The U.N. Mideast envoy said 2022 is on course to be the deadliest year for Palestinians in the West Bank since the U.N. started tracking fatalities in 2005, and he called for immediate action to calm “an explosive situation” and move toward renewing Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
Tor Wennesland told the U.N. Security Council that “mounting hopelessness, anger and tension have once again erupted into a deadly cycle of violence that is increasingly difficult to contain,” and “too many people, overwhelmingly Palestinian have been killed and injured.”
In a grim assessment, the special coordinator for the Middle East peace process said the downward spiral in the West Bank and current volatile situation stem from decades of violence that has taken a toll on Israelis and Palestinians, the prolonged absence of negotiations, and the failure to resolve key issues fueling the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
Wennesland said his message to Palestinian officials and factions, Israeli officials and the international community in recent weeks has been clear: “The immediate priority is to work to calm the situation and reverse the negative trends on the ground” but the goal must be “to empower and strengthen the Palestinian Authority and build towards a return to a political process.”
In the past month, the U.N. envoy said 32 Palestinians including six children were killed by Israeli security forces and 311 injured during demonstrations, clashes, search-and-arrest operations, attacks and alleged attacks against Israelis. Two Israeli forces personnel were killed and 25 Israeli civilians were injured by Palestinians during shooting and ramming attacks, clashes, the throwing of stones and Molotov cocktails and other incidents during the same period, he said.
Wennesland said the month saw “a spike in fatal violence” that has 2022 on track to be the deadliest in the West Bank.
More than 125 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli-Palestinian fighting in the West Bank and east Jerusalem this year. The fighting has surged since a series of Palestinian attacks killed 19 people in Israel in the spring. The Israeli army says most of the Palestinians killed have been militants. But stone-throwing youths protesting the incursions and others not
Read more via The Seattle Times/ AP
