Staff Reporter:
President Mohammed Shahabuddin’s wife Dr Rebecca Sultana at a special conference in Istanbul yester-day urged the international community to ensure peace and justice for the people of Gaza, demanding an urgent halt of displacement of Palestinians and end to the Israel’s aggression and occupation.
“Right now, we have no other goal but to stop this senseless bloodshed in Gaza . . . We are united to call for the immediate end to this humanitarian catastrophe,” she said.
She was speaking at a conference titled “United for Peace in Palestine”, a meeting of the spouses of the Heads of State and governments, in Turkey’s capital Istanbul this afternoon.
Terming the attack on the people of Gaza as a genocide which is definitely a deliberate attempt to wipe out Palestinians from Gaza and their homeland, Dr Rebecca Sultana said, “It is high time we raised our voice to hold Israel accountable in the relevant international bodies for its atrocities and crimes against humanity.”
She said, “We need to put our concerted efforts to end this violence and armed conflict but we must not lose focus on Palestinians’ rightful demand of an independent Palestinian State based on UNSC Resolu-tions on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital.
Apart from the decision of the 10th UN General Assembly Emergency Special Session on 27th October 2023 and the 18th October Open special meeting of the OIC Executive Committee, where Bangladesh voted for a humanitarian ceasefire, Dr Rebecca said Bangladesh Parliament (Jatiya Sangsad) has adopted a general resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire while denouncing the Israeli atrocities in Gaza.
Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, daughter of Founding Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, recently reiterated her strong support for the Palestinians and denounced the brutal killing of women and children at the opening ceremony of the International Conference on Wom-en in Islam” in Jeddah on 06 November 2023, Rebecca Sultana added.
First Lady of Turkey Emine Erdogan hosted the exceptional gathering while spouses of the Head of the States or governments of many other states, including Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Qatar, T?rkmenistan, Pakistan, Scotland, Congo, Senegal, Bosna Hersek, UAE, Uzbekistan and Palestine at-tended the programme where a joint resolution was passed.
Rebecca said the global community, especially the West, seems to be indifferent to the brutality and the silence of the Western world gives Israel the sense of immunity from accountability.
The world needs to hold Israel accountable for its cruelty, its crimes against humanity and flagrant viola-tions of international laws, she mentioned, expressing solidarity with the purpose and spirit of this meet-ing with expressing Bangladesh’s utmost desire for kind efforts to offer support and aid to the children in Gaza, who are in dire need of assistance.
Noting that the people of Palestine have been struggling for their ‘right to self-determination’ and inde-pendence for the last 75 years against Israel’s aggression and its occupation, Dr Rebecca said the current Israeli offensive has proved to be one of the deadliest in history, so far the killing over 11,000 Palestini-ans – mostly defenceless civilians, including killings of over 4,000 children and 3,000 women in Gaza Strip, representing 67% of all casualties.
