UNITED NATIONS, Oct 28 (APP):Israel has committed war crimes and crimes against humanity against Palestinians and continues to commit genocide in Gaza, independent UN human rights investigators said in a landmark report.
The crimes against humanity include extermination, persecution, torture, rape and other forms of sexual violence across the Occupied Palestinian Territory, according to the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel. Its latest report, released in Geneva, has been presented to the UN General Assembly.
The commission was established by the UN Human Rights Council in 2021. It is made up of independent experts who are not UN staff and are not paid for their work.
The intentional killing and injuring of Palestinian civilians and destruction of homes in the West Bank combined with Israel’s persistent denial of responsibility form part of a broader strategy to exterminate and displace Palestinians and impose conditions of life that are unliveable,” said Srinivasan Muralidhar, the commission’s chair.
He said Israel’s expansion of territorial control in Gaza “continues to result in the killing and harming of Palestinian civilians who approach or cross the “yellow line” – the line Israeli forces withdrew to under the October 2025 ceasefire agreement.
The investigators also found that in Gaza, “Israeli authorities and forces continue to commit genocidal acts even after the so-called ceasefire agreement, with the intent to destroy the Palestinian people, in whole or in part.”
The panel documented crimes against humanity in the West Bank, including extermination, torture, and sexual violence.
Between the October 2025 cease-fire agreement and late September 2026, Israeli airstrikes and gunfire killed 1,431 Palestinians in Gaza (including 300 children) and 1,080 Palestinians in the West Bank.
Israel rejected the findings. Its permanent mission in Geneva claimed the report was “yet another manifestation of its misinformation campaign to demonize the State of Israel and portray its very existence as criminal”.
Source: APP (Associated Press of Pakistan)
