[Michigan- September 3, 2014]: The American Human Rights Council (AHRC) joins the human rights community in the USA and the rest of the world in demanding that Israel void its recent action of annexing of close to 990 acres of the current Palestinian land in the West Bank calling that ‘state land.” The West Bank is occupied land under international law and state land belongs to the Palestinian people. According to media reports this Israeli land grab is the biggest since 1980 and came right after the cease fire with Gaza with the seeming intention of keeping tensions high in the holy land. It is extremely troubling that this land grab came right after the ceasefire that ended the Gaza assault that left over 2000 deaths, 11,0000 injured and 500,000.00 people displaced in addition to the massive destruction of civilian infrastructure. AHRC is deeply concerned that such Israeli action will escalate the tensions and erase every hope for any possible peace in the region on the basis of two states. Israel as the occupying power has no right to usurp Palestinian land. This land grab is a clear and blatant violation of international law. AHRC calls on the United Nations and the rest of the world to pressure Israel to cancel this illegal appropriation of Palestinian land.
“Once again- Israel seizes every opportunity to continue to undermine the peace process and make the two-state solution impossible,” said Imad Hamad, AHRC Acting director. “This confiscation of Palestinian land to build Jewish- only settlements is state aggression on the Palestinians and we hope that the human rights community and all the governments of the world bring enough pressure to undo the land grab,” continued Hamad.