Amnesty International: Israel is committing genocide in Gaza

Brussels – Since the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, 2023, Israel has “unleashed hell and destruction on the Palestinians of Gaza brazenly, continuously, and with total impunity.” Amnesty International issued a report today (Dec. 5) alleging that Israel has committed and continues to commit genocide in the Gaza Strip. Confirming allegations already made months ago by the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Francesca Albanese.

Another element of the widely documented horror of Israel’s counteroffensive in the Palestinian enclave, in addition to war crimes and crimes against humanity, of which the International Criminal Court charged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. After examining in detail the violations carried out by Israel in the Palestinian enclave between October 2023 and July 2024, interviewing 212 people in Gaza, and analyzing visual and digital evidence and the statements of senior Israeli government and military officials, Amnesty International “found sufficient basis” to conclude that what is taking place in Gaza is outright genocide.

“Month after month, Israel has treated Palestinians in Gaza as a subhuman group unworthy of human rights and dignity, demonstrating its intent to physically destroy them,” said Agnès Callamard, secretary-general of Amnesty International, noting that the “damning” findings contained in the report “must serve as a wake-up call” for an international community, powerless in the face of the Gaza tragedy. Callamard stressed — in line with the observations of the International Court of Justice regarding South Africa’s accusation against Israel of genocide — that “States that continue to transfer arms to Israel are violating their obligation to prevent genocide and risk becoming its accomplices.”

The figures cited in the report are those that UN Agencies on the ground report weekly in their bulletins. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA-OPT), at least 44,502 Palestinians have been killed and 105,454 wounded since Oct. 7, 2023. In the last week– Nov. 26 to Dec. 3 — Israeli shelling reportedly killed an additional 253 people and injured 708. It should be noted that Amnesty International’s report considers events up to July 2024, thus excluding the horrific offensive that the Israeli army launched in October on northern Gaza, which is under permanent siege and where humanitarian assistance “was largely denied for some 60 days, leaving between 65,000 and 75,000 people without access to food, water, electricity, or reliable health care.”

The deliberate and indiscriminate destruction of entire cities, critical infrastructure, agricultural land, and cultural and religious sites has “rendered large swathes of Gaza uninhabitable.” This has often been preceded by “officials urging their implementation.” Amnesty reviewed 102 statements made by Israeli government and military officials that “dehumanized Palestinians, called for or justified genocidal acts or other crimes against them.” A language shared and echoed even by Israeli soldiers in the field, as evidenced by several audiovisual contents showing military personnel celebrating the destruction of Palestinian homes, mosques, schools, and universities.

Amnesty International focused on 15 Israeli airstrikes that killed at least 334 civilians, including 141 minors, and wounded hundreds of others. Yet, for none of these raids, it found evidence that they were against military targets. The report identified a recurring pattern in Israel’s genocidal action: the damage and destruction of vital infrastructure, the repeated use of arbitrary and confusing mass “evacuation” orders to forcibly displace almost the entire population of Gaza, and the denial and obstruction of the provision of essential services, humanitarian assistance, and other life-saving supplies in and within Gaza. Israel has displaced nearly 1.9 million Palestinians – 90 percent of Gaza’s population – into increasingly smaller, insecure pockets of land in inhumane conditions.

“We are calling on the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to urgently consider adding genocide to the list of crimes it is investigating and for all states to use every legal avenue to bring perpetrators to justice,” Amnesty International’s report concludes. It is an appeal also addressed to Brussels, where silence reigns after the turn of Josep Borrell and Kaja Kallas as head of EU foreign policy, and to the capitals of the 27 member states, considered too prudent so far in confirming their loyalty to the Hague Tribunal and the arrest warrant for Israel’s prime minister.