A United Nations commission investigating the war in Gaza said Tuesday that Israel was committing genocide against Palestinians, the panel’s most sweeping findings yet about the Israeli government’s conduct in the conflict.
In earlier reports, the commission found that Israel had committed war crimes and crimes against humanity in its war with Hamas militants, but stopped short of declaring it genocide. On Tuesday, it said that Israel’s actions in Gaza constituted genocide under the 1948 Genocide Convention.
“The responsibility for these atrocity crimes lies with Israeli authorities at the highest echelons who have orchestrated a genocidal campaign for almost two years now with the specific intent to destroy the Palestinian group in Gaza,” the panel’s leader, Navi Pillay, a South African high court judge and former U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, said in a statement.
Israel has repeatedly rejected allegations of genocide from scholars and human rights groups, saying the target of its military campaign is the militant group Hamas. It did so again on Tuesday.
Oren Marmorstein, a spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry, denounced the report in a statement as “fake.”
“In stark contrast to the lies in the report, Hamas is the party that attempted genocide in Israel,” Mr. Marmorstein said.
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The post Israel Is Committing Genocide in Gaza, U.N. Inquiry Says appeared first on New York Times.
