According to the UN rapporteur, it is impossible to speak of a right to health in Gaza, which is under attack by Israel
According to the UN rapporteur, it is impossible to speak of a right to health in Gaza, which is under attack by Israel
United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health Tlaleng Mofokeng stated that it is impossible to speak of the right to health in Gaza, adding that the situation in the besieged area is deteriorating even further.
Mofokeng, who is in Geneva, Switzerland, to attend the 59th Session of the UN Human Rights Council, answered questions from an AA correspondent about the situation in Gaza, which has been subjected to intense Israeli attacks and blockade.
Mofokeng said, “It is impossible to speak of the right to health in Gaza. Both access to health facilities and the fundamental determinants of health have been under attack since day one. The situation is getting worse. We now have food aid that is being used to target civilians who are on the brink of starvation and trying to obtain basic food items for themselves and their families. We are also facing a situation in which humanitarian assistance is obstructed, UN agencies cannot reach people in the occupied Palestinian territories unhindered to deliver aid, and thus the violence continues.”
Describing what is happening as “colonial imperialist violence” against people who cannot defend themselves, Mofokeng said that the situation in Gaza cannot be defined as a war in terms of the balance of power.
Mofokeng continued, “Therefore, in a context of global leadership that keeps failing, we must acknowledge that genocidal plans will lead to the kind of catastrophic events we are witnessing today. This is not inevitable. This situation is not a natural progression of events as they should be, yet it is being portrayed as though it were.”
“We must reject the lack of accountability”
Pointing out that they continue to count the dead in Gaza, Mofokeng emphasized that hundreds of thousands of people are also missing. She continued:
“I would like to remind the global community that silence is not diplomacy. There has never been a moment when silence was heard so loudly from every segment of society. We saw that even the humanitarian aid being taken to Gaza on the Madleen ship belonging to the Freedom Flotilla Coalition was attacked, yet there was more silence and more indifference. This is not normal. Nothing about what is happening is normal. It has been normalized. It was portrayed as something we had to accept. However, we must reject this impunity [for Israel]. We must reject the lack of accountability.”
UN Rapporteur Mofokeng noted that, to prevent what is happening in Gaza, international human rights laws and standards, as well as the UN Charter and other legal instruments, are already in place.