GENEVA - UN experts* today issued an urgent appeal for an emergency meeting of the UN General Assembly, warning that the international community must act immediately before the 17 September-deadline for demanding an end to Israel's occupation of Palestine, as genocide and a man-made famine unfold in Gaza.
"Silence and inaction are not an option in the face of mass atrocities," the experts said.
"Israel must immediately end its obstruction of safe, effective and dignified humanitarian assistance. But lifting these restrictions alone will not be enough to save Gaza's devastated population. What is urgently required is an end to Israel's siege and the declaration of an immediate ceasefire," the experts said.
"At this critical moment, the world needs the General Assembly - the highest body of the United Nations - to take decisive leadership and act to prevent further catastrophe," they said.
After the formal confirmation of famine by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), the humanitarian emergency has reached intolerable proportions, with an entire population facing starvation under siege as the Israeli military advances into Gaza City, which is overcrowded with more than a million displaced Palestinians.
Three hundred and sixty-one Palestinians have died due to malnutrition, including 130 children. Thirteen of them, including 3 children, have died in the past 24 hours.
"The horrors of death by starvation will intensify if Israel is not stopped. Already, half a million people in Gaza are starving. Have State authorities become so numb to these numbers - so desensitised, once again, to the systematic breaches of our collective moral and legal obligations?" the experts said.
The famine in Gaza, deliberately engineered and perpetuated by Israel - and enabled by private and security actors - is an affront to humanity, the experts said.
"A State responsible for creating genocidal conditions aimed at destroying Palestinians in Gaza as a group by also starving them cannot and shall not be entrusted to control access, distribution, or supervision of humanitarian aid," they said.
They recalled that under international humanitarian law, occupying powers have binding obligations to guarantee the survival of the population under their control. "This is precisely what Israel is not doing," they said.
"The deliberate obstruction of food, water, medicine, shelter and other relief - compounded by deadly attacks on civilians, including women and children, gathering at aid distribution points, and repeated forced displacement - has transformed hunger into a weapon of war," they said.
Israel must be held accountable and not be given further excuses to escape accountability, the experts said.
They noted that more than 2,000 Palestinians have been killed at distribution sites - 70 % in the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation areas- in recent months, often in incidents involving indiscriminate or targeted fire. Several Palestinians have been forcibly disappeared from the distribution sites.
"This reality shows that existing mechanisms have utterly failed, and reliance on the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation constitutes a blatant violation of article 59 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and involved international crimes."
"The General Assembly must act without delay to stop the machinery of death," they said.
The experts called on the General Assembly to convene an emergency meeting to:
- Call on Member states to act under "uniting for peace" in line with General Assembly resolution 377 V and recommend a peace operation.
- Demand the opening of all the crossings to unrestricted humanitarian access under direct UN oversight.
- Demand the immediate suspension of failed or dangerous mechanisms, including those that have led to widespread killings at aid distribution points.
- Call on Member States with ports in the Mediterranean Sea to urgently deploy emergency navies carrying humanitarian aid.
- Request the authorisation of UN-led international humanitarian convoys with full UN authority to coordinate and supervise all crossings into Gaza.
- Demand an immediate, permanent ceasefire and the release of arbitrarily detained Palestinians and Israelis alike.
"The situation in Gaza is intolerable and unconscionable," the experts said.
"The General Assembly must uphold the duty of the United Nations to respect international humanitarian law and protect civilians, end the violence, and guarantee that life-saving assistance reaches the people of Gaza without obstruction or delay. Anything less makes the international community complicit in these grave violations."
