Condemnation comes as Human Rights Watch calls Israel’s Gaza blockade ‘a tool of extermination’
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today condemned the Israeli slaughter of more than 100 Palestinians on the day marking the 77th anniversary of the Nakba (May 15), during which Israeli forces carried out the ethnic cleansing of most of Palestine in 1948.
WATCH: UN NAKBA DAY COMMEMORATION
CAIR’s condemnation comes as Human Rights Watch said today that Israel’s total blockade of Gaza, in place since March 2, has become “a tool of extermination.”
Federico Borello, interim executive director of Human Rights Watch said:
“Hearing Israeli officials flaunt plans to squeeze Gaza’s 2 million people into an even tinier area while making the rest of the land uninhabitable should be treated like a five-alarm fire in London, Brussels, Paris, and Washington. Israel’s blockade has transcended military tactics to become a tool of extermination.”
Israel has slaughtered more than 53,000 people in Gaza, mostly women and children.
In a statement, CAIRNational Executive Director Nihad Awad, who is of Palestinian heritage, said:
“Each day, Israel’s genocidal government takes another step – whether through slaughter, starvation, ethnic cleansing or destruction – to complete the Nakba it began so many decades ago. Israel’s campaign of extermination of the Palestinian people will not stop until our government and those of other nations take concrete actions to end their complicity with the genocide and offer real hope to the Palestinian people that they may finally live in peace and freedom on their own land.
“Our government has for decades been giving Israel billions of taxpayer dollars and weapons of mass extermination. Indicted war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu proves times and again that he and his genocidal government are liabilities to our nation and obstacles to peace. Through his extremist government’s daily crimes against humanity, Netanyahu has been undermining U.S. interests in the region. President Trump can end the genocide and begin to restore our nation’s international reputation.”
Yesterday, CAIR condemned the Israeli government’s escalating slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza, including at least 22 children, as a “transparent attempt to sabotage” the Trump administration’s recent push to restart ceasefire negotiations and pursue an end to other regional conflicts.
Earlier this week, CAIR condemned the latest Israeli deadly bombings of Gaza hospitals as indicted war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu says half of Gazans will be ethnically cleansed and there is “no way” Israel will halt its genocide in Gaza, even if a ceasefire is achieved.
Washington, D.C., based CAIR called on the Trump administration to drop U.S.-Israeli efforts to force starving Palestinians in Gaza into de facto concentration camps surrounded by the Israeli military in order to receive food and other humanitarian aid after the release of a report by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IFSPC) stating that Gaza’s entire population is at imminent risk of famine.
CAIR also condemned the “systematic abuse and torture” that Gaza detainees face in Israeli prisons as outlined in a report released today. The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) report says that abuse is “an integral component of Israel’s genocide against Palestinians.”
CAIR’s mission is to protect civil rights, enhance understanding of Islam, promote justice, and empower American Muslims.
La misión de CAIR es proteger las libertades civiles, mejorar la comprensión del Islam, promover la justicia, y empoderar a los musulmanes en los Estados Unidos.
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CONTACT: CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell, 404-285-9530, e-Mitchell@cair.com; CAIR Government Affairs Director Robert McCaw, 202-742-6448, rmccaw@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-744-7726, ihooper@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Manager Ismail Allison, 202-770-6280, iallison@cair.com