Latest news with #UNCommissionofInquiry
Middle East Eye
28-04-2025
- Politics
- Middle East Eye
Irish lawyer presents genocide risk case against Israel at ICJ
Some more key arguments from Blinne Ni Ghralaigh's ICJ presentation: Genocidal conduct allegations : UN Commission of Inquiry and human rights experts confirm Israel's actions meet genocide criteria Current proceedings focus specifically on Israel's legal obligations to provide humanitarian aid Palestinians face "real and imminent" genocide risk requiring urgent international action ICJ authority affirmed : Court maintains full jurisdiction to rule on Israel's international law obligations Must determine member states' duty to prevent potential genocide Israel's procedural objections lack legal merit Evidence suppression : Israel actively blocks UN investigative teams from accessing Gaza Systematic destruction and burial of potential war crime evidence Creates evidentiary obstacles for future accountability processes International obligations : All states bear responsibility to prevent violations of fundamental norms Prohibition of genocide requires concrete preventive actions Court must issue clear directives regarding humanitarian protections
Boston Globe
13-03-2025
- Politics
- Boston Globe
Israel-Hamas talks deadlocked as Trump envoy turns to Ukraine
In mid-January, the two sides agreed to a multiphase truce that would ultimately end Israel's military campaign against Hamas in Gaza and free the Israeli and foreign hostages held by Palestinian militants there. The cease-fire began with a six-week pause in the fighting, during which Hamas released more than 30 hostages in exchange for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. During the initial phase of the truce, Israel and Hamas were meant to negotiate a second phase that envisioned an end to the war, the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, and the release of all of the surviving hostages still held in the territory. Advertisement But the two sides remain far apart on how to move ahead. Israel is still vowing to destroy Hamas and is insisting on the demilitarization of Gaza. Hamas has largely refused to disband its armed battalions or surrender its Gaza leaders. The 42-day first phase elapsed in early March without a deal on the second phase, although the fragile truce has held up so far without it, at least for now. Critics in Israel have accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of dragging his feet on an agreement for fear it would loosen his grip on power. His far-right allies in the governing coalition are pressing to go on with the war against Hamas despite concerns from the families of the remaining hostages that their loved ones may not survive. Up to 24 living hostages are still being held in Gaza along with the remains of more than 30 others who were taken captive, according to the Israeli government. Hamas seized about 250 people in the Oct. 7, 2023, attack that killed about 1,200 people in Israel and ignited the devastating 15-month-war in Gaza. Advertisement This month, Israel imposed harsh restrictions on humanitarian aid entering Gaza, barring the entry of food and other much-needed goods. Israeli authorities later cut off electricity to a waste water treatment center in Gaza. That has prompted fears of a resurgent humanitarian crisis in Gaza. The widespread wartime deprivation had eased somewhat since the cease-fire, and trucks of aid had begun to enter freely. Qatar, which has been brokering the truce alongside Egypt and the United States, has criticized the Israeli decision to close crossings to aid as a violation of the cease-fire agreement. Also on Thursday, a United Nations commission accused Israel of targeting hospitals and other health facilities in the Gaza Strip that provide reproductive services, including an in vitro fertilization clinic where thousands of embryos were destroyed, in what it called an effort to prevent Palestinian births. The report by the UN Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, called that and other actions that cause harm to women and girls 'genocidal acts' and accused Israel of punishing Palestinians collectively for the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack. Israel's mission to the United Nations in Geneva immediately rejected the report, saying in a statement that the commission was engaged in 'a shameless attempt to incriminate' the Israeli military 'to advance its predetermined and biased political agenda.' Netanyahu accused the UN Human Rights Council of attacking the country with 'false accusations.' Advertisement The commission said its report drew on earlier investigations it had carried out since the Hamas attack on southern Israel and on some 25 interviews conducted over recent months with medical experts, as well as victims and witnesses of the violence in Gaza. Some of the testimony was aired over two days of hearings in Geneva this week. The report marked the first time a UN committee has found that Israel has committed genocidal acts under the Rome Statute, which created the International Criminal Court, and under the international treaty that criminalizes genocide. The Israeli military's bombardment and invasion decimated Gaza's health care system in a way that aid groups and international bodies have called 'systematic.' The report said this included damage to clinics and other facilities that provide maternity services affecting more than 500,000 women and girls of reproductive age in Gaza. This article originally appeared in
The National
13-03-2025
- Health
- The National
Israeli attacks on Gaza reproductive health centres 'genocidal'
Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza Israel carried out 'genocidal' acts in Gaza with the systematic destruction of sexual and reproductive healthcare centres, a UN investigation concluded on Thursday. Forces 'simultaneously imposed a siege and prevented humanitarian assistance, including the provision of necessary medication and equipment to ensure safe pregnancies, deliveries and post-partum and neonatal care', the UN Commission of Inquiry said in a report. 'Israel has increasingly employed sexual, reproductive and other forms of gender-based violence against Palestinians as part of a broader effort to undermine their right to self-determination and carried out genocidal acts through the systematic destruction of sexual and reproductive healthcare facilities,' it said. The commission said such acts violate women's and girls' reproductive rights, as well as their right to life, health, human dignity, physical and mental integrity, freedom from torture and degrading treatment. The report came after the commission conducted public hearings in Geneva on Tuesday and Wednesday, hearing from victims and witnesses of sexual violence. The commission said it found that Israeli authorities have partly destroyed the reproductive capacity of Palestinians in Gaza by attacking sexual and reproductive health care. It said that this amounts to 'two categories of genocidal acts in the Rome Statute and the Genocide Convention, including deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinians and imposing measures intended to prevent births'. 'The targeting of reproductive healthcare facilities, including through direct attacks on maternity wards and Gaza's main in-vitro fertility clinic, combined with the use of starvation as a method of war, has impacted all aspects of reproduction,' said the commission's chair Navi Pillay. 'These violations have not only caused severe immediate physical and mental harm and suffering to women and girls, but irreversible long-term effects on the mental health and reproductive and fertility prospects of Palestinians as a group.' The three-person Independent International Commission of Inquiry was established by the UN Human Rights Council in May 2021 to investigate alleged international law violations in Israel and the Palestinian territories. Israel's mission in Geneva said it 'categorically rejects the unfounded allegations'. It accused the commission of advancing a 'predetermined and biased political agenda … in a shameless attempt to incriminate the Israel Defence Forces'. The UN Population Fund estimates that at least 50,000 pregnant women were caught up in the Gaza conflict, cut off from maternity care and delivery services. In September, it reported that more than 17,000 pregnant women were on the brink of famine, with nearly 11,000 experiencing severe food shortages. In February, doctors told the fund's representative Nestor Owomuhangi of the harrowing details of women facing miscarriages as a result of the long and arduous journeys on foot, travelling on broken roads in the wind and rain. About 500,000 returned to Gaza's north after a ceasefire deal took effect in January, many to homes that had been destroyed.
Ammon
13-03-2025
- Health
- Ammon
UN inquiry accuses Israel of committing acts of genocide in Gaza
Ammon News - An investigation released Thursday by a special UN commission confirmed that Israel committed acts of genocide in the Gaza Strip through the systematic destruction of reproductive health care facilities. The UN Commission of Inquiry concluded that the occupying authorities partially destroyed the reproductive capacity of Palestinians in Gaza as a group through the systematic destruction of the reproductive health sector, amounting to two categories of genocide. The UN Genocide Convention defines this crime as any acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, or religious group. The investigation found that Israel engaged in at least two of the five acts the UN Convention defines as genocide. It indicated that Israel was "deliberately inflicting conditions of life on the group (Palestinians) calculated to bring about its physical destruction and imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group. "These violations not only caused severe direct physical and psychological harm to women and girls, but also had long-term, irreversible consequences for the psychological and reproductive health and fertility prospects of Palestinians as a whole," said Navi Pillay, chair of the committee, in a statement. The investigation found that Israel carried out systematic attacks targeting Gaza's health infrastructure, including hospitals and clinics providing reproductive health services. It affirmed that this led to the near-total destruction of the health sector's ability to care for pregnant women and newborns. It emphasized that "severe restrictions on essential medical supplies and medicines exacerbated the deteriorating reproductive health of women and girls in Gaza, directly contributing to high maternal and newborn mortality rates." WAFA
Times of Oman
13-03-2025
- Health
- Times of Oman
UN investigation confirms Israel committed genocidal acts in Gaza
Geneva: A UN investigation into the Gaza Strip has confirmed that the Israeli occupation army committed acts of "genocide" through the systematic destruction of reproductive healthcare facilities. The UN Commission of Inquiry, in accordance with the UN Genocide Convention, found that Israeli occupation authorities have destroyed in part the reproductive capacity of Palestinians in Gaza as a group through the systematic destruction of reproductive healthcare, amounting to two categories of genocidal acts. The investigation found the occupation involved in two of the five acts defined by the UN Convention as genocide, noting that the Israeli entity was deliberately inflicting conditions of life on the group (the Palestinians) calculated to bring about its physical destruction and imposing measures aimed at preventing births within the group. In a statement, Chair of the Commission Navi Pillay said: "These violations have not only caused severe immediate physical and mental harm and suffering to women and girls, but irreversible long-term effects on the mental health and reproductive and fertility prospects of Palestinians as a group." The United Nations' genocide convention defines that crime as acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group. The three-person Independent International Commission of Inquiry was established by the UN Human Rights Council in May 2021 to investigate alleged international law violations in Israel and the Palestinian territories.
