"This Is Genocide": Amnesty Accuses Israel On Its War In Gaza (image@UNRWA)

London, UK: Amnesty International came to the conclusion that Israel’s war on Gaza meets the legal threshold for genocide in a new report. The human rights group’s damning new report which was titled as “You Feel Like You Are Subhuman”: Israel’s Genocide Against Palestinians in Gaza, is the culmination of months of research by the organisation. The report said that by analysing all aspects of the issue, only one thing can be concluded, “Israel’s intent is the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza”.

The report included extensive witness interviews, analysis of “visual and digital evidence”, including satellite imagery, and statements made by senior Israeli government and military officials. The report said that the Israeli Occupation Force has committed at least three of the five acts banned by the 1948 Genocide Convention, including indiscriminate killings of civilians, causing serious bodily or mental harm, and “deliberately inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction”.

“Month after month, Israel has treated Palestinians in Gaza as a subhuman group unworthy of human rights and dignity, demonstrating its intent to physically destroy them…Our research reveals that, for months, Israel has persisted in committing genocidal acts, fully aware of the irreparable harm it was inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza”, said Agnes Callamard, secretary-general of Amnesty International.

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“It continued to do so in defiance of countless warnings about the catastrophic humanitarian situation and of legally binding decisions from the International Court of Justice [ICJ] ordering Israel to take immediate measures to enable the provision of humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza,” she said.

She also added that the damning findings of Amnesty must be served as a wake up call to the international community. “This is genocide. It must stop now”, she said.

Callamard further added that by taking into “account the pre-existing context of dispossession, apartheid and unlawful military occupation” in which IOF’s crimes against the Palestinians of Gaza have been committed, “we could find only one reasonable conclusion: Israel’s intent is the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza”.

Calling Amnesty “deplorable and fanatical”, Israel dismissed the report as “entirely false” and fabricated.

“The deplorable and fanatical organisation Amnesty International has once again produced a fabricated report that is entirely false and based on lies,” Israel’s foreign ministry said in a statement.

The Israeli military held on to their usual argument that it is lawfully targeting Hamas and other fighters who are located among the civilian population of Gaza, and that it is not deliberately targeting the Palestinian people. It does not stand up to scrutiny, Amnesty said.

“The presence of Hamas fighters near or within a densely populated area does not absolve Israel from its obligations to take all feasible precautions to spare civilians and avoid indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks,” the group said.

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“Regardless of whether Israel sees the destruction of Palestinians as instrumental to destroying Hamas or as an acceptable by-product of this goal, this view of Palestinians as disposable and not worthy of consideration is in itself evidence of genocidal intent,” it said.

The right group also said that it found “no evidence” that the reported diversion of humanitarian aid by armed groups in besieged enclave “could explain Israel’s extreme and deliberate restrictions on life-saving humanitarian aid” to the civilian population of the war-torn territory.

Israeli officials have consistently rejected allegations of committing genocide in Gaza, claiming they are acting in self-defence after Hamas’ October 7th attack on Tel Aviv. The Israeli officials slammed anyone that criticised their war is anti-Semitic.

The Amnesty report, however, also states that the crimes documented in Gaza were often “preceded by officials urging their implementation”. The report reviewed more than 100 statements by Israeli military and government officials. The report “dehumanised Palestinians, called for or justified genocidal acts or other crimes against them”.

Among the said statements, 22 were made by senior officials in charge of managing the war on Gaza and “appeared to call for, or justify, genocidal acts, providing direct evidence of genocidal intent”.

“This language was frequently replicated, including by Israeli soldiers on the ground” who made calls to “erase” Gaza and celebrated “the destruction of Palestinian homes, mosques, schools and universities”, Amnesty said. Callamard said the international community was also guilty of a “seismic, shameful failure” in Gaza by failing to “press Israel to end its atrocities”.

(With inputs from agencies)