At the 39^th congress of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), which took place in Johannesburg, South Africa, 23-27 August 2016, Al-Marsad - Arab Human Rights Center in Golan Heights was accepted as a new member.  Al-Marsad is delighted and honored to have become a member of one of the most important human rights families in the world.

The FIDH membership will enable Al-Marsad to interact with hundreds of human rights organizations, therefore increasing awareness of the human rights situation in the Occupied Syrian Golan, in particular, the systematic discrimination of the native Syrian citizens by the occupying authority, that violates their inherent human rights. Furthermore, the membership will allow Al-Marsad to engage with international and regional human rights forums to present evidence of Israeli practices that violate international humanitarian and human rights law, and to demand that Israel fulfills its obligations enshrined in international law treaties.

Various resolutions were adopted at the FIDH congress, including a special statement on the situation in Syria demanding that the warring parties abide by international human rights and humanitarian law and standards, including: the non-targeting of civilians and civilian objectives; the cessation of killings; torture; arbitrary detention; and the lifting of sieges of all besieged areas to ensure the access of humanitarian aid to civilians. The statement stressed the need to end the war and to guarantee accountability for all perpetrators of war crimes and crimes against humanity, before the International Criminal Court to ensure that there is no impunity. The statement also emphasized that the Syrian Golan is an occupied Syrian territory, and called on Israeli occupying authorities to end all policies and practices contrary to international law, particularly the policy of systematic discrimination against the native Syrian citizens, and the expansion of illegal Israeli settlements.

FIDH is an international human rights NGO federating 178 organizations from 120 countries. Since 1922, FIDH has been defending all civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights as set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The main FIDH headquarters are in Paris, with regional offices in Pretoria in South Africa, Tunis, Tunisia, and permanent delegations in Geneva (United Nations) and New York (United Nations) and Brussels (European Union) and The Hague (International Criminal Court).

Al-Marsad is an independent, nonprofit, legal human rights organization. It is the only human rights organization operating in the Occupied Syrian Golan. For additional information, please contact:

marsad@golan-marsad.org

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