EU envoy blasts Israel over deadly Jenin raid
A European envoy blasted Israel Saturday over the “proportionality” of the force it uses, as international envoys toured Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank following this week’s deadly raid.
His remarks echoed UN chief Antonio Guterres who on Thursday told reporters “there was an excessive force used by Israeli forces” in its 48-hour operation, the largest Israel has staged in the Palestinian territory for years, according to AFP.
It included air strikes and armoured bulldozers ripping up streets.
Jenin is a centre for multiple resistance Palestinian groups.
European Union representative to the Palestinian territories Sven Kuehn von Burgsdorff made his comments as he led a delegation of UN officials and diplomats from 25 countries to the camp in the northern West Bank.
“We are concerned about the deployment of weaponry and weapons systems which question the proportionality of the military during the operation,” Kuehn von Burgsdorff said of the operation in which 12 Palestinians and one Israeli soldier were killed.
“This cycle of violence has to end, it cannot continue. If there is no political solution to the conflict, we are going to stand here in a week’s time, in a month’s time, in a year’s time, with nothing changed,” he added.
Jenin camp has been the site of several large-scale raids by the Israeli military this year, but this week’s was the biggest such operation in the West Bank since the second Palestinian “intifada” or uprising of the early 2000s.
The camp’s infrastructure was severely damaged during the raid, which Israel claimed was targeting Palestinian fighters.