Arab League, Parliament condemn Israeli aggression on Gaza, call for ceasefire, aid Access

AMMAN — The Arab League on Thursday condemned Israel for defying international legal obligations, as the occupying power, including United Nations Security Council resolutions demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and the unconditional entry of humanitarian aid.

The League also criticised Israel’s refusal to comply with provisional measures issued by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to prevent the crime of genocide.

In a statement marking the 77th anniversary of the Nakba, the Arab League’s General Secretariat condemned and criminalised the ongoing Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank, which has persisted for over 585 days.

The Secretariat said that the Nakba, a major tragedy in human history, was initiated by Zionist militias in 1948 and continues to this day, as the Palestinian people face extermination, killing, displacement, and forced expulsion.

"These acts have turned millions of Palestinians into refugees both within and outside their homeland, a form of oppression and injustice rarely witnessed by any people in centuries, the statement said.

The statement emphasised the critical role of the international justice system and human rights organisations, international, regional, and local, as well as civil society institutions, in ensuring accountability and securing justice for the Palestinian people.

It also reiterated the Palestinian right to self-determination and called for the establishment of an independent state with East Jerusalem as its capital, based on the pre-1967 borders.

The League underscored that this year’s commemoration comes amid a devastating war in Gaza, ongoing for more than 19 months, which has left over 200,000 people dead, injured, or missing, the majority of them women and children.

It also pointed to the mass displacement of Gaza’s population, estimated at two million, and the systematic destruction of civilian infrastructure, including homes, hospitals, and schools.

The statement also condemned the continued blockade of humanitarian aid, resulting in acute shortages of food, water, and medicine, and described these actions as war crimes of unprecedented magnitude in the region.

The Arab League also denounced the attacks on UN facilities, medical centres, and the targeted killing of healthcare workers, journalists, and aid personnel, calling such acts blatant violations of humanitarian, moral, and legal norms.

It also urged the international community to uphold its responsibilities and push for an immediate end to what it called a genocidal war and campaign of ethnic cleansing in Gaza.

Also on Thursday, the Arab Parliament urged the international community, the UN Security Council, and international and regional parliaments to uphold their moral, humanitarian, and legal obligations by taking immediate action to stop what it described as an ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people and to ensure international protection for them.

Speaker of the Arab Parliament Mohammed bin Ahmed Yamahi said, "This year’s commemoration comes as Palestinians endure a new catastrophe no less horrific or criminal than that of 1948."

He pointed to the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip, now in its 19th month, during which more than 53,000 people have been killed and over 120,000 injured, the majority of them women and children.

He also highlighted the intensifying Israeli assaults on refugee camps in the northern West Bank, which he said aim to undermine the right of return and erase the Palestinian refugee cause.

Al Yamahi emphasised that the Nakba is not a chapter of the past but a persistent and escalating tragedy, renewed in ever more brutal forms under the shadow of international silence.

This reality, he said, demands urgent and decisive international intervention to end the Israeli occupation and its daily violations of international law and UN resolutions.

He reaffirmed the Arab Parliament’s full support for the Palestinian people across all diplomatic and parliamentary arenas, stressing the need to uphold their inalienable rights, foremost among them the right of return, freedom, and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.