| Amnesty flays West Bank’s ‘wall of injustice’ |
MADRID Amnesty International on Thursday handed a letter with some 130,000 signatures to the Israeli Embassy in Madrid demanding the Jewish state halt construction of its Occupied West Bank separation barrier.
“On November 9, 1989, there was the fall of the Berlin wall, known as the ‘wall of shame’,” Amnesty said in a statement.
“Eighteen years later, another wall, the ‘wall of injustice’, follows. This one is Israeli and divides the Occupied Territories, isolating towns and villages.”
The organisation said the letter addressed to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was signed by more than 130,000 people by mail and over the Internet.
It “calls on him to halt construction of the Occupied West Bank wall, including in Occupied East Jerusalem, demolish the stretch already built and repair the damage caused,” said the statement, written in Spanish.
As the letter was delivered, activists outside the embassy unfurled a banner reading: “The Occupied West Bank wall is illegal and violates human rights. More than 130,000 people call on Israel to demolish the unjust wall.”
Israel says its massive barrier, made of electric fencing, barbed wire and concrete walls, is needed to stop potential attackers infiltrating the country and Jewish settlements in the Occupied West Bank.
But the Palestinians denounce it as an “apartheid wall” aimed at grabbing their land and undermining the viability of their promised state.
In 2004, the International Court of Justice issued a non-binding ruling that parts of the 650-km barrier criss-crossing the Occupied West Bank are illegal and should be torn down.
Israel has vowed to complete the project.
Amnesty said that when the barrier is completed, 60,500 Palestinians in 42 towns will live in “closed zones” between the wall and the “green line” that separates the Occupied West Bank from Israel.
“In addition, its construction leads to the arbitrary destruction of Palestinian houses and properties and undermines such essential rights as the right to a residence, a job and, definitely, to a decent life,” Amnesty said.
Agence France-Presse
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