DayofPal– Two of Israel’s leading human rights organizations, B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights – Israel (PHRI), have issued a joint report accusing the Israeli government of carrying out a campaign of genocide in the Gaza Strip.
The report details a systematic and deliberate policy aimed at the destruction of Palestinian life, society, and infrastructure in Gaza.
According to the organizations, the Israeli army has razed entire cities, targeted and destroyed essential infrastructure, including hospitals, schools, mosques, and cultural centers, and forcibly displaced over two million people.
The report includes extensive data, eyewitness testimonies, and photographic evidence documenting what the groups describe as coordinated state violence with the goal of expelling Palestinians from the territory and rendering it uninhabitable.
“This is not just war. This is the destruction of a people,” said Yuli Novak, Executive Director of B’Tselem. “What we are witnessing in Gaza is not collateral damage—it is a policy. And that policy amounts to genocide.”
Dr. Guy Shalev of PHRI emphasized the catastrophic humanitarian toll, saying that “Children are starving, entire families are buried under rubble, people are dying for lack of basic medical care, and clean water is scarce. These are not unfortunate consequences of war, they are tools of a campaign to make life in Gaza impossible.”
The report describes how Israeli airstrikes and ground operations have obliterated neighborhoods and refugee camps, with civilians frequently targeted in places they believed were safe.
The groups also documented attacks on displaced persons living in tents, widespread starvation due to the blockade on aid, and the decimation of Gaza’s medical system.
“This is the very definition of genocide,” the report states, citing the 1948 Genocide Convention, which defines genocide as acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group.
B’Tselem and PHRI called on the international community to act immediately to halt Israel’s military campaign. They accused world leaders of complicity through their silence and inaction and urged the use of all available legal and diplomatic tools to stop what they describe as crimes against humanity.
“It is our duty and responsibility to say the truth: genocide is happening, right here and right now,” B’Tselem wrote in a statement accompanying the release of the report.
Human rights organizations and international legal experts have repeatedly warned that the scale and scope of destruction in Gaza cannot be justified under international law.
The new report has intensified calls for international investigations and legal accountability at institutions like the International Criminal Court (ICC), which is already conducting a probe into alleged war crimes by both Israeli and Palestinian actors.
With the humanitarian crisis in Gaza worsening by the day, B’Tselem and PHRI say the time for diplomatic hesitation has long passed. “The world must act now,” Novak said. “Every day of silence costs more Palestinian lives.”
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