It added, in a statement marking the 39th anniversary of the Sabra and Shatila massacre, that the massacre will continue to haunt the Zionist perpetrators and all those who colluded with them.

Massacres won’t break the Palestinian people’s steadfastness, Hamas said, adding that the Palestinian people will never forget their martyrs and will exert all efforts to prosecute those who committed massacres against them.

 The Movement underlined that the massacre reaffirms that the Zionist entity is a criminal entity that is not interested in peace and that the so-called negotiations with it would not lead to any tangible results.

Sabra and Shatila massacre

On September 16, 1982, several thousand Palestinians at Sabra and Shatila refugee camps were brutally massacred by a Lebanese militia group immediately after the zionist army under Ariel Sharon had occupied the Lebanese capital, Beirut, where the camps are located.

The zionist army allowed the militias access to the camps and knew about the massacre that went on for three days but did nothing to stop it, according to an israeli commission that investigated the events of those days. The massacre claimed the lives of at least 3,000 Palestinian refugees.

The zionist troops surrounded the camps to prevent the refugees from leaving and allowed entry of the Phalangist militias, a known enemy of the Palestinians. The zionist troops fired flares throughout the night to light up the killing field - thus allowing the militiamen to see their way through the narrow alleys of the camps.

The massacre went on for three days. As the bloodbath concluded, the zionist regime supplied the bulldozers to dig mass graves.

In 1983, Kahana Commission found that Ariel Sharon, the zionist regime’s Defense Minister at the time, bore "personal responsibility" for the slaughter of the Palestinian civilians.

The massacre at Sabra and Shatila was a direct consequence of israel‘s violation of the American-brokered ceasefire and the impunity bestowed on Israel by the US and the international community.

This massacre, as well as other massacres against the Palestinian people, went unpunished by the international community. (ILKHA)