By Emma Farge
GENEVA (Reuters) – A United Nations Fee of Inquiry concluded on Tuesday that Israel has dedicated genocide in Gaza and that prime Israeli officers together with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had incited these acts – accusations that Israel referred to as scandalous.
The U.N. report cites examples of the dimensions of the killings, help blockages, compelled displacement and the destruction of a fertility clinic to again up its genocide discovering, including its voice to rights teams and others who’ve reached the identical conclusion.
“Genocide is going on in Gaza,” mentioned Navi Pillay, head of the Fee of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory and a former Worldwide Felony Court docket choose.
“The duty for these atrocity crimes lies with Israeli authorities on the highest echelons who’ve orchestrated a genocidal marketing campaign for nearly two years now with the particular intent to destroy the Palestinian group in Gaza.
ISRAELI AMBASSADOR CALLS GENOCIDE REPORT ‘SCANDALOUS’
Israel’s ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, Daniel Meron, referred to as the report “scandalous” and “faux”, saying it had been authored by “Hamas proxies”.
“Israel categorically rejects the libellous rant revealed at this time by this fee of inquiry,” Meron instructed journalists.
Israel, which accuses the fee of getting a political agenda towards Israel and diverging from its mandate, declined to cooperate with it.
The fee’s 72-page authorized evaluation is the strongest U.N. discovering so far however the physique is impartial and doesn’t formally communicate for the United Nations. The U.N. has not but used the time period genocide however is below mounting stress to take action.
Israel is preventing a genocide case on the Worldwide Court docket of Justice in The Hague. It has rejected such accusations, citing its proper to self-defence following the lethal October 7, 2023, Hamas assault that killed 1,200 individuals and resulted in 251 hostages, in response to Israeli figures.
The next struggle in Gaza has killed greater than 64,000 individuals, in response to the Gaza Well being Ministry, whereas a worldwide starvation monitor says a part of it’s affected by famine.
The 1948 U.N. Genocide Conference, adopted within the wake of the mass homicide of Jews by Nazi Germany, defines genocide as crimes dedicated “with intent to destroy, in complete or partially, a nationwide, ethnic, racial or spiritual group, as such”.
To rely as genocide, no less than considered one of 5 acts will need to have occurred.
The U.N. fee discovered that Israel had dedicated 4 of them: killing; inflicting critical bodily or psychological hurt; intentionally inflicting situations of life calculated to deliver concerning the destruction of the Palestinians in complete or partially; and imposing measures meant to stop births.
It cited as proof interviews with victims, witnesses, docs, verified open-source paperwork and satellite tv for pc imagery evaluation compiled for the reason that struggle started.
ISRAEL ‘DEHUMANISING’ PALESTINIAN POPULATION
The fee additionally concluded that statements by Netanyahu and different officers are “direct proof of genocidal intent.” It cites a letter he wrote to Israeli troopers in November 2023 evaluating the Gaza operation to what the fee describes as a “holy struggle of complete annihilation” within the Hebrew Bible.
The report additionally names Israeli President Isaac Herzog and former defence minister Yoav Gallant.
South Africa’s Pillay, who headed a U.N. tribunal for Rwanda the place greater than 1 million individuals have been killed in 1994, mentioned the conditions have been comparable. “Once I take a look at the information within the Rwandan genocide, it’s extremely, similar to this. You dehumanise your victims. They’re animals, and so subsequently, with out conscience, you’ll be able to kill them,” she mentioned.
Whereas the Worldwide Court docket of Justice referred to different Israeli statements in regard to Gaza and Palestinians in its 2024 emergency measures order, it didn’t title Netanyahu.
“I hope, because of our report, that the minds of states may even be opened,” mentioned Pillay, who retires in November.
(Reporting by Emma Farge; Further reporting by Stephanie van den Berg in The Hague; Enhancing by Lisa Shumaker, Aidan Lewis and Kevin Liffey)
