Hamas urges global move to halt Israel

Yousef Rizqa, a political advisor to the democratically elected Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh

Source: Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/171156.html

The Palestinian Islamic resistance movement Hamas has called upon international organizations to intervene as Israel intensifies its attacks on the blockaded Gaza Strip.

”In urgent messages conveyed to the United Nations, Arab League and a number of European Union nations, Hamas has disclosed the scope of Israeli aggression against the Gaza Strip. The government in the Gaza Strip [Hamas] has asked for their immediate intervention to stop Israel's aerial attacks on the enclave,” the Palestine Information Center quoted Yousef Rizqa, a political advisor to the democratically elected Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, as saying on Monday.

Rizqa underlined that the recent surge in Israeli assaults on Gaza come in the wake of revolutions and popular uprisings in the Middle East. Such developments have seriously challenged Tel Aviv's expansionist policies in the region.

Israeli forces have carried out large numbers of ground and air attacks on Gaza since the end of Operation Cast Lead against the enclave.

More than 1,400 Palestinians were killed during the three-week Israeli land, sea and air offensive in the impoverished coastal sliver during the winter of 2008-2009. The offensive also inflicted USD 1.6 billion damage to the Gazan economy.

A United Nations inquiry led by former South African judge Richard Goldstone, detailed what investigators had described as Israeli actions "amounting to war crimes, possibly crimes against humanity," during their offensive against the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli regime laid an economic siege on the Gaza Strip in June 2007, after Hamas took control of the enclave.

The blockade has had a disastrous impact on the humanitarian and economic situation in the Gaza Strip.

Some 1.5 million people are being denied their basic rights, including freedom of movement and their rights to appropriate living conditions, work, health and education. Poverty and unemployment rates stand at approximately 80 percent and 60 percent, respectively, in the Gaza Strip.