VARIOUS: PALESTINIANS GIVE THEIR REACTIONS TO ISRAELI DECISION TO BOYCOTT WORLD COURT HEARING ON CONTROVERSIAL WEST BANK SECURITY FENCE
Record ID:
400067
VARIOUS: PALESTINIANS GIVE THEIR REACTIONS TO ISRAELI DECISION TO BOYCOTT WORLD COURT HEARING ON CONTROVERSIAL WEST BANK SECURITY FENCE
- Title: VARIOUS: PALESTINIANS GIVE THEIR REACTIONS TO ISRAELI DECISION TO BOYCOTT WORLD COURT HEARING ON CONTROVERSIAL WEST BANK SECURITY FENCE
- Date: 12th February 2004
- Summary: (EU) BOUDROUS, WEST BANK (FEBRUARY 12, 2004) (ABU DHABI TV - ACCESS ALL) 1. WIDE OF INTERNATIONAL ACTIVISTS, CARRYING PALESTINIAN FLAGS ON HILLSIDE PROTESING ABOUT ISRAELI SECURITY FENCE 0.03 2. WIDE OF ISRAELI SOLDIERS ON ROAD BELOW HILLSIDE 0.05 3. WIDE OF WOMEN PROTESTORS CHANTING SLOGANS 0.12 4. WIDE OF PROTESTORS ON THE HILLS
- Embargoed: 27th February 2004 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: VARIOUS LOCATIONS IN THE WEST BANK/ GAZA CITY, GAZA AND JERUSALEM
- City:
- Country: Palestinian Territories
- Reuters ID: LVA5AJKLJN2E03DNBIYJ0YZZYU5C
- Story Text: Palestinians angry at Israeli decision to boycott
World Court hearing on controversial fence across the West
Bank.
Seething Palestinian anger at Israel's security
barrier being built across the West Bank, taking in Jewish
settlements and cutting across their land soared further on
Thursday (February 12) when the Israeli government said it
would boycott a World Court hearing on whether it should
tear it down.
A handful of them, joined by peace activists,
demonstrated on a hill close to a section of the new fence
in Boudrous, on Thursday. There was no violence during the
demonstration which was quickly controlled by Israeli
soldiers patrolling the area.
Israeli officials say the barrier is meant to keep out
suicide bombers and has thwarted dozens of attacks.
Palestinians call it a bid to annex land they need for a
viable state since it snakes deep into the West Bank.
The stalemate underlined the paralysis in Middle East
peacemaking and came a day after Israel killed 15
Palestinians in a major army assault into the Gaza Strip,
triggering vows of large-scale suicide attacks by vengeful
Palestinian militants.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's office, announcing the
boycott, said special legal advisers feared the World Court
session would lend credence to a case that Israel sees as
politically motivated and beyond the tribunal's
jurisdiction.
Israel would make do with an affidavit it filed with
the court last month outlining these misgivings, the office
said.
Israel's Minister for the Secret Services, Uzi Landau,
said in Jerusalem that the Isareli government's main and
only concerned about was the safety of its citizens and
rejected the international court's efforts.
He also dismissed the United Nations outright which he
argued was unfairly biased towards the Palestinians.
"The court in Hague has no authority to deal with
political issues. This is a political project, and a
project that is geared to save life. We have very bad
experience with bodies of the United Nations and the Arabs
have such an influence over there that they can just move
and get any decision they wish," Landau said.
The move met with an immediate wall of Palestinian
condemnation, as Israeli officials declined repeated
requests for an on-camera comment.
Nabil Rdainah, a senior aide to Palestinian president
Yasser Arafat said the move showed that Israel expected to
lose and that Israel did not belong to the community of
nations.
"This proves that the Israelis cannot face justice. The
Israelis knew from the beginning that they are facing the
international court, the world community and they cannot
defend their illegal actions in the West Bank and Gaza
especially building the wall on Palestinian land. " he said
in Ramallah.
Any ruling by the tribunal, based in The Hague, would
be non-binding, but Israel is concerned a finding against
it would be so influential that it might spawn U.N.
Security Council action against it.
The World Court hearing, due to begin on February 23,
was scheduled at the request of the U.N. General Assembly,
where pro-Palestinian sentiment is strong.
Palestinian lawyer and a member of the delegation due to
travel to the hearing, Shawky Aysseh, says Israel is in no
position to challenge the decision of the international
court. He also fears that the fence, as a well as Israel's
refusal to bow to international legal pressure, will
backfire and further radicalise Palestinians who are losing
their land, access to some of their essential services and
their civil rights.
"Well, it's not Israel who give the international court
the jurisdiction to work, and we believe that the
Palestinians are choosing the legal way and the peaceful
way to challenge the wall," Aysseh said.
An Israeli raid in Gaza on Wednesday (February 11) in
which 15 Palestinians were killed has already angered
militant groups who have vowed to carry out revenge attacks
on Israeli targets. Hamas's armed wing, the Izz el-Deen
al-Qassam Brigades, urged its cells in all West Bank and
Gaza cities and refugee camps on Thursday (February 12) to
carry out "major martyrdom operations" as retribution for
Israel's most lethal assault into Gaza since 2002.
Wednesday's Gaza violence damaged efforts to arrange an
Israeli-Palestinian summit in the hope of reviving a
U.S.-backed peace plan and came amid signs of Israeli army
concern about Sharon's plan to remove settlers from Gaza.
Hamas spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin said the
long Israel refuses to face up to international demands and
to return occupied land to the Palestinians the more
radical Palestinians will become and warned of further
bloodshed.
"He is erecting a racist wall to separate the one
Palestinian people.The Palestinian people are being divided
into cantoons, losing their land, their freedom and their
entity and because of that, the enemy knows that his is a
losing case and that the court will rule against him so he
wanted to run away and take a ruling in abstentia that he
will not be able to stand," Yassin said.
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