Israel carried out “genocidal acts” in opposition to Palestinians by systematically destroying ladies’s health-care services through the battle in Gaza, and used sexual violence as a conflict technique, United Nations consultants say in a brand new report.
In its report launched Thursday, the UN Unbiased Worldwide Fee of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, together with East Jerusalem, and Israel stated the use of heavy explosives in civilian areas and Israeli assaults on hospitals and well being services.
It stated all three led to “disproportionate violence in opposition to ladies and youngsters.”
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected the report’s findings, saying they have been biased and antisemitic.
“As a substitute of specializing in the crimes in opposition to humanity and conflict crimes dedicated by the Hamas terrorist group … the United Nations as soon as once more chooses to assault the state of Israel with false accusations,” he stated in an announcement.
Israel disengaged from the Human Rights Council in February.
“Israeli authorities have destroyed in half the reproductive capability of the Palestinians in Gaza as a bunch, together with by imposing measures supposed to forestall births, one of the classes of genocidal acts in the Rome Statute and the Genocide Conference,” stated the UN fee’s report.
These actions, in addition to a surge in maternity deaths on account of restricted entry to medical provides, amounted to the crime in opposition to humanity of extermination, the fee stated.
The report accused Israel’s safety forces of utilizing pressured public stripping and sexual assault as half of their commonplace working procedures to punish Palestinians following the Hamas-led assaults on southern Israel in October 2023.
The ensuing conflict in the Gaza Strip has killed greater than 48,000 Palestinians, in line with Gaza well being officers.
IDF says insurance policies ‘prohibit such misconduct’
The fee additionally accused Israeli safety forces of rape and sexual violence in opposition to Palestinian detainees. Israel denies any systematic abuse of prisoners and says it takes motion when there are violations.
Israel has rejected the accusations.
“The IDF [Israeli Defence Force] has concrete directives … and insurance policies which unequivocally prohibit such misconduct,” the everlasting mission to the UN in Geneva responded in an announcement, including that its assessment processes are in line with worldwide requirements.
A earlier report printed by the fee in June 2024 accused Hamas and different Palestinian armed teams of critical rights violations in the 2023 assaults, which killed 1,200 folks and resulted in 251 hostages, in line with Israeli tallies.
In March final yr, a workforce of United Nations consultants stated there have been “affordable grounds to consider” sexual violence, together with rape, occurred at a number of places through the militant group’s assault.
The fee is led by former UN human rights chief Navi Pillay. Its findings can be utilized as proof for the Worldwide Felony Courtroom or different our bodies that search to prosecute conflict crimes.
Palestinian officers say folks in Gaza may quickly run out of clear ingesting water. After Israel minimize off the electrical energy provide to Gaza this weekend, a desalination plant in Deir al-Balah has been operating at about 30 per cent capability on backup turbines.
Israel is occasion to the Genocide Conference and was ordered in January 2024 by the Worldwide Courtroom of Justice to take motion to forestall acts of genocide through the conflict in opposition to Hamas.
It shouldn’t be occasion to the Rome Statute, which supplies the Worldwide Felony Courtroom jurisdiction to rule on particular person prison instances involving genocide and crimes in opposition to humanity.
South Africa has introduced a genocide case in opposition to Israel’s actions in Gaza on the Worldwide Courtroom of Justice.
Source link
#report #accuses #Israel #genocidal #acts #sexual #violence #Gaza #CBC #News
