Shunpiking Online Vo.4 No.4 UN to probe Israeli crimes in Palestine

11 November 2006: The women of Beit Hanoun mobilize to defend the resistance against the Israeli Occupation Force.

(29 March 2007) - THE UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has adopted a resolution calling for two urgent fact-finding missions to inspect Israeli crimes in occupied Palestinian territory.

The 47-member Council expressed concerns that previous attempts to investigate human rights abuses in Palestine had been hindered by Israel, noting that the regime had not cooperated with two previous resolutions which dispatched the missions.

The UNHRC has also requested UN higher commissioner for Human Rights Louis Arbor to brief the council in June 2007 on the UN verification of the regime's compliance with the investigation.

A resolution in June 2006 had urged Israel to "end its military operations in the occupied Palestinian territory, abide by the provisions of international human rights laws, and refrain from imposing collective punishment on Palestinian civilians."

John Dugard, the Special Reporter on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories, reported that he had not been allowed by the Israeli government to carry out his survey called for by a Council resolution last year.

The UNHRC voted last June to send an investigation team to the Gaza Strip, right after an Israeli massacre in Beit Hanoun city.

On June 9, 2006, the Israeli army fired five tank shells on a Palestinian neighborhood in Beit Hanoun, killing 19 civilians including women and children from the same family.

However the team, headed by Nobel peace prize winner, Desmond Tutu, was not allowed by the Israeli regime into the Gaza Strip.