Tuesday, July 29, 2025
Israel committing genocide in Gaza says human rights group
The Guardian reports that two leading human rights organisations based in Israel, B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights, say their government is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza and the country’s western allies have a legal and moral duty to stop it.
They add that in reports published on Monday, the two groups said Israel had targeted civilians in Gaza only because of their identity as Palestinians over nearly two years of war, causing severe and in some cases irreparable damage to Palestinian society:
Multiple international and Palestinian groups have already described the war as genocidal, but reports from two of Israel-Palestine’s most respected human rights organisations, who have for decades documented systemic abuses, is likely to add to pressure for action.
The reports detailed crimes including the killing of tens of thousands of women, children and elderly people, mass forced displacement and starvation, and the destruction of homes and civilian infrastructure that have deprived Palestinians of healthcare, education and other basic rights.
“What we see is a clear, intentional attack on civilians in order to destroy a group,” said Yuli Novak, the director of B’Tselem, calling for urgent action. “I think every human being has to ask himself: what do you do in the face of genocide?”
It is vital to recognise that a genocide is under way even without a ruling in the case before the international court of justice, she said. “Genocide is not just a legal crime. It’s a social and political phenomenon.”
Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) focuses in its report on a detailed chronological account of the assault on Gaza’s health system, with many details documented directly by the group’s own team, which worked regularly in Gaza before 7 October 2023.
Relatives of Palestinians who lost their lives during Israeli attacks mourn during a funeral ceremony at al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images The destruction of the healthcare system alone makes the war genocidal under article 2c of the genocide convention, which prohibits deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to destroy a group “in whole or part”, said its director, Guy Shalev.
“You don’t have to have all five articles of the genocide convention to be fulfilled in order for something to be genocide,” he said, although the report also details other genocidal aspects of Israel’s war.
Both B’Tselem and PHR said Israel’s western allies were enabling the genocidal campaign, and shared responsibility for suffering in Gaza. “It couldn’t happen without the support of the western world,” Novak said. “Any leader that is not doing whatever they can to stop it is part of this horror.”
The US and European countries have a legal responsibility to take stronger action than they have done so far, Shalev said. “Every tool in the toolbox should be used. This is not what we think, this is what the genocide convention calls for.”
Israel denies is it carrying out a genocide, and says the war in Gaza is one of self-defence after cross-border attacks by Hamas on 7 October 2023 killed 1,200 people, the majority civilians. More than 250 others were kidnapped and taken to Gaza, where 50 remain held hostage, with 20 of them believed to still be alive.
A key element to the crime of genocide, as defined by the international convention, is showing intent by a state to destroy a target group in whole or part.
Genocidal statements from politicians and military leaders, and a chronology of well-documented impacts on civilians after nearly two years of war are proof of that intent, even without a paper trail of orders from the top, both PHR and B’Tselem say.
The UK has sat on the fence too long. It is time that Keir Starmer and the UK government made a stand against these actions by the Israeli government.
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The West is complicit in Israels action by, until now, not saying anything. That is not a good look in the World. But is this just a symptom of what is going on in the World when the International Rules introduced to control wars, pogroms etc that happened last century are ALLOWED to be ignored by power groups/men. Israel is newsworthy!? What about Sudan?,
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