Press Releases
16 January 2025
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Gaza, 16 January 2025 – Al Mezan welcomes the announcement of a ceasefire agreement in Gaza, viewing it as an essential step toward de-escalating violence and halting the ongoing killing of Palestinians through deadly force and other forms of violence. However, we firmly underline that a ceasefire alone cannot end the ongoing genocide that Israel is perpetrating against the Palestinian people in Gaza. What is required is for Israel to end all ongoing genocidal acts, open Gaza, and for the international community to ensure accountability for those responsible while addressing the root causes of Israel's atrocities in Gaza.
The agreed ceasefire is expected to go into effect on Sunday, 19 January 2025. We note with concern that overnight, the Israeli military continued to carry out relentless attacks across all of Gaza, killing scores of Palestinians. Al Mezan reaffirms that cessation of hostilities is not equivalent to ending genocide. Israel’s genocidal policies—including the destruction of infrastructure necessary for the physical survival of the population, mass forced displacement, starvation, the deliberate restriction on the entry and distribution of humanitarian aid, and other policies of dehumanization—will continue to threaten the existence of the Palestinian people in Gaza for the upcoming future. Ending the ongoing genocide requires—at a bare minimum—the immediate cessation of all these practices. All Palestinians abducted by Israeli forces from Gaza, forcibly disappeared, and unlawfully detained must also be released immediately and unconditionally.
Israel’s closure and blockade of Gaza, illegally maintained for over 17 years and aggravated into a total siege since 9 October 2023, constitutes collective punishment and serves as a key driver of the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding on the ground. Even with a ceasefire, the total siege, willfully imposed by the Israeli government with complete cognition of its lethal consequences on Palestinians, continues to deprive Gaza’s population of the resources essential for physical survival and the means to rebuild their lives. To restore dignity and ensure the survival of Palestinians in Gaza:
● The blockade and closure of Gaza must be fully, immediately, and unconditionally lifted.
● Freedom of movement must be ensured for people and goods, to, from, and within Gaza—particularly for the wounded and medical patients.
● Unhindered humanitarian access and equitable distribution must be facilitated.
As the occupying power, Israel has explicit obligations under international law to ensure the protection of Gaza’s civilian population. In this regard, international humanitarian law requires—at a bare minimum—that Israel ensures, to the fullest extent of the means available to it, that the basic needs of Gaza’s population are met. Specifically, it must guarantee the supply of food, medical supplies, and other essential goods necessary to ensure the population can live under adequate material conditions, as stipulated in Article 55 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.
Al Mezan highlights the fundamental role of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in providing critical humanitarian and life-saving services to Palestinians in Gaza and stresses that it must be at the forefront of the humanitarian relief effort in Gaza following the implementation of the ceasefire agreement. The international community must protect and increase support for UNRWA and unequivocally reject Israel’s attempts at disrupting the Agency’s operations and essential services throughout the entire occupied Palestinian territory (OPT).
The international community must also cease absolving Israel of its responsibilities as an occupying power. Al Mezan urges the international community to demand Israeli authorities to immediately and permanently open all Gaza’s crossings and ensure the flow of aid and resources. Gaza must also be opened for the free movement of people, particularly medical patients and the wounded who require immediate, life-saving treatment otherwise unavailable due to Israel’s wholesale destruction of Gaza’s healthcare system. International journalists, investigators from the International Criminal Court, investigative bodies of the United Nations, and other relevant organizations must be granted access to enter Gaza to document the extent of Israel’s devastation.
Accountability and justice are imperative not only for breaking cycles of violence but also as guarantees of non-repetition, ensuring that Israel's systemic human rights abuses against the Palestinian people are definitively brought to an end. The international community can no longer turn a blind eye to addressing the root causes of Israel's genocide in Gaza, specifically Israel’s settler-colonial apartheid regime and the ongoing Nakba endured by the Palestinian people.
The State of Israel must be held accountable under the law of state responsibility. In contrast, its officials, including senior government leaders, military commanders, and soldiers involved in perpetrating and executing acts of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, as well as other crimes against the Palestinian people, must be held accountable under the framework of individual criminal responsibility. To this end, Al Mezan calls for:
● International investigations into the crime of genocide, crimes against humanity, including apartheid, and war crimes.
● Prosecution of individual perpetrators in national and international courts, including the International Criminal Court.
● Mechanisms to monitor Israel’s compliance with international law, including the prompt enforcement of the International Court of Justice’s July 2024 Advisory Opinion and its three provisional measures orders.
The Palestinian people in Gaza cannot endure further suffering under policies designed to erase their existence. The international community has a responsibility to act decisively. The ceasefire offers a moment of hope, but it must be a springboard for transformative action: ending genocide, lifting the blockade, ending Israel’s unlawful occupation, ensuring accountability, and addressing root causes are the only paths toward justice, dignity, and self-determination for the Palestinian people.
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