The Bishop in Jerusalem, the Rt Revd Riah Abu El Assal, has asked the Anglican Communion News Service to encourage its readers to read and sign the current petition being circulated by the Palestinian people on the internet. A report on the recent observance of Holy Week and Easter in Jerusalem will be forthcoming from details sent by the Dean of St George's College, the Very Revd Ross Jones. The right to self-determination and continued occupation stand in fundamental conflict.
Continued occupation is the root cause of the present situation.
It is the machinery of occupation which produces the systematic violation of the range of other individual and collective rights provided for by the Covenant, including the right to liberty and security of person, the right to freedom of movement, the right to control one's own natural resources, and others. It is the machinery of occupation which produces settlements, closures, checkpoints, home demolitions, land confiscation, destruction of crops, and wanton killings by settlers and occupation forces, which the Palestinian people have continued to endure even during the last 7 years under cover of the peace process. Occupation can be maintained only by violence or the threat of violence. Instead of respecting the principles of human rights and international law, and acknowledging the Palestinian right to self-determination, Israel has declared war on the Palestinian people. It has openly unleashed an arsenal of military violence against them.