(WASHINGTON, D.C., 12/19/2023) – The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today condemned the reported mass killing of a Palestinian grandfather’s family in front of his eyes, vandalism of West Bank homes by Israeli forces, the deaths and alleged torture of Palestinian detainees, and more massacres in refugee camps and residential areas of Gaza.
According to Reuters: “When the Israeli soldiers entered the Gaza school where Yousef Khalil was sleeping near his family, they began shooting indiscriminately, killing nine people including children.” “They are my children and grandchildren. Why did they shoot them in front of my eyes?” said Khalil.
[NOTE: CAIR recently said that the Israeli military’s killing of three unarmed, shirtless Israelis waving a white flag is further proof that Israeli troops are “wantonly killing Palestinian civilians.” Over the weekend, CAIR called for United Nations to investigate reports that Israeli forces in Gaza bulldozed medical tents with injured Palestinians inside, allegedly burying civilians alive.]
In the West Bank, Al Jazeera reports: “Residents of the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank say Israeli Forces [vandalized] their homes, ate their food, and allowed their dogs to defecate inside residents’ homes.”
Al Jazeera also reports new massacres in Gaza: “Victims are just lying on the ground. Many have been killed, bodies ripped apart. Even animals aren’t spared.”
At least 29 Palestinians were killed in an Israeli air strike in a residential area of the so-called “safe area” of Rafah in southern Gaza “while a hospital has been raided in north Gaza and 13 people were killed in an attack on a refugee camp in that part of the enclave.”
Several Palestinians are reported to have died in an Israeli detention facility after being detained in the Gaza. Others report being tortured.
“These war crimes – and the many more that undoubtedly go unreported – carried out by Israel’s apartheid government will continue until the Biden administration joins the international community in forcing an end to the ongoing slaughter, forced starvation and ethnic cleansing in Gaza,” said CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper. “There must be a ceasefire now.”
Yesterday, CAIR condemned other Israeli war crimes after deadly Israeli strikes on a Gaza maternity hospital and other medical facilities, the killing of more than 100 people in a refugee camp and the killing of two Christians seeking shelter in a besieged church.
Israel has killed some 20,000 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, and including hundreds of UN workers, journalists and medical personnel.
CAIR recently called on the Biden administration to respond to reports that Israel forces shot women, children and babies “execution-style” after they sought refuge in a school in Gaza.
CAIR condemned the attempted assassination of an Al Jazeera journalist (and the ultimate death of another) by Israeli forces, the desecration of Gaza cemeteries by Israeli troops in Gaza, and a deadly airstrike targeting a UN school in Gaza.
OTHER ISRAELI WAR CRIMES:
A new US intelligence assessment concluded that nearly half of the air-to-ground munitions that Israel has used in Gaza have been unguided, also known as “dumb bombs.” Unguided munitions are typically less precise and can pose a greater threat to civilians.
CAIR condemned the Israeli government’s celebration of IDF troops who took over and desecrated a mosque in the West Bank as an “attack on Islam.”
CAIR said the far-right Israeli government’s controlled demolition of a U.N. school in Gaza is “further evidence of the ongoing campaign of ethnic cleansing.”
Video posted online shows a man, reportedly with special needs, being detained by Israeli soldiers and then shot at point-blank range.
CAIR condemned an Israeli attack on another hospital in Gaza and said the Biden administration is actively participating in Israel’s “ethnic cleansing and genocide of the Palestinian people.”
CAIR condemned another “war crime of the day” – the slaughter of at least 50 civilians in airstrikes on two UN-run schools sheltering displaced Palestinians in Gaza.
CAIR recently called on the Biden administration to address reporting that the U.S. supplied the Israeli government with white phosphorus used in attacks on civilian areas.
The Israeli government’s extremist leaders have declared that there are no innocent civilians in Gaza, justified cutting off water, electricity and other basic necessities because Palestinians are ‘human animals,’ embraced an ancient biblical verse about the mass slaughter of an entire city from animals to infants, demanded a million residents of northern Gaza leave their homes or face death, and announced that the aim of the bombing in Gaza was destruction rather than accuracy.
CAIR said a new report by Heritage for Peace detailing Israel’s ongoing destruction of Palestinian cultural sites shows its desire to entirely “eliminate Palestinian existence.”
Washington, D.C., based CAIR questioned whether Western leaders even regard Palestinians as “human” after more than 700 women, children and men were massacred by Israel within just the last 24 hours.
CAIR condemned the “Israeli war crime of the day” after more than 100 men, women and children were killed in the bombing of residential buildings hosting displaced families in Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp.
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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END 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