Palestine Human Rights Campaign

Palestine Human Rights Campaign

The Palestine Human Rights Campaign (PHRC) is joining the global call by human rights groups for the rejection of Israel's application for membership of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The OECD is scheduled to convene next month to formally consider Israel’s application.

PHRC spokeperson Tuma Hazou calls on Prime Minister John Key and the government to cast New Zealand's vote against Israel’s application. Tuma says "respect and compliance with international humanitarian and human rights law are requirements for membership of the OECD, yet Israel is in compliance with neither international law nor OECD standards "

International law expert and former UN Human Rights Rapporteur, Professor John Dugard, has described Israel as a state that is practising belligerent military occupation, colonisation and ethnic discrimination.

Israel has yet to comply with the recommendations of the UN Fact Finding Mission on Israel's 2008/2009 'Operation Cast Lead' in the Gaza Strip and investigate and prosecute, where needed, those responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity that resulted in the death of more than 1400 Palestinians, most of them civilians. Israel maintains an illegal blockade of the Gaza Strip, which has brought hunger and economic deprivation to almost 1.5 million Palestinians. The majority of victims in the territory are refugees that Israel displaced and dispossessed in 1948.

Israel fails to comply with the 2004 International Court of Justice Advisory Opinion that requires Israel to dismantle the annexation Wall it is building in the occupied West Bank.

Further, Israel has yet to end its almost 43-year occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949) states that: “The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.” But, this year on a visit to an illegal Israeli settlement in the West Bank, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu proclaimed defiantly “we are here to stay”.

The PHRC says that a vote by New Zealand against Israel's application for membership is all that is necessary to put an end to the application and urges John Key to make a principled stand to ensure OECD standards and international laws are respected and maintained.

ENDS

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