Iran Press/Europe: According to Iran Press News Agency from Paris, citing the Iranian mission in Geneva, this request was raised after the UN General Assembly passed a resolution on October 23, during the tenth emergency special session of the General Assembly on the issue of examining the legal consequences of the policies and actions of the Israeli regime in occupied Palestine.
In this letter, the Iranian delegation has presented documents and evidence as documentation of the apartheid crimes by the Israeli regime.
The request is based on evidence that Israel has created a dual legal system, granting Jewish settlers special rights and privileges, while Palestinians are subject to strict military laws. Iran insists that this discriminatory and racist system is an example of the crime of apartheid that must be addressed internationally.
One of the most prominent examples in the documentation provided is the widespread seizure of Palestinian lands.
The letter from the Islamic Republic of Iran's representative explained that "in addition to land grabbing, the Israeli regime has also plundered the water resources of the West Bank and Gaza and is exploiting them to develop its settlements."
Israel extracts 90 percent of Palestinian-owned groundwater, while Palestinians benefit from only 10 percent of these resources.
Israel has also issued military orders to deny Palestinians access to water resources such as the Jordan River. It has destroyed or confiscated more than 547 Palestinian water and sanitation facilities between 2009 and 2019. During this period, Israeli settlers in the West Bank used four times more water than Palestinians.
Referring to the restrictive laws imposed by the Israeli regime on issuing construction permits for Palestinians, the Iranian delegation emphasized that over the past two decades, out of thousands of construction permit applications from Palestinians, only 245 permits have been issued, which accounts for less than 4 percent of all applications. In contrast, between 2009 and 2020, more than 23,000 housing units for Israeli settlers have been built in the West Bank.
In this correspondence, the Islamic Republic of Iran has emphasized that the evidence presented shows that the Israeli regime has committed "inhumane acts" by implementing a series of discriminatory and racist policies, under Article 2 of the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid.
These actions include expropriation, denial of access to water resources and services, destruction of structures, and the imposition of discriminatory laws, which are clearly identified as crimes of apartheid.
By sending the documents mentioned above to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Islamic Republic of Iran has called for serious international follow-up to end this apartheid regime and bring its officials to justice. 219
