By Ayo Yusuf
King Salman bin Abdulaziz, the ruler of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, has called for an emergency meeting of the member states of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, OIC.
The OIC is the second largest organisation after the United Nations with a membership of 57 states, including Nigeria, spread over four continents. The organisation is also the collective voice of the Muslim world.
According to a statement posted on OIC’s official website on Sunday, the meeting is slated for October 18 and 19, in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
The emergency meeting is called to discuss the ongoing conflict in the Gaza strip between Hamas and Israel.
“At the invitation of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which chairs the current session of the Islamic Summit and the Executive Committee of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the Organization’s Executive Committee is convening an urgent open-ended extraordinary meeting at the ministerial level, to address the escalating military situation in Gaza and its environs as well as the deteriorating conditions that endanger the lives of civilians and the overall security and stability of the region,” the statement read.
“The extraordinary meeting of the Executive Committee of the OIC will take place on Wednesday, October 18, 2023, at the General Secretariat headquarters in Jeddah Governorate,” said the statement.
On October 7, Hamas launched an unprecedented and coordinated land, air and sea incursion into Israel which reportedly killed 1,300 Israelis.
According to Gaza’s health ministry, at least 1,900 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli retaliatory strikes, including 614 children and 370 women.
