Jakarta. Indonesia recently urged the United Nations General Assembly -- also known as the UNGA -- to investigate Israel’s deadly air strikes in Gaza. 

The UN’s main policy-making body convened Thursday an emergency session to discuss the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict that had killed many civilians. Speaking at the UN podium, Foreign Affairs Minister Retno Marsudi reaffirmed Indonesia stood with the Palestinians. Indonesia also set out some concrete steps that the UNGA should take to stop the conflict. This includes having an investigative body to find facts on the ground following the Israeli attack on a Gaza hospital. 

“The General Assembly should demand an immediate, durable, and fully respected ceasefire. We must be able to avoid future recurrence of the atrocities,” Retno said.

“The General Assembly should call for accountability, including the establishment of an independent commission of inquiry to investigate this horrifying humanitarian situation,” she told the forum.

Retno expressed Indonesia’s outrage over the Gaza hospital and places of worship attacks. She said: “Indonesia condemns in the strongest terms Israel’s violence against Palestinians, against hospitals, and places of worship in Gaza.”

An Israeli bomb recently struck the Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church in Gaza. The church was sheltering hundreds of displaced Palestinians. News outlet Anadolu Agency wrote Wednesday that Israeli attacks had destroyed 33 mosques in Gaza since the conflict escalated on Oct. 7 after a Palestinian militant group Hamas's surprise attack on Israel.

An Israeli airstrike not long ago hit the Al-Ahly al-Arabi Hospital in Gaza. Palestinian officials reported that the blast had claimed at least 500 lives. 

Hamas accused Israel of launching the airstrike, while the Israeli military put the blame on Islamic Jihad, a smaller, more radical Palestinian militant group that often works with Hamas, the Associated Press wrote.