Background on the Current Mid- East Violence

The situation in the Gaza Strip continues to deteriorate as Israeli forces continue
artillery shelling and air strike in the Gaza Strip and Palestinian
armed groups continue to launch “qassam” rockets into Israel. (Note: There is a separate Amnesty action on the conflict between Israel, Lebanon and Hezbollah.

Between 28 June and 13 July, some 80 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and some 200
others were injured. Many of those Palestinians killed and injured were civilians who took no part in the fighting. While no Israelis have been killed in recent weeks by the “qassam” rockets, 3 Israeli civilians have been injured.

The living condition for the population of Gaza is worsening due to the shortage
of electricity and water, caused by the destruction by Israeli forces
of Gaza’s only electricity power station on 28 June. According to the
UN OCHA Gazans are receiving on average 6-8 hours of electricity per
day and most families living in urban areas 2-3 hours of water per
day. The electricity and water shortage is affecting the health and
sanitation systems. Learn more.

Shortages of foodstuffs and medicine continue due both to the recurrent and
prolonged closures by Israel of the Karni crossing point through which
all goods must pass to enter the Gaza Strip, and to the financial
sanctions imposed on the Hamas-led PA. Shortage of fuel, also due to
Israeli closure, has become an additional problem because fuel is now
crucial for the generators which are necessary to produce electricity
(since the destruction of the electricity power station in Gaza) and
to power the water pumps.

KILLINGS/INJURIES

Since the beginning of the Israeli army “Operation Summer Rains” on 28 June 2006, which
Israel says it launched to release Gilad Shalit, the soldier who was
abducted by Palestinian armed groups on 25 June 2006 and to stop the launch of “qassam” rockets into Israel, the number of
Palestinian casualties has sharply increased. Amnesty has called for the release of Corporal Shalit, saying that under hostage taking is expressly prohibited by international humanitarian law. Learn more.

Between 28 June and 13 July, some 80 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and some 200
others were injured. Many were killed in armed clashes but many
others were unarmed, including some 13 children.

This brings the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces this year to some 240.
In the same period Palestinian armed groups have killed some 20 Israelis.

On 8 July 2006, a Palestinian woman and two of her children aged six-year-old and 20
year-old were killed and five other members of the same family were
injured when an Israeli Air Force dropped a bomb close to their home
in the Shaja’iya district of Gaza City. The family was reportedly
sitting in the garden and were killed by shrapnel from the bomb which
exploded nearby. The Israeli army confirmed dropping the bomb, which
it said was aimed at a militant. In another attack, three Palestinian
children were killed and one was seriously injured on 10 July, when an
Israeli Air Force missile fell near the children in an area previously
used as soccer field near their home in Beit Hanoun. In the night of
11-12 July 2006 an entire family, Nabil and Salwa Abu Salmiya and
their seven children aged between seven and 17, were killed when the
Israeli Air Force bombarded their home in a densely populated
residential district in Jabaliya, north of Gaza City. Learn more.
.

On 10 July, Khaled Nidal Wahbah, 15 months old died from a serious wounds sustained on 21
June when a missile launched by the Israeli Air Forces hit the family
home in Khan Younis. The missile had apparently been targeting a car
transporting members of Islamic Jihad but missed and hit the Wahbah
family home. The boy’s mother, Fatima and her brother were killed on
the spot in the blast and other family members, mostly children were
injured by shrapnel. The AI researcher was in Gaza at the time and
visited the family and inspected the house. The family was well known
to AI as we had been working for many years on the case of a member of
the family, Khaled Wahbah (the brother-in-law of the deceased Fatima
and uncle of the little Khaled who also died) who had been detained
by the PA from the mid-1990s until his release in May 2005.


Palestinian armed groups also continued launching “qassam” rockets into Israel, causing
no death but injuring at least 3 Israeli civilians. On 4 July for the
first time a “qassam” rocket landed in the Israeli town of Ashkelon
(which is further away from the Gaza Strip than the town of Sderot,
where Palestinian rocket often fall), hitting an empty parking lot of
a school. The following day another rocket again reached Ashkelon and
it hit a power station there.

HUMANITARIAN SITUATION

On 8 July, the UN humanitarian agencies operating in the Occupied Territories (the UN
Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the World Health Organisation (WHO),
the World Food Programme (WFP) and the UN Children’s Funds (UNICEF) )
issued a statement, expressing concerns about the situation in the
Gaza Strip. According to WFP, 70% of the Gaza population were unable
to cover their daily food requirements without assistance in June. WHO
said that the public health system is facing a grave crisis as 50% of
the hospitals and care centres are having to rely on generators for
their electricity and the stock of fuel will last for a maximum of two
weeks. UNCEF reported that the families in Gaza Strip are afraid to
send their children out door because of the heavy firing in civilian
areas. Learn more.

THE NEED FOR AN INTERNATIONAL INVESTIGATION

As the conflict in Israel and the Occupied Territories continues to escalate, respect for human rights and international law has declined dramatically. Amnesty International has called on all parties to respect and observe international law, as well as calling on the United Nations to assemble and deploy a team of
authoritative international experts to Israel and the Occupied Territories, with a mandate to carry out an independent and thorough investigation into the deteriorating human rights situation in the
Gaza Strip.

Such experts should investigate the growing number of killings of
Palestinians by Israeli forces and the deliberate and disproportionate
attacks by Israeli forces against civilian property and infrastructure
in the Gaza Strip, as well as the launching of 'qassam' rockets by
Palestinian armed groups from the Gaza Strip into nearby areas in
Israel.

Such an investigation should be adequately resourced. It
should be conducted by impartial investigators with the necessary
expertise in conducting criminal and forensic investigations. It
should include individuals who are expert in the fields of forensics,
ballistics, international human rights and humanitarian law. All
parties -- Israeli and Palestinian -- should agree to cooperate fully
and grant the experts unimpeded access to people, places and
documents.

Amnesty International believes that the gravity of the
current situation requires a comprehensive approach whereby all
aspects of the current crisis, including the factors contributing to
it, are investigated. The aims should be to establish the respective
responsibilities of all concerned parties and to identify concrete
steps that should be taken by each party in order to ensure the
protection of the civilian population and to provide effective and
accessible remedies for the abuses the parties have
committed.

After a year that saw a marked reduction in the level of
killings by both sides, the situation has sharply deteriorated in
recent months. Since the beginning of this year Israeli forces have
killed some 150 Palestinians -- many of them unarmed -- including more
than 25 children. To date none of these cases have been adequately
investigated.

In recent months the Israeli army has launched thousands of
artillery shells and scores of air strikes against densely populated
areas in the Gaza Strip, killing dozens of Palestinians, including
several women and children, and injuring many others.

In the same period Palestinian armed groups have launched
indiscriminately hundreds of 'qassam' rockets at Israel, injuring
several civilians.

Most recently, following the abduction by Palestinian armed groups of an Israeli soldier who continues to be held hostage,and the killing of an Israeli settler in the West Bank Israeli forces have launched repeated and deliberate air strikes against
electricity and water supply systems, roads and other civilian
infrastructure, educational and other public institutions and private
property in the Gaza Strip. The destruction is having serious
humanitarian consequences for the Palestinian population, whose
situation had already worsened due to the impact of the sanctions
imposed after Hamas won a majority in January's Palestinian
elections.

Both sides claim that their respective attacks are in
response to attacks by the other side, disregarding the prohibition
under international law of reprisals, the deliberate targeting of
civilians, and disproportionate and indiscriminate attacks that
endanger civilian lives. All parties to the conflict must ensure
the effective protection of the human rights of all -- Palestinians and
Israelis -- caught up in the current crisis.