The International Fact-Finding Mission on Israeli Settlements was a United Nations fact-finding mission created in March 2012 by the Human Rights Council, an agency of the United Nations, to "investigate the implications of the Israeli settlements on the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights of the Palestinian people throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem. [1] The mission was composed of Christine Chanet from France (Chair of the Mission), Asma Jahangir from Pakistan, and Unity Dow from Botswana. [2]
Following a public call for submissions from interested parties, including representatives of Israeli settler communities, the mission received information from governments, inter-governmental organisations, international and national NGOs, professional bodies, academics, victims, witnesses and the media. It planned visits to both Israel and the occupied territories, to observe the situation on the ground, but was unable due to a lack of Israeli cooperation. In order to obtain first hand information the mission set up meetings in Jordan in which it met and interviewed various involved individuals and organisations. [1]
The final report of the Mission was presented at a Human Rights Council session on 18 March 2013 in Geneva by Christine Chanet and Unity Dow. The report states Israel commits a multitude of human rights abuses against the Palestinian people and calls for nations and businesses to abide by the international legal regulations.
The report met with both full endorsement and rejection. Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, said: "This is incredible. We are extremely heartened by this principled and candid assessment of Israeli violations.(...) The UN Human Rights Council's call for sanctions against Israel is crucial because it clearly expresses the idea that the settlement enterprise leads to "ethnic cleansing" in the West Bank." [3] Israeli newspaper Haaretz ran an Opinion Editorial by Saeb Erekat, the Chief Negotiator of the Palestinian Authority, in which he urged that "The UN report on Israeli settlements should be read by every single Israeli citizen. It is an opportunity for the international community to hold Israel accountable and end a culture of impunity that has all but destroyed the possibility of a two-state solution." [4]
Representatives of Israel did not take the floor during the 18 March debate, [5] and the Israeli Foreign Ministry dismissed the report, calling it "counterproductive" and saying that the Human Rights Council "has sadly distinguished itself by its systematically one-sided and biased approach towards Israel. This latest report is yet another unfortunate reminder of that." [6] In a similar spirit, UN Watch, an Israel-affiliated [7] non-governmental organisation, described the report as "categorically one-sided, casting Palestinians as the sole victims of the Arab–Israeli conflict, while denying the slightest consideration to any basic human rights for Israelis." [8]
The Palestinian territories are the two regions of the former British Mandate for Palestine that have been occupied by Israel since the Six-Day War of 1967, namely the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has referred to the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, as "the Occupied Palestinian Territory", and this term was used as the legal definition by the ICJ in its advisory opinion of July 2004. The term occupied Palestinian territory was used by the United Nations and other international organizations between October 1999 and December 2012 to refer to areas controlled by the Palestinian National Authority, but from 2012, when Palestine was admitted as one of its non-member observer states, the United Nations started using exclusively the name State of Palestine. The European Union (EU) also uses the term "occupied Palestinian territory". The government of Israel and its supporters use the label "disputed territories" instead.
Issues relating to the State of Israel and aspects of the Arab–Israeli conflict and more recently the Iran–Israel conflict occupy repeated annual debate times, resolutions and resources at the United Nations. Since its founding in 1948, the United Nations Security Council, has adopted 79 resolutions directly related to the Arab–Israeli conflict as of January 2010.
Saeb Muhammad Salih Erekat was a Palestinian politician and diplomat who was the secretary general of the executive committee of the PLO from 2015 until his death in 2020. He served as chief of the PLO Steering and Monitoring Committee until 12 February 2011. He participated in early negotiations with Israel and remained chief negotiator from 1995 until May 2003, when he resigned in protest from the Palestinian government. He reconciled with the party and was reappointed to the post in September 2003.
The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) is a United Nations body whose mission is to promote and protect human rights around the world. The Council has 47 members elected for staggered three-year terms on a regional group basis. The headquarters of the Council are at the United Nations Office at Geneva in Switzerland.
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UN Watch is a Geneva-based non-governmental organization (NGO) whose stated mission is "to monitor the performance of the United Nations by the yardstick of its own Charter". It is an accredited NGO in Special Consultative Status to the UN Economic and Social Council and an Associate NGO to the UN Department of Public Information.
Issues relating to the State of Palestine and aspects of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict occupy continuous debates, resolutions, and resources at the United Nations. Since its founding in 1948, the United Nations Security Council, as of January 2010, has adopted 79 resolutions directly related to the Arab–Israeli conflict.
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