“Everyone is responsible”

He President of Palestine Mahmoud Abbas He declared on Thursday that “the whole world is responsible for what is happening” to the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank, and demanded an end to the sale of arms to Israel.

“Stop the genocide. Stop selling weapons to Israel“This madness cannot continue,” Abbas told the UN General Assembly, nearly a year after the war in Gaza, which has left more than 41,000 dead, many of them civilians.

Abbas, who has been that received with prolonged applause When he entered the room – unusually – he took advantage of the speech to criticize the United States, “the world’s largest democracy,” for having three times vetoed Security Council resolutions calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.

“The US was left alone and said, ‘No, let the fighting continue.’ They used their veto, and worse, they supplied Israel with lethal weapons that killed thousands of civilians,” he exclaimed, in a criticism that is also unusual for its strength toward the Washington government, Israel’s main ally in the world.

Abbas also announced that he will ask the General Assembly to take action to expel Israel from the United Nations, arguing that the country has failed to comply with United Nations resolutions since 1949.

On the other hand, Abbas has presented a 12-point plan for post-war Gaza, which includes a call for “international protection for the Palestinians,” the imminent holding of elections (but has not given a date), and the extension of the Palestinian Authority agreement to the two territories of the West Bank and Gaza (where Hamas rules).

He also called for an international conference, sponsored by the UN, to implement the two-state solution, Israeli and Palestinian, and ended by announcing his upcoming visit to the territory of Gaza, for which he asked for international assistance and the UN itself to “put pressure on the occupying government and not to obstruct this initiative.”

At the end of his speech, two Palestinians in the audience began to shout, “Free a free Palestine” and “From the river to the sea.”

5 billion additional dollars for Israel

Israel will receive more than $5 billion in additional military aid from the United States, the Israeli Defense Ministry announced Thursday. Specifically, the new aid will strengthen the Iron Dome and David’s Sling systems, which enable Israel to intercept short- and long-range missiles, and launch a new “laser defense system” that is in the final stages of development, a Defense Ministry statement said.

The $5 billion comes on top of the more than $3 billion in military aid Israel receives annually as part of a 10-year deal with Washington that went into effect in 2019.

New attack on schools

At least 15 people, including children, were killed in yet another Israeli attack on a school on Thursday. This time, the attack took place in the Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, shortly after the school in Fallujah was also attacked.

The army has assured that its attack was directed against a group of militiamen operating from a “command center” installed in the complex, and as always when it attacks civilian infrastructure in Gaza, it has accused the Islamist group Hamas of “abusing” these types of structures, which usually house hundreds of displaced civilians.