A United Nations (UN) inquiry has concluded that Israel's war on Gaza constitutes a genocide, marking a landmark moment after nearly two years of Israel's assault on the Palestinians.
Navi Pillay, chair of the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, disclosed the findings on Tuesday, holding Israeli President Isaac Herzog, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and former defence minister Yoav Gallant responsible, among others, reports Al Jazeera.
"We've identified the Israeli president, the prime minister, and the former minister of defence based on their statements and the orders that they've given. Because they are agents of the state, under international law, the state itself is held accountable," he said.
According to the UN report, the statements made by the Israeli officials and forces are the "circumstantial evidence" that proves that they acted with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, and repeated attacks on civilian infrastructure contributed to the finding that Israeli forces "intentionally killed" civilians.
The report further mentioned that there are reasonable grounds to conclude that four of the five genocidal acts defined under international law have been carried out since the start of the war with Hamas in 2023: killing members of a group, causing them serious bodily and mental harm, deliberately inflicting conditions calculated to destroy the group, and preventing births, reports BBC.
Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs slammed the report's findings, denouncing the report as "fake" and accusing its authors of acting as "Hamas proxies." In a statement on X (formerly Twitter), saying, "The report relies entirely on Hamas falsehoods, laundered and repeated by others. Israel categorically rejects this distorted and false report and calls for the immediate abolition of this commission of inquiry."
Daniel Meron, Israel's permanent representative to the UN, echoed the same, and called the findings "scandalous," "fake," and a "libellous rant", according to the Al Jazeera report.
'Intentionally killed'
The UN inquiry report also found that the use of "wide impact munitions" and repeated attacks on civilian infrastructure contributed to the finding that Israeli forces "intentionally killed" civilians.
The UN report concludes, "The Israeli authorities have committed the crime against humanity of extermination in the Gaza Strip by killing Palestinian civilians. While the number of victims is not relevant for an act to constitute an act of genocide, the commission notes that the number of victims may be taken into consideration to establish genocidal intent."
On 7 October 2023, Israel's war in Gaza began following the Hamas-led attack in southern Israel, which killed 1,139 people and more than 200 were taken hostage, of whom 48 remain in Gaza.
As of Monday, the Gaza Health Ministry reported at least 64,871 Palestinians killed and 164,610 wounded due to Israeli attacks.
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