Urgent Appeal from Intellectuals for Gaza

The Institute for Genocide Research Canada issued a press release announcing an urgent appeal from intellectuals regarding the endangerment of fundamental human rights and freedoms in Gaza, reports the Patria News Agency.

- Appreciating the commitment of the international community and global interest in interstate and international peace and security, and the protection of fundamental human rights and freedoms of every individual, regardless of their national, ethnic, religious, or racial affiliation, we consider it justified and purposeful to contribute to raising global public awareness in the broadest sense regarding the destructive activities on the ground in Gaza, where mass human rights violations, especially of children, women, and civilians in general, are evident.

We believe that killing, violence, and other forms of destructive human actions directed against individuals or collectivities, or human groups, are not a way to resolve certain interstate or internal state issues. Besides the fact that we live in the 21st century, we are witnessing numerous examples that confirm the dark side of human nature.

Destructive activities such as wars, killings, violence, and other forms of inhumane treatment of individuals or certain collectivities continue to accompany modern man. Unfortunately, parallel to general development and prosperity in all spheres of human activity, even more brutal and destructive forms, methods, and means of inhumane treatment are emerging. Numerous international legal documents dealing with criminal-legal protection of every person as an individual and as a member of a certain collectivity or human group have clearly not yielded the expected results.

The international community lacks a proportionate preventive response to crimes of an international and inter-ethnic nature, given that they are repeated in various geographical locations in even more devastating and destructive forms and modalities.

The horrific crimes in Gaza, where protected categories (children, women, civilians) are targets of attacks, require an urgent and energetic reaction aimed at stopping the killing, violence, and other forms of destructive activities that can be legally formulated as crimes against humanity and values protected by international law. We particularly take this opportunity to emphasize that the non-prevention of crimes, or a passive attitude legally defined as inaction, constitutes participation in the crime and entails responsibility. We sincerely believe and hope that the international community in the broadest sense of the word has a unified will and commitment to act preventively, or at least to stop further destruction, the killing of innocent people, especially children, women, etc., and possesses the available capacities to realize such an intention in material terms. The fact that persons who are not militarily active and objects of no military significance (schools, hospitals...) are the subject of attacks is concerning.

In the name of respecting man as a human being, in the name of humanity, in the name of justice and fairness... we demand the engagement, decisive participation, and concrete action of all subjects at the international and regional levels aimed at stopping the latest bloodshed in Gaza, it was announced.

Signatories of the Urgent Appeal:

1. Professor Francis A. Boyle

2. Professor Marko Attila Hoare

3. Professor David Pettigrew

4.  Professor Keith Doubt

5. Professor Safiya Soliman

6. Roger M. Richards

7. Chris Mathieu

8. Professor Emir Ramić

9. Professor Smail Čekić

10. Professor Fahira Fejzić

11. Professor Mirsada Hukić

12. Professor Kasim Trnka

13. Professor Rasim Muratović

14. Professor Senadin Lavić

15. Professor Suad Kurtčehajić

16. Professor Mujo Begić

17. Professor Admir Muratović

18. Professor Mevlud Dudić

19. Professor  Edina Bečirević

20. Professor Hariz Halilović

21. Professor Sead Berberović

22. Professor Fikret Bečirović

23. Dr Emir Suljagić

24. Dr. Mustafa Cerić

25. Magistar Sadmir Karović

26. Magistar Osman Softić

27. Magistar Sanja Seferović Drnovšek

28. Magistar Marjan Hajnal

29. Adil Kulenović

30. Ibrahim Kajan

31. Bakira Hasečić