Hamas: UN statement reveals suffering of Palestinians in Gaza
The Palestinian resistance movement, Hamas, has hailed recent remarks by a spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who called for the full lifting of Israel’s years-long blockade on the impoverished Gaza Strip.
In a statement on Wednesday, Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said the UN official's remarks revealed once again the extent of the suffering of the more than two million Palestinians as a result of the unjust siege that clearly violates international law and human rights.
"We call on the UN and all human rights and international organizations to take all these statements and reports seriously, work to intensify efforts to end the suffering of our Palestinian people and to pressure the Zionist occupying regime to lift its siege," Hamas said.
He further stressed the need to "end the policy of apartheid practiced by the Zionist occupation against our Palestinian people."
Hamas Political Bureau member Mousa Abu Marzouk and other senior officials have said the Palestinian resistance will finally succeed in having the siege lifted on the Gaza Strip and commence its reconstruction.
On Tuesday, Stephane Dujarric called for the complete removal of the Israeli blockade of Gaza, in line with a 2009 UN Security Council resolution.
"Today is the 15th anniversary of the beginning of the blockade in the Gaza Strip," Dujarric said during a press briefing held at the UN headquarters in New York.
"Due to poverty, high unemployment and other factors caused by the blockade, about 80 percent of Gaza's population depends on humanitarian aid.
"This year, $510 million is needed to provide food, water, sanitation and health care for 1.6 million people, and we now have only 25 per cent of that," he added.
In the latest Israeli bombardment campaign against the Gaza Strip, at least 260 Palestinians, including over 60 children, were killed in a time span of 11 days that began on May 10 last year.
That came following Palestinian retaliation for violent Israeli raids on worshipers at al-Aqsa Mosque and the regime’s plans to force a number of Palestinian families out of their homes at the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East al-Quds.
In response, Palestinian resistance movements launched Operation al-Quds Sword and fired more than 4,000 rockets and missiles into the occupied territories, killing 12 Israelis.
Apparently caught off guard by the unprecedented barrage of rockets from Gaza, Israel announced a unilateral ceasefire on May 21, which Palestinian resistance movements accepted with Egyptian mediation.
Elsewhere, the UN official pointed out that only sustainable political solutions between Palestinian factions can alleviate the pressure on the people of Gaza.
"Efforts should be continued to reach a compromise between all Palestinian political groups," he said.
The Palestinian leadership has been divided between Fatah and Hamas since 2006, when the latter scored a landslide victory in parliamentary elections in the Gaza Strip. Hamas has ever since been running the coastal enclave, while Fatah has been based in the autonomous parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Previous reconciliation attempts by the two sides to form a power-sharing unity government in Gaza and the West Bank have failed.