UN commission says Israel is committing genocide in Gaza

In a 72-page report released on Tuesday, the commission, which was set up by the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), found that Israel has “committed four genocidal acts” in the enclave since October 7, 2023, when Hamas carried out deadly attacks on Israel and Israel launched its military campaign.CNN reported.

These acts include the killing of Palestinians in Gaza, causing Palestinians “serious bodily and mental harm,” “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part,” and “imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group,” according to the report.

Nearly 65,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since October 7, according to the Palestinian health ministry there. The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and fighters but has said that most of the casualties are women and children.

The Israeli government has maintained it is conducting the war in Gaza in self-defense and in accordance with international law, firmly denying accusations of genocide.

“Israel categorically rejects the distorted and false report and calls for the immediate abolition of the Commission of Inquiry,” the country’s foreign ministry said in a statement Tuesday. It described the inquiry as a “report that relies entirely on Hamas falsehoods” and accused the authors of being proxies for the militant group “whose horrific statements about Jews have been condemned worldwide.”

For years, Israel has accused the HRC, which commissioned the report, of having an anti-Israel bias.