GENEVA:
The U.N. pointman for Palestinian human rights launched a blistering attack on
the international community Monday, accusing it of conspiring in Israeli
settlement policies and branding the peace process a “trick.”
Richard
Falk, the special U.N. rapporteur for human rights in the occupied territories,
also took aim at the so-called Middle East Quartet’s peace envoy Tony Blair
over his efforts in the region.
Falk,
who spoke to reporters after addressing the U.N. Human Rights Council in
Geneva, said Palestinians in the occupied West Bank were offered no protection
in Israeli law and that their treatment was akin to apartheid.
“I
think one has to begin to call the reality by a name,” he said, likening the
“discriminatory dualistic legal system” in the West Bank to the former system
in South Africa.
In
his report to the council, Falk expressed his concern about Israel’s use of
administrative detention, the expansion of settlements and violence by
settlers.
Israel
in March severed contacts with the council after the 47-member body said it
would investigate settlements in the occupied territories, which are considered
illegal under international law.
Peace
talks between the two sides have been on hold since September 2010, with the
Palestinians refusing to resume them without a moratorium on settlement
building.
“The
peace process is a trick rather than a way to find a solution to the problem,”
Falk said.
He
also criticized the work of the former British Prime Minister Tony Blair in the
region.
“Tony
Blair has not much to show for his 86 visits to the Middle East ... [it is] an
extension of the peace process which I regard as a failure because while time
passes the settlement culture continues.”
“The
international community is conspiring – maybe unwittingly – in a process that
has no way of bringing justice to the people involved in this conflict,” he said
of settlements.
At
least 3,500 buildings were under construction in the West Bank in 2011, Falk
reported, not including Israeli settlements in occupied East Jerusalem.
Such
building on Palestinian land “more or less closes the book on the reality and feasibility”
of a two-state solution to the conflict, Falk said.
“The
credibility of the Human Rights Council is very much at stake if there is
nothing that is done about the non-cooperation or non-compliance” by Israel
with the council’s recommendations, he said.
“The
language of censure doesn’t help the Palestinian people if there is no action.”
Settler
violence against Palestinians was a new feature of the drive to occupy
Palestinian territories, especially around Hebron and Nablus, he added.
“Many
people say the Israeli government is an extension of the settlers and I think
that is an accurate description,” he said.
Falk
said Palestinians were disillusioned by the international peace efforts and had
resorted to extreme measures such as hunger strikes to raise awareness of
abuses including illegal detention by Israel.
But such action was ignored
in Western media, Falk said, sending “the unfortunate signal that only violent
protests will be noticed internationally.”
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2012/Jul-03/179116-un-rights-pointman-brands-middle-east-peace-process-a-trick.ashx#axzz1zZJnh1LU
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