Gaza, (Pal Telegraph) - Governments around the world should respond to the new UN report calling the blockade of the Gaza Strip “legal and appropriate” by following Turkey’s lead and imposing sanctions on the state of Israel, says the European Campaign to End the Siege of Gaza (ECESG).

The umbrella group of 34 human-rights organisations issued the call following the release of the document called the “Palmer Report,” which was commissioned by the United Nations to investigate Israel’s 2010 attack on a six-ship flotilla sailing in international waters to break the siege on Gaza – killing nine civilian passengers in the process. The report’s authors declared that that the way Israeli forces boarded the vessels was “excessive and unreasonable,” but then went beyond their mandate to give their support to the five-year blockade. The blockade has destroyed the enclave’s economy by prohibiting all exports; severely restricting import of vital supplies such as cement and other building materials; and limiting traffic in and out of what has become known as the “world’s largest open-air prison.”

Ahmet Davutoğlu, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Turkey, denounced the Palmer report, and declared on Sept. 2 that the government would downgrade its diplomatic relations with Israel, cease all military cooperation, take whatever measures it deems necessary to ensure freedom of navigation in the Eastern Mediterranean (on which it has the longest coastline) and work to bring the Gaza blockade before the International Court of Justice.
 
“The Palmer Commission’s conclusions on the Gaza blockade fly in the face of the United Nations’ mandate to protect civilian lives, and of international conventions prohibiting collective punishment,” says Ramy Abdu, spokesman for the ECESG, which was among the sponsors of the flotilla. “International activists for justice will continue to organize flotillas with a mission to break the siege on Gaza, and we welcome Turkey’s pledge to ensure freedom of navigation in the Eastern Mediterranean. It is time for other governments to join Turkey in actively opposing Israel’s flagrant violations of international law.”
 
The European Campaign to End the Siege on Gaza (ECESG) is an umbrella group of 34 European human rights and humanitarian organisations that work collectively to pressure the international community and Israel to end the siege on Gaza’s civilian population of 1.6 million.