An independent commission appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council concluded that Israel was responsible for genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, alleging that Israeli authorities and security forces had carried out four of the five genocidal acts defined by the 1948 Genocide Convention. Israel categorically rejected the report as false and distorted.
The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel said it found reasonable grounds for allegations of killing members of a protected group, causing serious bodily or mental harm, deliberately creating conditions intended to destroy the group, and imposing measures intended to prevent births.
A genocide finding also requires evidence of specific intent to destroy a protected group, in whole or in part. Commission chair Navi Pillay said the panel examined both statements by Israeli leaders and the broader pattern of military and government conduct. The commission concluded that genocidal intent was the only reasonable inference from that material.
Its report cited the scale of deaths and injuries, siege conditions, restrictions on humanitarian aid and damage to health and education systems. The panel also examined alleged sexual and gender-based violence and the treatment of children. It attributed responsibility to the state and alleged that senior Israeli political and military figures had incited genocide.
The commission is a three-member expert body created by the Human Rights Council in 2021. Its members are appointed by the council but are not UN staff, and the finding does not constitute the official position of the United Nations as a whole. The report nevertheless represented the strongest conclusion on genocide issued by a UN-mandated investigative body at that stage of the war.
Israel’s foreign ministry dismissed the inquiry’s evidence and accused the commissioners of advancing a narrative favourable to Hamas. Israeli officials maintained that the military campaign was an act of self-defence after the Hamas-led attacks of October 7, 2023, and said their forces sought to defeat armed groups, recover hostages and limit civilian harm. An Israeli military official also called the report baseless.
The commission had previously found that Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups committed war crimes and other serious violations during the October 7 attacks. It had also accused Israeli forces of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
In its new findings, the panel urged Israel and other states to meet their obligations under international law to prevent and punish genocide. The competing positions left a stark divide: an independent UN-mandated inquiry said the legal threshold had been met, while Israel disputed both the evidence and the inference of intent.
