and must be avoided at all costs", he said.

The heaviest fighting since 2014 between Israel and Islamist group Hamas, sparked by unrest in Jerusalem, has claimed 174 lives in the crowded coastal enclave of Gaza and killed 10 people in Israel since last Monday. Both Israel and Hamas, the Islamist group that runs the enclave, insisted they would continue their cross-border fire after Israel destroyed a 13-floor building in Gaza City that housed the Qatar-based Al Jazeera and the Associated Press news agency.

US President Joe Biden expressed his "grave concern" over violence in Israel and Gaza in a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Saturday, while separately telling President Mahmoud Abbas that Hamas must "cease firing rockets." Speaking on the sixth day of a paroxysm of Israeli-Palestinian violence that has left scores dead or wounded, Biden expressed his "strong support" for Israel's right to defend itself against rocket attacks by "Hamas and other terrorist groups", in his call with Netanyahu, while also emphasizing his clear concern over the deadly flare-up and casualties on both sides, as well as for the safety of journalists.

In a televised statement late Saturday, Netanyahu thanked Biden for "unequivocal support". Netanyahu told the US that Israel was doing its utmost to safeguard civilians in its Gaza bombing campaign. "The proof is that towers containing terror sites are cleared of uninvolved people prior to being attacked," he said. Balls of flame and a mushroom cloud of debris shot into the sky Saturday afternoon as Israel's air force flattened the Gaza building housing Al Jazeera and AP, after giving a warning to evacuate. Israeli defence officials said the building housed not only news bureaus but offices of Hamas militants.

Both Al Jazeera and AP condemned the attack, with AP asking Israel to put forward evidence, Reuters reported. Hamas began its rocket assault on Monday after weeks of tensions over a court case to evict several Palestinian families in East Jerusalem, and in retaliation for Israeli police clashes with Palestinians near the city's Al Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third-holiest site, during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other militant groups have fired more than 2,000 rockets from Gaza since Monday, the Israeli military said on Saturday. Israel has launched more than 1,000 air and artillery strikes into the densely populated coastal strip, saying they were aimed at Hamas and other militant targets.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

COURTESY thejakartapost

-----------------