ISRAEL’S deadly strike on a Gaza City hospital takes a heavy toll on innocent people. Hundreds of children, women and men were killed in the devastating airstrike. A Gaza City hospital crowded with wounded people and other Palestinians seeking shelter was rocked by a huge blast on Tuesday. According to media reports, at least 500 people were killed in the massive Israeli airstrike.
Leaders from across the globe have vociferously condemned the blatant Israeli airstrike on a hospital in Gaza City. The brazen and barbaric Israeli airstrike on a hospital was completely in contravention of the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, adopted on 12 August 1949 by the Diplomatic Conference for the Establishment of international Conventions for the Protection of Victims of War, held in Geneva from 21 April to 12 August 1949.
According to Article 18 of the Convention Civilian hospitals organized to give care to the wounded and sick, the infirm and maternity cases, may in no circumstances be the object of attack, but shall at all times be respected and protected by the parties to the conflict.
States which are parties to a conflict shall provide all civilian hospitals with certificates showing that they are civilian hospitals and that the buildings which they occupy are not used for any purpose which would deprive these hospitals of protection in accordance with Article 19.
Civilian hospitals shall be marked by means of the emblem provided for in Article 38 of the Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field of August 12, 1949, but only if so authorized by the State.
The parties to the conflict shall, in so far as military considerations permit, take the necessary steps to make the distinctive emblems indicating civilian hospitals clearly visible to the enemy land, air and naval forces in order to obviate the possibility of any hostile action.
In view of the dangers to which hospitals may be exposed by being close to military objectives, it is recommended that such hospitals be situated as far as possible from such objectives.
When viewed in the context of Article 18 of the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, by targeting a Hospital Israel has outrightly breached the Geneva Convention. It has committed an unpardonable war crime, and must, therefore, be tried in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) .
The world community, which has vociferously condemned the blatant Israeli airstrike on the hospital, must also ensure that Israel is brought to justice for the heinous crime it has committed by targeting a civilian hospital in which hundreds of innocent souls have lost their precious lives.
Before it is too late, the powers that be must realize that the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict could potentially engulf the entire region and beyond. In the interest of regional and world peace it should make concerted efforts to bring this catastrophic war to an immediate halt. It should bring the two warring sides to the negotiation table, and earnestly endeavor to seek a permanent resolution to the decades-long dispute between them.
Needless to emphasize, a permanent resolution of the long-drawn-out Israeli-Palestinian conflict lies in “Two-State Solution, proposed framework for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by establishing two states for two peoples: Israel for the Jewish people and Palestine for the Palestinian people.”
In 1993, the Israeli government and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) agreed on a plan to implement a two-state solution as part of the Oslo Accords, leading to the establishment of the Palestinian Authority (PA). This is what is required to be done expeditiously to establish lasting peace between Israel and Palestine in particular and the entire region in general.
—The writer is a columnist and analyst based in Islamabad -Pakistan.
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