International Quds Day On International Quds Day, the last Friday of the holy month of Ramadan, the Islamic Republic of Iran reiterates its steadfast commitment to realizing justice and supporting the dignity and the rights of the Palestinian people to determine their own destiny. The oppressed people of Palestine have for several decades suffered from savage occupation, apartheid policies, forced displacement, and systematic efforts at ethnic cleansing at the hands of the Israeli regime. International Quds Day is the unique legacy of Imam Khomeini (may God have mercy on him) for the liberation of Al-Quds; a legacy derived from the profound understanding of the great founder of the Islamic Revolution regarding the soft and spiritual power of the clear religion of Islam, as well as from the insight and courage of a great international leader. Undoubtedly, International Quds Day stands as one of the most prominent examples of an idea being realized in various dimensions and transformed into a practical program for both Muslim and non-Muslim communities around the world. Eight decades have passed since the occupation of Palestinian lands and the deprivation of the Palestinian people of their inherent human rights, including the fundamental right to determine their own destiny. During this period, the colonial plan to eliminate the Palestinian nation using the most horrific methods of mass killing and genocide has persisted. For all these years, the aim of the Zionist apartheid regime in employing the most severe forms of violence, torture, and humiliation has been, on one hand, to extinguish the spirit of resistance among Palestinians and the entire Islamic world, and on the other, to normalize crime in order to force the region and the world to accept a reality without Palestine. Over the past two years, following the Al-Aqsa Storm operations—which erupted as the pent-up anger of the oppressed Palestinian people and signified the enduring motivation and spirit of resistance against the tyranny and defiance of the occupiers—the Zionist regime has turned occupied Palestine into a stage for unprecedented violations of all the principles and norms of international law, especially those pertaining to human rights and humanitarian law, by massacring more than fifty thousand innocent Palestinians, primarily children and women, imposing a complete siege on Gaza with resultant starvation, hunger, and thirst, utterly destroying hospitals and medical centres, and by killing and arresting thousands in the West Bank. The Zionist regime, as a defiant actor and the sole possessor of nuclear weapons in the region, represents the greatest threat to international peace and security. In such circumstances, resistance is the only option to confront the exaggeration and contentiousness of the Zionist regime and its supporters—not only in Palestine and Lebanon but throughout the region and the Islamic world. The Islamic Republic of Iran, based on the complete legitimacy of the Palestinian people’s resistance against the occupiers, and in pursuit of achieving all their human rights—including the fundamental right to self-determination and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with its capital in the noble Quds across all historical Palestine—reminds all governments of their responsibilities under the principles of international law, the United Nations Charter, international humanitarian treaties, the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, and other human rights documents and norms to put an end to occupation, apartheid, and genocide. International Quds Day is an unparalleled opportunity for the Islamic world and for all free and conscientious human beings of every religion, creed, and nationality to express their opposition and repugnance towards the greatest injustice and oppression remaining from the twentieth century, and to affirm their solidarity with their oppressed brothers and sisters who have fallen victim to the defiance, arrogance, cruelty, and expansionism of the Zionist regime and its supporters.