“Nearly three weeks have passed since Hamas launched an appalling act of terror on Israeli civilians. Since then, images of suffering families in Israel and Gaza have filled our screens.
“Countless and completely innocent Palestinians now face indiscriminate and devastating Israeli bombardment and total siege. They are deprived of shelter, medical care, and even drinking water. This collective punishment brings endless suffering to civilians and costs thousands of lives.
“While we get increasingly desperate pleas of help and protection from our aid workers inside a sealed-off Gaza, world leaders have been incapable of producing anything that would end or even alleviate this hemorrhage of innocent lives: No humanitarian ceasefire – not even a humanitarian pause; no humanitarian corridors; no lifting of the suffocating siege. We have witnessed a few trucks arrive to limited parts of Gaza, both totally insufficient and without supplies of essential fuel. This is not a humanitarian response worthy of nations and leaders who claim to respect humanitarian principles and international law.
“By failing to live up to their responsibilities to protect civilian life on all sides, leaders are not helping to break the vicious cycle which condemns future generations of Palestinians and Israelis to yet more conflict and death.
“World leaders must immediately call for a humanitarian ceasefire to end the suffering and restart the process that can address the root causes of generations of deprivation, conflict, terror, and occupation. History will be watching.”
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