The UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Tor Wennesland, has estimated that 2022 could end up becoming the deadliest year for the Palestinian population in the West Bank since the beginning of the international institution’s records in 2005.
Wennesland recalled the wave of Israeli operations in the West Bank to arrest terror suspects. These raids, the mediator declared, are at the origin of most of the violence generated against the West Bank population.
According to the balance sheet declared by Wennesland himself, at least 32 Palestinians, including six children, were killed by Israeli forces during demonstrations, clashes, search and arrest operations or alleged attacks against Israelis».
The number of injured has risen to 311, including one woman and eight children, while at least 106 attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians have been recorded, resulting in 63 injuries or damage to their property.
On the Israeli side, two army servicemen have been killed, while 25 civilians have been injured, including five women and three children. In addition, at least 13 military members of the security forces have been injured in Palestinian attacks by shooting, ramming, stones, Molotov cocktails or other means.
Wennesland noted that, in total, 115 attacks on Israeli civilians have been recorded, 100 of which were stone-throwing incidents, resulting in injuries or damage to Israeli property.
Therefore, at this rate, «this year is on track to be the deadliest for Palestinians in the West Bank since the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs began recording Palestinian fatalities there in 2005,» he said during Friday’s open debate at the UN Security Council.
Wennesland lamented that «too many people, overwhelmingly Palestinians, have been killed or injured in daily acts of violence». As a result, «despair, anger and tension have erupted once again in the form of a deadly cycle of violence that is increasingly difficult to contain.»
The mediator recalled that these tensions «have been particularly intense» in the town of Nablus, where he lamented that Israeli settlers often «impede the main access routes of the population» and have even entered southern towns such as Huwwara, where they «have damaged Palestinian property and incited fights against residents, in some cases in the presence of Israeli Security Forces».
Wennesland also reported that, over the course of this year, «Israeli authorities have demolished, or appropriated» 38 Palestinian-owned structures in Area C of the West Bank — where Israeli settlements are located — and three others in East Jerusalem. In total, 81 Palestinians have been expelled.
«These demolitions have been carried out when Palestinians were unable to obtain Israeli-issued building permits, something almost impossible to achieve,» he said.
Expressing alarm at the intensity of violence in the West Bank and deploring the fact that children continue to be victims of violence, Wennesland reiterated that the perpetrators of all such acts must be held accountable and called once again on the security forces to exercise maximum restraint.
On a positive note, Wennesland applauded the October 13 signing of the Algiers Declaration, where 14 Palestinian factions, including Hamas and Fatah, agreed, among other things, to recognize the Palestine Liberation Organization as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people and to hold elections for the presidency of the Palestinian Authority, the Palestinian Legislative Council and the Palestinian National Council.
Still, Wennesland explained that «unless the fundamental political issues are addressed, mistrust and hostility will continue to grow.» «I clearly sense the growing frustration and anger of Palestinians in the face of decades of Israeli occupation,» he added.
«The Palestinian Authority urgently needs the economic support and political space to fully exercise its authority, including security, in the areas under its control,» he reiterated before, once again, «pledging the support of the UN to resolve the conflict by ending the occupation and achieving a two-state solution on the basis of the 1967 lines, in line with relevant UN resolutions.»
