Human Lives Human Rights: With the advent of the Islamic month of Ramadan, the Palestinian Muslims, as usual like in previous years, planned to hold religious ceremonies in the Al-Aqsa Mosque and other occupied areas, which again, like before were obstructed by violence of the Israeli security forces.
In fact, this time the crackdown of the Israeli security forces against the Muslim and fasting people of Palestine began on the very first day of the month of Ramadan, April 2, 2022.
This trend of violence against the Palestinians is not limited to Al-Aqsa Mosque. Rather, from the first day of the month of Ramadan, clashes between Palestinian security forces and Palestinian fighters intensified, on the same day, three Palestinians were killed by Israeli security forces.
Major clashes also took place in the Bab al-‘Amoud area, one of occupied East Jerusalem’s Old City gates, to the extent that on the night of Monday, April 4, 2022, Israeli security forces shot and wounded twenty-four Palestinians. In this area, the goal of the Israeli security forces was to prevent the Palestinian Muslim people from holding religious ceremonies during the month of Ramadan.
It should be noted that this is the constant policy of the Israeli government to prevent religious ceremonies of the Palestinian Muslim people. But why it always intensifies in the month of Ramadan, the reason could be the International Quds Day, which is observed on the last Friday of Ramadan. Tel Aviv did all this to prevent prayers in the areas such as Bab al-‘Amoud, because Israel considers the Quds Day ceremony to be a serious and effective threat against itself. Therefore, it made all efforts to prevent the holding of Friday prayers in Al-Quds in the occupied areas since the very beginning of Ramadan.
The Israeli government, is by no means willing to guarantee the rights of the Palestinian people. While it considers human rights to be a selective and abstract phenomenon, it is not willing to provide them equally to Palestinian citizens. Tel Aviv took action to prevent the religious rites of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Territories and thus violated Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which explicitly states:
Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.
Israel’s actions also violate Article 19, which states:
Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers. But despite the fact that the Israeli government signed the four Geneva Conventions in 1951 and acceded to them, again, relying on excuses, it not only refuses to fulfill its obligations to the Palestinian people in the occupied territories, but also deliberately violates them.
