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Arab League Renews Call for UK to Recognize Palestine

Palestinians throw shoes at an effigy depicting Arthur Balfour during a protest in the West Bank city of Bethlehem (Reuters)
Palestinians throw shoes at an effigy depicting Arthur Balfour during a protest in the West Bank city of Bethlehem (Reuters)
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Arab League Renews Call for UK to Recognize Palestine

Palestinians throw shoes at an effigy depicting Arthur Balfour during a protest in the West Bank city of Bethlehem (Reuters)
Palestinians throw shoes at an effigy depicting Arthur Balfour during a protest in the West Bank city of Bethlehem (Reuters)

The Arab League (AL) has renewed its call for the UK to recognize the independent Palestinian State. The pan-Arab organization also called on the UK to correct the 'historical British mistake', when then UK Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour promised to establish a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine.

The organization also demanded the UK correct the mistake by supporting peace through backing the two-state solution and pushing Israel to stop its crimes and violations against the Palestinian people.

In a statement on Monday, marking the 103rd anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, the AL said that the British declaration was the start point of the tragedy of the century and caused historical injustice for the Palestinian people.

The organization said the Palestinian people have been suffering the repercussions of the declaration for more than a century, undergoing displacement, ethnic cleansing, and other continuing crimes carried out by the Israelis, according to the statement.

"There is only one path for comprehensive and permanent peace, which is ending the Israeli occupation and establishing the Palestinian State with Eastern Jerusalem as a capital, in accordance with the international legitimacy resolutions and the Arab Peace Initiative," it added.

It also stressed its full support to the Palestinian people in their fair struggle, slamming the Israeli violations and practices and the establishment of settlements.

On 2 November 1917, Balfour promised the Anglo-Jewish community that the British Empire, which was occupying Palestine at that time, would support the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine.

In a related development, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh called on Britain to recognize the independent state of Palestine on the borders approved by the international legitimacy with East Jerusalem as its capital.

Speaking during a weekly online meeting of the Palestinian Authority cabinet, Shtayyeh said that "the recognition of a Palestinian state must be the British compensation."

For his part, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement said in a press statement that the Palestinian people "will not yield to the plans that began with the Balfour Declaration."

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Red Cross Urges Unhindered Aid Access to Flood-hit and Freezing Gaza

Paramedics from the Palestine Red Crescent Society protest over the deaths of their colleagues in the war between Israel and Hamas on February 11, 2024. Hazem Bader/AFP/Getty Images
Paramedics from the Palestine Red Crescent Society protest over the deaths of their colleagues in the war between Israel and Hamas on February 11, 2024. Hazem Bader/AFP/Getty Images
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Red Cross Urges Unhindered Aid Access to Flood-hit and Freezing Gaza

Paramedics from the Palestine Red Crescent Society protest over the deaths of their colleagues in the war between Israel and Hamas on February 11, 2024. Hazem Bader/AFP/Getty Images
Paramedics from the Palestine Red Crescent Society protest over the deaths of their colleagues in the war between Israel and Hamas on February 11, 2024. Hazem Bader/AFP/Getty Images

The Red Cross called Wednesday for safe and unhindered access to Gaza to bring desperately needed aid into the war-torn Palestinian territory wracked by hunger and where babies are freezing to death.

Heavy rain and flooding have ravaged the makeshift shelters in Gaza, leaving thousands with up to 30 centimetres (one foot) of water inside their damaged tents, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said.

The dire weather conditions were "exacerbating the unbearable conditions" in Gaza, it said, pointing out that many families were left "clinging on to survival in makeshift camps, without even the most basic necessities, such as blankets".

Citing the United Nations, the IFRC highlighted the deaths of eight newborn babies who had been living in tents without warmth or protection from the rain and falling temperatures, AFP reported.

Those deaths "underscore the critical severity of the humanitarian crisis there", IFRC Secretary-General Jagan Chapagain said in a statement.

"I urgently reiterate my call to grant safe and unhindered access to humanitarians to let them provide life-saving assistance," he said.

"Without safe access -- children will freeze to death. Without safe access -- families will starve. Without safe access -- humanitarian workers can't save lives."

According to a UN count, more than 330 humanitarian workers have been killed in Gaza since Israel unleashed its war there.

Chapagain issued an "urgent plea to all the parties... to put an end to this human suffering. Now".

The IFRC said the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) was striving to provide emergency health services and supplies to people in Gaza, with an extra sense of urgency during the cold winter months.

But it warned that "the lack of aid deliveries and access is making providing adequate support all but impossible".

The IFRC stressed that the closure of the main Rafah border crossing last May had had a dramatic impact on the humanitarian situation.

"Only a trickle of aid is currently entering Gaza," it warned.

It also lamented the "continuing attacks on health facilities across the Gaza Strip", which it said meant people were unable to access the treatment they need.

"In the north of Gaza, there are now no functioning hospitals," it said.

The Doctors Without Borders (MSF) charity warned that access to healthcare had also become "seriously compromised" in parts of the West Bank. It was seeing "a dramatic decline in children's mental health", it added.

It pointed in a statement to the drastic increase in restrictions imposed by Israeli forces since the start of the war in Gaza. In particular, it highlighted the situation in the Jaber neighbourhood inside the H2 area of Hebron City, which is under full Israeli military control.

MSF, which said it had been forced to suspend its operations for five months from December 2023, urged Israeli forces to "stop implementing restrictive measures that impede the ability of Palestinians to access basic services, including medical care".

MSF project coordinator Chloe Janssen warned that "although we are now able to provide care in the MSF clinic in Jaber neighbourhood, access remains challenging as our staff can be searched and delayed at the checkpoints to enter the H2 area.

"Access to medical care should never be arbitrarily denied, impeded or blocked."