Gaza, July 02: The radical Islamist Hamas movement rejected Thursday accusations by Amnesty International that it had committed war crimes during last winter’s Israeli offensive in Gaza.
The 117-page report from the London-based human rights group accused both Hamas and Israel of war crimes during the 22-day conflict.
Amnesty did not talk to Hamas leaders, making the report “automatically unbalanced,” Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuchri told a news conference in Gaza City.
“What is needed after seeing all those images of destruction, is not to blame Hamas, but to take those murders (Israel) to court to sue them, instead of publishing such reports,” he said.
“Hamas is rejecting all the accusation made against it in Amnesty’s report,” he said.
“Amnesty’s call on other countries to stop smuggling weapons (to Hamas) is aiming at misleading world public opinion and increase the accusations against Hamas,” he charged.
He called it a bid to “guarantee the continuation of the imposed siege on Gaza.”
The report, he said, also ignored the “mass destruction caused the brutal and unfair war carried out by the (Israeli) Occupation.”
The report said that more than 3,000 homes were destroyed and some 20,000 damaged in Israeli attacks which reduced entire neighbourhoods of Gaza to rubble. It also called for an end to the Israeli blockade on the Strip, which it said was “collective punishment” illegal under international law.
—–Agencies