Varsen Aghabekian Shahin says international community must take concrete steps to end Israeli impunity for abuses.The international community must “shoulder its responsibility” and take action against Israel’s genocide in Gaza, the Palestinian foreign affairs minister has told Al Jazeera before an emergency United Nations Security Council session.In an interview on Saturday, Varsen Aghabekian Shahin said the 15-member council must uphold international law when it convenes at UN headquarters in New York on Sunday to discuss the situation in the Gaza Strip.The meeting was organised in response to Israel’s newly announced plan to seize Gaza City, which has drawn widespread condemnation from world leaders.“I expect that the international community stands for international law and international humanitarian law,” Aghabekian Shahin told Al Jazeera.“What has been going in Palestine for the last 22 months is nothing but a genocide, and it’s part and parcel of Israel’s expansionist ideology that wants to take over the entirety of the occupied State of Palestine.”The Israeli security cabinet approved plans this week to seize Gaza City, forcibly displacing nearly one million Palestinians to concentration zones in the south of the bombarded coastal enclave.Palestinians have rejected the Israeli push to force them out of the city while human rights groups and the UN have warned that the plan will worsen an already dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza and lead to further mass casualties.Israel has pledged to push ahead with its plans despite the growing criticism, saying that it wants to “free Gaza from Hamas”. Advertisement The country’s top global ally, the United States, has not commented directly on the plan to seize Gaza City. But US President Donald Trump suggested earlier this week that he would not block an Israeli …
