India should raise its voice on Palestine issue, help in establishing peace: Farooq Abdullah

Srinagar, Nov 3 (PTI) India should help in finding ways to establish peace in Palestine, National Conference president Farooq Abdullah said after a meeting of the leaders of the Peoples Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) here on Friday.

PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti, CPI(M) leader M Y Tarigami and National Conference (NC) leader Hasnain Masoodi were also part of the meeting held at Abdullah’s residence at Gupkar here.

The leaders, however, said the surprise meeting was not a meeting of the PAGD an alliance of four political parties seeking the restoration of Article 370 which was abrogated by the Centre in August 2019.

“This is not a meeting of the PAGD. We met today because Mehbooba ji and I hadn’t met for a long time. We discussed some issues, especially the situation in Palestine,” Abdullah, who is also the president of the PAGD, told reporters after the meeting.

“We expressed concern over that (Palestine issue) and decided that we should make a request to the prime minister. First, we thank him for the aid that India sent there. But what is needed the most is that peace gets established there,” the NC president said.

Abdullah expressed regret over India’s abstention from voting on the United Nations resolution on the Israel-Hamas conflict. “When we can talk about Ukraine, talking about Palestine is important as well,” he said.

Abdullah said the situation is “like what happened in South Africa during the apartheid.”

“Children, men, women, elderly are getting killed like they are not humans. Cities have been levelled and the people there are digging through the debris with their bare hands as they have no machines,” he said.

The Government of India should raise its voice on the issue and find ways for peace to prevail, the Lok Sabha MP from Srinagar said.

“The country of Mahatma Gandhi should raise its voice… We want our voice to reach the powers that be and tell them that it is enough and it should stop,” he said.