Genocide Emergency: Gaza and the West Bank
December 30, 2024
By the Gaza Team: Grace Condon, Frankie Condon, Grace Harris, and Gregory Stanton
A genocide of the Palestinian people by Israel is underway in Gaza. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister General Yoav Gallant have demonstrated their intent to destroy a substantial portion of the civilian population of Gaza. Israel is committing war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide in Gaza. It is also committing crimes against humanity against Palestinians in the West Bank.
On October 7, 2023, Hamas massacred over 1200 civilians in Israel and kidnapped over 250 hostages. The hostages have been tortured, beaten, or murdered. 62 remain hostage in Gaza. 117 hostages have been rescued or released, and 72 died or were murdered by Hamas.
Hamas openly declares its intent to destroy the nation of Israel and the Jewish people. Hamas is a genocidal terrorist organization that must be defeated. Israel’s response to the Hamas assault on its citizens is a military response to what Israelis see as an existential threat reminiscent of the Holocaust.
Defeating genocidal terrorists does not justify committing genocide against Palestinian civilians.
Israeli leaders have led a dehumanizing campaign of anti-Palestinian propaganda that denies any distinction between Hamas combatants and Palestinian civilians. Netanyahu and Gallant claim that Hamas hides under hospitals and among Palestinian civilians, using them as human shields. It is an attempt to justify the bombing and starvation of Palestinian civilians. It is an excuse for war crimes.
Israel’s rules of engagement permit killing twenty civilians for each Hamas fighter killed, the highest “collateral damage” percentage in any modern war. These rules of engagement give Israeli Air Force and IDF troops a license to commit war crimes on the pretext of defeating Hamas.
Ignoring demands of Israelis to prioritize freeing Israeli hostages, Netanyahu portrays opposition to Israeli bombing in Gaza as a pro-Hamas campaign to destroy Israel itself. Netanyahu’s claims that the UN, ICC, and protests against Israel’s war crimes are “antisemitic,” conflate opposition to Israel with antisemitism.
Genocide
The UN estimates that 45,000 Palestinians and 1500 Israelis have died since October 7, 2024. Over 14,500 of the dead were children. To deny these statistics, Israel uses two classic tactics of denial : attack the truth tellers and minimize the statistics. Israel claims Hamas and UN figures are unreliable exaggerations.
Israeli bombs intentionally target schools, homes, hospitals, and designated humanitarian zones. Israel uses 2000-pound bombs that level entire apartment buildings and throw shrapnel that kills and maims people 360 meters away. Of 163,778 buildings in Gaza, 52,564 have been destroyed and 18,913 severely damaged. Two-thirds of the dwellings in Gaza are uninhabitable.
2 million Palestinians in Gaza are on the brink of starvation. Israel has blocked over eighty percent of food aid from entering Gaza since the start of the war. Israel claims it has permitted enough food aid, but it is stolen by Hamas. This LIE is propaganda to convince Israelis that Israel is obeying the laws of war. It is not. The truth is that Israel has allowed under twenty percent of necessary food to be delivered to Gaza.
Starvation and killing members of an ethnic or national group violate Genocide Convention Article 2(a) and Article 2(c) “Killing members of the group” and “Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”
War crimes
All hospitals in Gaza have been bombed by Israel on the pretext that Hamas uses them as bases.
Northern Gaza has collapsed, with food aid blocked and thousands of residents facing famine. The UN reports that hospitals lack water, fuel, staff, and medical supplies.
Directing attacks against hospitals is a war crime that violates ICC statute Article 8(2)(b)(ix).
The Israeli Defense Forces may be intentionally targeting media and aid groups. Since 2023, at least 341 aid workers have been killed by Israeli bombing or shelling. Israel has refused to lift restrictions on desperately needed goods and services entering Gaza and has failed to provide more aid crossings. Access by aid workers is increasingly difficult.
Israel only allows Palestinian journalists to report from Gaza. No foreign journalists have access except on IDF escorted tours. 55 prominent journalists have protested this ban. This policy allows Israel to claim that reports of its war crimes and crimes against humanity come from biased sources, a tactic of denial.
“Intentionally directing attacks against personnel, installations, material, units, or vehicles involved in a humanitarian or peacekeeping mission” is a war crime under ICC statute Article 8(2)(b)(iii).
Crimes against humanity
1.9 million Palestinians, most of the population of Gaza, have been forcibly displaced. Palestinians are ordered to evacuate from one “safe area” to another, then ordered to move again. Many were ordered to move south to escape bombing in the north. After the Israeli invasion of Rafah, where many internally-displaced people took refuge, access to humanitarian aid was cut off, and the displaced fled north again.
