Inter-Parliamentary Al-Quds platform endorses global boycott against Israel

ISTANBUL

The closing declaration of the Fifth Conference of the League of Parliamentarians for al-Quds and Palestine, which took place in Istanbul with the participation of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Speaker of the Grand National Assembly of Türkiye Numan Kurtulmus, supported the global boycott movement against Israel.

"Supporting the global boycott movement of Israel and its supporters and calling on parliaments to enact laws that contribute to the global boycott movement," the 27-point declaration said.

The conference took place in Istanbul on April 26-28.

The first article of the declaration strongly condemned the despotic genocidal war waged by the Israeli occupation state in the Gaza Strip.

The declaration emphasized that the participants consider the Israeli occupation as the biggest obstacle to peace in the region and that the Zionist ideology is the biggest threat to world peace and its actions that violate all humanitarian values.

The declaration condemned the efforts of the US and some Western countries to support the occupying entity militarily and economically and called for the smooth delivery of sufficient food, drinking water and medical aid to the residents of Gaza.

Here are some of the issues included in the declaration:

- Calling to end this war immediately to spare innocent people, stop the machine of crime and destruction.

- Stressing that the policy of killing and annihilation committed by the Israeli war machine has been an official policy systematically practiced against the Palestinian people since the occupation of Palestine in 1948.

- Highlighting the measures of apartheid committed by Israel, which is the ugliest form of occupation in the world.

- Commending the Palestinian resistance and its extraordinary heroism against the genocidal war, and emphasizing that the Palestinian people’s resistance against the occupation by all means is a legitimate right guaranteed by divine laws and international legislation.

- The participants believe that the Palestinian factions defending their people and land are liberation movements that deserve praise and acclaim for their national role in seeking freedom, liberation and independence, and they reject branding them as terrorism.

- Acclaiming the positions of the countries that stood up against the unjust aggression on Gaza since its beginning, and these are most of the countries in the world led by Türkiye, and the distinguished position of its president in refusing to label the Palestinian resistance movements as terrorism.

- Denouncing the lack of impartiality of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court and his visit to Israel while failing to visit the Gaza Strip to inspect the crimes of genocide and demanding him to issue arrest warrants against Israeli criminals involved in the war of genocide.

- Calling for the establishment of an international legal initiative supported by parliamentarians and parliaments that will coordinate the efforts of legal professionals working to prosecute the criminals involved in the genocide war.

- Warning of the new wave of displacement of the Palestinian people from the West Bank and Gaza announced by the Israeli government at the beginning of the war on Gaza.

- Supporting the global boycott movement of Israel and its supporters and calling on parliaments to enact laws that contribute to the global boycott movement in addition to criminalizing dealing and communicating with Israel in all fields.

- Standing firmly in the face of the wave of normalization with Israel, including by some Arab and Islamic countries, and emphasizing that parliamentarians have a decisive role in rejecting normalization by their countries.

- Supporting international activists from various countries of the world who are contributing to efforts to stop the war and lift the unjust siege on Gaza, and inviting parliamentarians to participate in such activities, including the Freedom Flotilla to break the siege.

- Striving diligently to activate the most prominent decision of the conference to establish the global alliance to revive the system of rights, justice, values and rational principles across parliaments, governments and peoples in the face of the alliance of oppression, injustice, tyranny, occupation and racism that supports Israel in its criminal war on the Gaza Strip and to devote the right and support it everywhere in the world, and calling on the Turkish President to take the lead position in this global alliance.

- Contributing to relief efforts and urging parliamentarians and parliaments to provide relief aid to Gaza to confront the danger of famine threatening Palestinians in the Strip.

The closing declaration thanked Türkiye for "their role in supporting the League and hosting its conferences in Türkiye, which contributed to its prestigious global status as an international parliamentary platform defending the Palestinian issue.”

Hasan Turan, chief administrative officer of the Grand National Assembly of Türkiye was elected as the President of the Inter-Parliamentary Al-Quds Platform Türkiye, and AK Party Ankara MP Asuman Erdogan was elected as a member of the Board of Directors of the platform.