Situation in the OPT – Letter from Qatar

Letter dated 10 September 1985 from the Permanent Representative of

Qatar to the United Nations addressed to the Secretary-General

In my capacity as Chairman of the Arab Group for the current month, I have the honour to transmit herewith the letter of the Deputy Permanent Observer for the Palestine Liberation Organization to the United Nations, dated 10 September 1985, concerning the violence by Israeli occupation troops against Palestinians living in the occupied territories (see annex).

I should be grateful if you would arrange for this letter and its annex to be circulated as a document of the General Assembly, under items 33 and 38 of the provisional agenda, and of the Security Council.

(Signed)  Hamad Abdelaziz AL-KAWARI

Ambassador

Permanent Representative

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*A/40/150.

ANNEX

Letter dated 10 September 1985 from the Deputy Permanent Observer of the

Palestine Liberation Organization to the United Nations

addressed to the Secretary-General

I am instructed by Yasser Arafat, Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, to bring the following to your immediate attention.  Violence by Israeli occupation trooops against Palestinians living in the occupied territories continues to escalate.  The areas have been turned into a living hell for Palestinians.

In our letter of 9 September we informed you that additional Israeli military forces had been deployed throughout the occupied Palestinian territories.  It is now known that these reinforcements are paratroopers, infamous for their ruthlessness and savagery. The regular Israeli occupation police, the border guards, have been withdrawn from the occupied areas.

Yesterday, paratroopers shot and seriously wounded four Palestinian children in Al-Khalil (Hebron).  Today, paratroopers have rampaged through the Palestinian towns of Jenin and Nablus indiscriminately attacking and beating up Palestinian men, women and children, creating an atmosphere of sheer terror.

Last night 20 more Palestinians were detained under the 4 August 1985 Administrative Detention Law. Curfews are still in effect in Ramallah and Al-Khalil (Hebron).  Collective punishments have reached an acute level. Zionist settler vigilantism has spread throughout the occupied Palestinian territories, and settlers are actively engaged in drumming up anti-Palestinian hatred. Censorship of the Palestinian press is in effect.

The Israeli Court announced today that a decision will be given on Thursday whether to deport three Palestinians being held in prison. Such a hurried decision raises the fear that all three will be deported immediately after the announcement is made, and that 12 other Palestinians also served with deportation notices could well be deported at the same time. We would remind that these deportations, if carried out, will be in flagrant violation of the 1948 Universal Declaration on Human Rights, the 1949 Geneva Conventions and numerous United Nations resolutions on the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people.

Chairman Arafat wishes to assert that these criminal acts can only lead to an exacerbation of the already explosive situation in the Israeli occupied Palestinian territories and he calls on your good offices to take immediate and effective measures to put an end to this intolerable and inhuman situation.

(Signed) Riyad MANSOUR

Deputy Permanent Observer

Chargé d'affaires, a.i.

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