Iran urges int’l community to address Israel’s ‘savage crimes’ against Palestinians in West Bank

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei made the remarks on Friday, one day after video emerged showing Zionist regime’s forces fatally shooting two unarmed Palestinians at close range despite the fact that the pair had raised their hands above their heads to surrender.

He said that the global community should pay attention to ongoing Israeli atrocities in the West Bank, including attacks by the occupation soldiers and settlers on Palestinian refugee camps in the cities of Nablus and Jenin, as well as the killings and arbitrary arrests of Palestinians, and the demolition of their homes and farms.

He also referred to reports by human rights organizations regarding Israel’s prolonged detention of hundreds of Palestinian children and their torture that led to the murder of dozens in the regime’s jails.

The international community, particular the UN and its Human Rights Council, must address the gross violations of Palestinians’ rights by the usurping regime, Baghaei added.

"It is essential to document each of these crimes as crimes against humanity and to ensure the prosecution and punishment of the Zionist criminals.”

The Palestinian Authority condemned Israel’s killings of Muntasir Billah Mahmoud Qassem Abdullah, 26, and Yousef Ali Yousef Asa’asa, 37, in the Jabal Abu Dhahir neighborhood of Jenin as “a fully-fledged war crime and a flagrant violation of all international laws, conventions, norms, and humanitarian values.”

The Gaza-based Hamas resistance movement said the crime exposes Israel’s “criminal mentality” and “utter disregard” for Palestinian lives, marking a new episode in the Zionists’ “systematic genocide and elimination” campaign in the West Bank.

In a statement, Hamas further noted that brutal Israeli attacks against Palestinians across the West Bank prove that the resistance is the “natural and legitimate response” to the regime's violations.

Meanwhile, Sarit Michaeli, the international director of B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights organization, denounced the killings as “cold-blooded execution”.

Additionally, Zionist regime’s lawmaker Ofer Cassif said Tel Aviv was “importing” its “war of extermination” from the Gaza Strip to the occupied West Bank.

“This is not a ‘war’, it is cold-blooded murder for which the murderers must pay a heavy price,” he emphasized.