Editorial Note: The following news reports are summaries from original sources. They may also include corrections of Arabic names and political terminology. Comments are in parentheses.

Israel's decision of not allowing foodstuff into Gaza is a war crime, says European anti-siege committee

Anti-siege committee: Israel's decision of not allowing in foodstuff war crime

[ 12/06/2008 - 11:34 AM ]

BRUSSELS, (PIC)--

The European Campaign Committee against the siege strongly denounced the Israeli occupation government (IOG) for taking Wednesday a decision to suspend the passage of trucks loaded with curtailed quantities of foodstuff through the Sufa crossing into the Gaza Strip, describing it as a war crime.

The campaign said that the IOG is working according to a carefully-prepared plan to turn Gaza into an area of destitution and mass death, a repository of pain and graveyard for patients.

The campaign pointed out that the statute of the international criminal court defines genocide as any action that would impose living conditions on a group of people leading to the destruction of their lives wholly or partially. And in the article no. eight of the statute, war crimes are defined as using starvation of civilians as a method of warfare by depriving them of objects indispensable to their survival, including willfully impeding relief supplies as provided for under the Geneva convention, it elaborated.

The campaign underlined that the EU countries could end the siege tragedy immediately if they wished to stop the wheel of mass death, adding that moral balance of Europe decreases everyday because of its passivity.

In a new development, the Hebrew radio reported that Egyptian soldiers is receiving special training in US Texas to improve their ability to discover alleged tunnels for smuggling arms into the Gaza Strip in response to the Israeli government's calls in this regard.