Members of the Ministerial Committee assigned by the Joint Arab-Islamic Extraordinary Summit under the chairmanship of His Highness Prince Faisal bin Farhan bin Abdullah, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, met on Monday, 26 February 2024, with the Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, at the United Nations headquarters in Geneva. The committee members who participated in the meeting were His Excellency the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, Ayman Al-Safadi, His Excellency the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Arab Republic of Egypt, Mr. Sameh Shoukry, Her Excellency the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia, Retno Marsudi, and His Excellency the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates of the State of Palestine, Riad Malki.
During the meeting, they discussed the dangerous developments in the Gaza Strip and the Israeli occupation's continued military escalation against defenseless civilians. The members renewed their unified position regarding the rejection of the Israeli occupation forces' continued aggression against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip. They renewed their call for the necessity of an immediate and complete ceasefire, to ensure the protection of civilians, as stipulated in international humanitarian law.
The members of the committee also called for confronting all flagrant violations committed by the Israeli occupation forces against the Palestinian people, which increase the human tragedy and impede the entry of urgent humanitarian aid into the besieged Gaza Strip. They stressed on the importance of holding the occupation accountable for the ongoing violations in the Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, which violates international law and international humanitarian law.
The members of the Ministerial Committee expressed their position of completely rejecting all forced displacement operations, which the occupation seeks to implement. They stressed on the importance of adhering to international law and international humanitarian law and their emphasis on confronting them at all levels.
The members stressed that any practices and procedures that violate freedom of worship in the Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem will exacerbate tensions and push the situation into a continuing spiral of violence.
Members warned of the extremely dangerous repercussions of storming and targeting the city of Rafah in the Gaza Strip, the last refuge for hundreds of thousands of civilians.
The members of the committee stressed the importance of creating serious political conditions for the establishment of a Palestinian state on the lines of June 4, 1967, in accordance with the relevant international resolutions. They expressed their rejection of dividing the Palestinian issue and discussing the future of the Gaza Strip in isolation from the Palestinian issue.