The recent looting of 100 food trucks by Palestinian gangs, which Israeli propaganda highlights, is the exception, not the rule. In one incident, now known as the “flour massacre,” 118 people were killed and over 700 were wounded when IDF soldiers shot at a crowd of people waiting to receive food aid in Gaza City.
Under international law, as an occupying power, Israel has a legal obligation to provide basic needs to Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank. Not only has Israel failed to provide for basic needs, but Israel actively blocks aid into Gaza.
Starvation is the crime against humanity of Extermination under Article 7 (1)(b) of the ICC statute: “the intentional infliction of conditions of life, inter alia the deprivation of access to food and medicine, calculated to bring about the destruction of part of a population.”
Israeli Settlements in the West Bank
According to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, 700,000 Israeli settlers currently live in settlements in the West Bank. Israel subsidizes expansion of these settlements.
Violent conflicts between Israeli settlers and Palestinians are common. From October 2023 to August 2024, 660 Palestinians were killed in the West Bank. Most settlers identify with Israeli political parties that support Netanyahu. Attacks by settlers against Palestinians reached a high in 2022. They were extensively documented. Under one percent these attacks since 2017 have been prosecuted by Israeli authorities.
In August 2024, The IDF conducted a major operation to target “terrorist infrastructure” in the West Bank. It included invasions of three Palestinian refugee camps. It resulted in the deaths of 16 Palestinians, and substantial damage to Palestinian homes, farms, and public services.
Palestinian civil rights have been nullified in both Gaza and the occupied West Bank. Israel has rounded up and imprisoned Palestinian boys and men without any charges or access to legal aid.
Israeli settlements in the West Bank are war crimes under Article 8 (2)(b)(viii) of the ICC Statute, which prohibits: “the transfer, directly or indirectly, by the Occupying Power of parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.”
The UN, the International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court
The UN Security Council by a vote of 14 – 0 (Russia abstaining) adopted Resolution 2735 on June 10, 2024 calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of all hostages. A UNSC resolution in December 2024 was vetoed by the US because it failed to demand that Hamas release all hostages. A UN General Assembly resolution passed December 11, 2024 by 158 to 9 called for a ceasefire and release of all hostages.
On 29 December 2023 South Africa brought a case for violation of the Genocide Convention against Israel in the International Court of Justice. On 26 January 2024, the ICJ issued provisional measures calling on Israel to prevent acts of genocide against Palestinians and do more to help civilians, but it did not order a ceasefire as requested by South Africa.
Netanyahu and Gallant are now charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court, along with Hamas’s Mohammed Deif, and the deceased Yahya Sinwar and Ismail Haniyeh.
Hamas has demanded total withdrawal of Israeli forces as a condition for any hostage release. But on 12 December 2024 Hamas agreed to a temporary IDF presence in Gaza. Hamas admits that 33 hostages have been killed, and others have “gone missing.”
Prime Minister Netanyahu states that there will be no end to the war until Hamas is totally destroyed.
Such demands for total surrender make ending wars impossible without a total victory by one side.
This stalemate can be broken only when Hamas releases all hostages and Israel withdraws from Gaza. Meanwhile scores of Palestinian civilians are being killed daily by constant bombing while thousands are dying of starvation. Any hope for peace between Israel and Palestinians depends on ending this war.
Genocide Watch recommends:
an immediate, permanent ceasefire with cessation of all bombing, missile attacks and shelling;
release of all hostages held by Hamas, with surrender and disarmament of all Hamas fighters;
lifting of the Israeli blockade of Gaza with free flow of food, medicine, water, and electricity to Gaza;
deployment of thousands of United Nations peacekeeping troops in Gaza;
Arab and Palestinian recognition of the legitimacy of the State of Israel;
Israeli, Palestinian, Arab, UN, US, EU, and NATO support for a diplomatic resolution of the conflict.
We add the following recommendations:
To be paid for by Israel, Egypt, US, EU, UN, NATO, the World Bank, Arab League, Organization of Islamic Cooperation, neighboring Arab states, and international businesses:
Massive resupply of food and medicine, hospitals, schools, water, and electricity in Gaza;
Massive financing to rebuild Gaza so its residents can return to their homes and businesses;
Elections for a democratic government in Gaza -- excluding Hamas -- supervised by the UN.
THE ONLY WAY TO STOP WAR CRIMES IS TO STOP WAR