YESTERDAY marked Human Rights Day, a day observed annually across the world to commemorate the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations on December 10, 1948.
The theme for this year’s commemoration, ‘Human rights are the foundation of our dignity in everyday life’, comes as Palestinians endure one of the greatest humanitarian crises in modern history.
Human rights organisations have exposed the reality for Palestinians across the occupied territories as being one where they are denied the most basic rights guaranteed under the Universal Declaration.
These include the rights to life, self-determination, adequate living standards, health and education. At the same time, Palestinian detainees continue to face severe abuses, including torture and ill-treatment.
Alongside this, the Zionist regime have continued attacks in Gaza despite the ceasefire, with Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) maintaining air, land and sea operations striking civilians and civilian property.
Since the ceasefire started on October 10, the Zionist genocidal war has continued with around 600 violations in the last seven weeks, killing at least 386 Palestinians including over 70 children and wounding 980.
The IOF, which maintains military control of over 53% of the Gaza Strip, also continues to restrict the freedom of movement, especially for medical patients and the wounded.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) said that more than 185,500 patients, including 4,000 children, are currently waiting to leave Gaza for urgent specialised medical care. According to the Palestine Information Centre, the devastation has caused Gaza’s healthcare system to collapse, with medicine shortages reaching 55% and medical consumables 71%.
Severe restriction on goods entering Gaza by the IOF means that only 171 trucks a day are allowed into the Strip, far below the pre-genocide level of around 600, while essential items such as food, medicine, fuel and materials for making shelters continue to be blocked.
Tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza are without adequate shelter and around 288,000 families are facing life-threatening risks as winter storms intensify. Yesterday, a severe rainstorm destroyed thousands of tents used by displaced people in Gaza, according to local reports.
Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights, a human rights group based in Gaza, described the situation as a ‘war of genocide’ and a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law and fundamental human rights.
The Centre issued an urgent call to the international community to intervene to halt the genocide, ensure the withdrawal of Israeli forces form the Gaza Strip, allow patients and injured civilians to travel freely for treatment and facilitate the entry of food and medical aid.
Al Mezan further urged people worldwide to intensify solidarity efforts and pressure their governments to uphold their moral and legal obligations to stop genocide and end occupation.
The imperialist nations have never been bound by the Declaration of Human Rights but their open contempt for human rights and international law in actively enabling Zionist genocide has, as the UN Special rapporteur on Gaza, Francesca Albanese, said on Sunday, awakened global conscience.
Meanwhile Labour prime minister Keir Starmer observed Human Rights Day by demanding at a European summit yesterday for the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) to be torn up to stop asylum seekers using their rights under the Convention to avoid being swept up and deported.
Labour home secretary David Lammy argued yesterday that the ECHR could also be ‘reinterpreted’ to limit rights under Article 3 which prohibits torture and ‘degrading treatment’.
Starmer’s government stands complicit with Zionist genocide and is now intent on tearing up human rights law in order to wage a war against refugees and asylum seekers fleeing imperialist wars and poverty.
The time has come for the powerful working class to deal with Starmer’s government by forcing the TUC to end its complete inactivity and silence, and immediately call a general strike to bring them down and bring in a workers government and socialism.
A workers government will immediately give all the support required for the victory of the Palestinians over their occupiers and for the establishment of the independent state of Palestine.
This is the way forward!
