On 27 February 2008, the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) rejected the application of the Director of Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, Mr Issam Younis, for permission to travel to Ramallah in the West Bank.
Mr.
Younis's travel was in response to an invitation to meet with the German Federal Minister of Economic Cooperation and Development, Mrs.
Heidimarie Wieczorek-Zeul, who is visiting the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT).
Mr.
Younis received an invitation from the German Representative in Ramallah to meet with the Minister.
After many days of waiting for a response, the Israeli military refused to issue permission for him to leave Gaza.
Al Mezan views preventing its Director from travel as part of the policy of siege and blockade that the IOF impose on Gaza, which prohibits the movement of people and goods to and from it.
IOF's measures prevent civilians, including patients and students, from leaving Gaza.
As a result, about 103 patients died in Gaza because the IOF denied their access to health services that Gaza's hospitals cannot provide.
Preventing Mr.
Younis's travel comes in the context of restricting the movement of civil society activists, and particularly human rights defenders, who work inside Gaza and seek to advance respect and protection of the internationally recognized human rights through exposing their violations in international forums and demand the international community to act and bring to an end the IOF systematic breaches of the rules of international law, and to provide protection for the civilian population.
It also comes under a serious escalation of the collective punishment procedures and military escalation by IOF against Gaza.
On 27 February 2008, Mr.
Younis and a number of civil society representatives met in Gaza City with a delegation from the British Consulate.
They provided them with a perspective about the serious implications of the continued blockade of the OPT under the absence of effective international intervention, which only allows for graver violations of human rights.
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