UNITED NATIONS, Sept 26 (NNN-XINHUA) – Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas, yesterday accused Israel of committing “a war of genocide” on Gaza, saying, these crimes will be recorded in “the pages of international conscience as one of the most horrific chapters of humanitarian tragedy in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.”
“I speak to you today after almost two years, in which our Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip have been facing a war of genocide, destruction, starvation and displacement,” said Abbas, while addressing the UN General Assembly via video link.
Genocide has been “waged by the Israeli occupation forces,” in which they killed and injured more than 220,000 Palestinians, the majority of whom are unarmed children, women and the elderly, he stressed.
The president also condemned the Israeli government’s settlement expansion on the West Bank, warning that it threatens the two-state solution.
“We reject and completely deplore” a plan by Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for a “greater Israel,” Abbas said, while drawing attention to the increasing “terrorism of settlers.”
Meanwhile, “we reject what Hamas carried out on the seventh of Oct,” said Abbas, noting that, such acts do not represent the Palestinian people, nor “their just struggle for freedom and independence.”
He affirmed that the Gaza Strip “is an integral part of the State of Palestine,” and the Palestinian Authority is “ready to bear full responsibility for governance and security there.”
“Hamas will not have a role to play in governance,” he added.
Yesterday, Israeli troops advanced further into Gaza City, as Netanyahu vowed to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, before departing for New York to address the General Assembly today.
The Israeli strikes in Gaza have killed at least 65,419 Palestinians, since Oct, 2023, according to the Gaza health authorities.– NNN-XINHUA
