3 days ago
Israel accused of genocide by human rights groups
Samantha Donovan: As global concern about famine and killings in Gaza grows, two Israeli human rights groups have taken the dramatic step of accusing the Netanyahu government of genocide in the enclave. The groups have released separate damning reports, alleging Israel has carried out coordinated and deliberate action to destroy the Palestinian society. The Israeli government has dismissed the accusations as baseless. Dijana Damjanovic prepared this report.
Dijana Damjanovic: Children in Gaza use their hands to collect flour off the ground and the scenes of starvation continue inside hospitals and makeshift homes.
Asma: I'm so sorry to tell you, the starving people took everything.
Dijana Damjanovic: One Gazan woman named Asma sent this voice note to the BBC.
Asma: I can't go among thousands of people fighting each other in order to get food. I can't fight. I have never. I don't know what to tell you. This is death. If only I could get out of here.
Dijana Damjanovic: In 24 hours, hospitals in Gaza have recorded another 14 deaths due to hunger and malnutrition. That takes the total number of deaths due to starvation to at least 147. Images of the suffering in Gaza sparked some concern in Israel. In this cafe in Jerusalem, this woman says she's shocked by what she's seen.
Israeli: It feels difficult to me as an Israeli, as a Jew, to watch those images and feel anything but tremendous compassion and horror, to be honest. I feel horror. I'm a mother. I watch women holding their babies and it makes me feel despair.
Dijana Damjanovic: In Israel, some activists are increasingly raising alarm about the actions of their government in Gaza. For the first time, human rights groups in Israel have called those actions genocide.
Guy Shalev: That is what we understand, the only conclusion that we can infer from 22 months of the Israeli attack on the Gazan people.
Dijana Damjanovic: Guy Shalev is the director of Physicians for Human Rights Israel, one of two groups who have issued separate damning reports highlighting indiscriminate bombing campaigns, the killing of health workers and the repeated forced displacement of civilians.
Guy Shalev: The attack on health care, on all life-sustaining systems is not an attack on Hamas or militants. It's clearly an attack on more than 2 million people living and their conditions of living, not allowing them to survive.
Dijana Damjanovic: The Israeli government has rejected both groups' findings. Government spokesperson David Mencer says their facts are wrong.
David Mencer: When it comes to this accusation of genocide, yes of course we have free speech here in Israel, but we strongly reject the accusation. It is baseless. There is no intent. Key for the charge of genocide, there is no intent. It simply doesn't make sense for a country to send in 1.9 million tonnes of aid, most of that being food, if there is an intent of genocide. It's completely incongruous.
Dijana Damjanovic: Dr Eyal Mayroz is a senior lecturer in Peace and Conflict Studies at Sydney University. He says Israelis who have previously been silent are starting to speak out.
Eyal Mayroz: More and more people that were shy of looking not only at our Israeli hostages but also at the terrible toll on the Gaza population are beginning to make noises.
Dijana Damjanovic: Dr Mayroz says around 70% of the Israeli public is now against the continuation of the fighting.
Eyal Mayroz: Yes, I think the Israelis are realising the toll on the Israeli society, on the death of their own soldiers, on the name and reputation of Israel that has become a pariah state. Unfortunately not enough in terms of how they view the toll on the Gaza population because the trauma and the craving or desire for revenge are still dominant in some parts of the Israeli society.
Dijana Damjanovic: At the United Nations headquarters in New York, political leaders from around the world are meeting for a three-day conference to discuss a path towards peace in the Palestinian territories through a two-state solution. The Palestinian Prime Minister, Mohammed Mustafa, is with the Palestinian Authority, which is rival to Hamas. He's in New York for the conference and says Palestinians have been waiting years for a genuine international intervention.
Mohammed Mustafa: What's happening in Gaza is its latest and most brutal manifestation and we are all more than ever compelled to act. This conference is also a message to the Israeli people that there is a path to peace and regional integration. It will be achieved through our independence, not our destruction.
Dijana Damjanovic: Another issue raising concern is the role of gangs in stealing and selling aid. News outlet the Associated Press has found flour is selling for $60 a kilogram. The UN's World Food Program says it will only be able to safely deliver aid to the most vulnerable once security is restored inside Gaza.
Samantha Donovan: Dijana Damjanovic reporting.
