Last Updated on September 16, 2025 2:09 pm by INDIAN AWAAZ
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The United Nations Commission of inquiry has found that Israel has committed acts of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. The report claims there are “reasonable grounds to conclude” that four of the five acts defined as genocide under international law have been carried out since the conflict began in 2023.
These acts are cited as killing members of a group, causing serious bodily and mental harm, deliberately inflicting conditions calculated to destroy the group, and preventing births. The commission’s findings are based on what it describes as statements made by Israeli leaders and the patterns of conduct by Israeli forces, which it presents as evidence of genocidal intent.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry rejected the report as “distorted and false,” accusing the UN panel of echoing Hamas propaganda. A spokesperson claimed the panel ignored evidence and asserted that Hamas, not Israel, committed acts of genocide during the October 7, 2023, attack that killed 1,200 people and saw 251 taken hostage.
In response to the Hamas-led attack, the Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza. Since then, the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza reports that at least 64,905 people have been killed in Israeli attacks. Additionally, UN-backed food security experts have declared a famine in Gaza City.
The UN Human Rights Council established the commission to investigate alleged violations of international humanitarian and human rights law. The three-member panel is chaired by Navi Pillay, a former UN human rights chief and president of the international tribunal on Rwanda’s genocide.
At a press conference in Geneva, the panel’s members – who are not UN staff but instead appointed by the Human Rights Council’s 47 Member States – explained that their investigations into the war in Gaza beginning with Hamas-led terror attacks in Israel on 7 October 2023 had led to the conclusion that Israeli authorities and security forces “committed four of the five genocidal acts defined by the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide”.
These acts are:
- killing,
- causing serious bodily or mental harm,
- deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the destruction of the Palestinians, and
- imposing measures intended to prevent births.
Ms. Pillay maintained that responsibility for the atrocity crimes “lies with Israeli authorities at the highest echelons”, amid “explicit statements” denigrating Palestinians by Israeli civilian and military authorities.
The Commission also analysed conduct of Israeli authorities and the Israeli security forces in Gaza, “including imposing starvation and inhumane conditions of life for Palestinians in Gaza…genocidal intent was the only reasonable inference that could be concluded from the nature of their operations”, the panel said.
Methodical examination
The Commission’s assertion follows its review of Israeli military operations in Gaza, “including killing and seriously harming unprecedented numbers of Palestinians” and the imposition of a “total siege, including blocking humanitarian aid leading to starvation”, it said.
According to the UN aid coordination wing, OCHA, nearly one million people remain in Gaza City, famine has been confirmed there, and residents face daily bombardment and “compromised access to means of survival after the Israeli military placed the entire city under a displacement order”.
For its latest report, the panel also examined what it called the “systematic destruction” of healthcare and education in Gaza and “systematic” acts of sexual and gender-based violence against Palestinians.
Justice call
In addition, the Commission of Inquiry reviewed the alleged “direct targeting” of children and Israel’s “disregarding [of] the orders of the International Court of Justice, which issued an order in March 2024 that Israel should take ‘all necessary and effective measures to ensure…the unhindered provision at scale by all concerned of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance to Palestinians throughout Gaza’”.
“The international community cannot stay silent on the genocidal campaign launched by Israel against the Palestinian people in Gaza,” said Ms. Pillay.
“When clear signs and evidence of genocide emerge, the absence of action to stop it amounts to complicity,” she added.
“All States are under a legal obligation to use all means that are reasonably available to them to stop the genocide in Gaza.”
Qatari dimension
In a related development on Tuesday, the Human Rights Council shuffled its schedule to make way for an urgent debate on last week’s Israeli strike on Hamas’s political leadership in Qatar.
The strike targeted a neighbourhood of the Qatari capital, Doha, reportedly killing six people including five members of Hamas and prompting widespread condemnation including from the Security Council and Secretary-General.
In a statement, António Guterres spoke out against what he called a “flagrant violation” of Qatari sovereignty and territorial integrity.