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July 12, 2004
AIDA WELCOMES ICJ OPINION ON ISRAEL’S WEST BANK BARRIER
The undersigned organizations call on Israel to accept the International Court of Justice’s advisory opinion regarding the construction of a wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and recognize the immense suffering it causes to the Palestinians.
AIDA, an umbrella organization for more than 50 non-governmental organizations, welcomes the ruling and believes that Israel would show that it was out of step with world opinion if it failed to pay heed to the court’s advisory opinion.
The undersigned AIDA members are deeply concerned about the adverse impact the Wall is already having on Palestinian daily life. It is cutting off farmers from their fields and water, family from family, children from schools and the sick from hospitals.
Only one quarter of the 700-km long barrier has been built so far but its destructive impact is such that Palestinians fear that when it is completed they will be inmates of the biggest open-air prison in the world.
We hope that even though Israel rejects the court’s authority on the Wall, the ICJ statement echoes widespread concern that its route seriously violates international humanitarian law, annexes productive West Bank land and causes further suffering to an impoverished population.
The ruling echoes loudly international public opinion. The U.N. General Assembly, the United States, the European Union, numerous other governments as well as Palestinians and many Israelis have all denounced the route of the Wall.
The ICJ ruling follows one by Israel’s High Court on June 30, which said that a 30km stretch of the Wall would have to be re-routed because of the harm it will do to Palestinians living in the area.
Ninety percent of the barrier will be on West Bank land and it will, in some places, cut some 20km into Palestinian territory to include illegal Israeli settlements and their water resources.
We deplore the way in which the Wall is undermining the fragile security of nearly one million Palestinians by preventing them from reaching their workplaces, wells, schools, hospitals and relatives.
The Wall deviates sharply from the Green Line and will seriously jeopardize the atmosphere for peace talks and the chance of a viable Palestinian state being established alongside Israel.
It will weaken the economy, jeopardize livelihoods and increase suffering in a population of which half already lives below the poverty line of two dollars a day and two thirds are unemployed.
Palestinians fear that the Wall is an attempt by Israel to demarcate the borders of a future Palestinian state.
This can only be agreed at real negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israeli government. The undersigned organizations call on the international community to use all its influence to ensure the resumption of negotiations for a just solution and a sustainable peace.
Genuine negotiations on a just peace would give Palestinians and Israelis cause to hope and believe in the future and would also enhance prospects for peace and security for all states and peoples in the region.
Signed by:
A.M. Qattan
Foundation
America’s Development Foundation (ADF)
American Near East Refugee Aid (ANERA)
Caritas Jerusalem
Comitato Internazionale per lo Sviluppo dei Populi (CISP)
Cooperation for Development – Near East Foundation
Cooperazione e Sviluppo
Cooperazione Internazionale
Healthlink Worldwide
International Christian Committee
Japan International Volunteer Center
Lutheran World Federation
Medecins du Monde - France
Medical Aid of Palestinians (Map UK)
Mennonite Central Committee
Movimiento por la Paz, el Desarme y la Libertad (MPDL)
Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA)
Quaker Youth Program
Ricerca e Cooperatione (RC)
Save the Children – Sweden
Solidaridad Internacional
Terre des Hommes
Union Aid Abroad – APHEDA
Unity and Cooperation for the Development of the People (UCODEP)
World Vision Jerusalem
For more
information please contact:
Christina Badde/Fabricio Lomanto
AIDA Secretariat
Tel: 02 6566234
Fax: 02 6566236