A newly published United Nations investigative report has found that Israel has “perpetrated a concerted policy to destroy Gaza’s healthcare system” amid continuing strikes in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon, which Lebanon’s prime minister say suggest a ‘rejection’ of cease-fire.
The report also found that Palestinians detained in Israel, including minors, had been subjected to widespread abuse, physical and psychological violence, and sexual and gender-based violence, amounting to “war crimes”.
Navanethem Pillay, chairwoman of the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel, presented the commission’s latest investigative report to the UN General Assembly and news briefing on Thursday.
Pillay said this report to the General Assembly “examines attacks on medical facilities and personnel and the treatment of detainees and hostages” from Oct 7, 2023, to Aug 24, “and we conclude that Israeli authorities have implemented a concerted policy to destroy (the) Gaza healthcare system”.
In what it called “one of the most egregious cases”, the commission investigated the killing of 5-year-old Hind Rajab in January, along with her extended family, and the shelling of a Palestinian Red Crescent Society ambulance and the killing of two paramedics sent to rescue her.
The commission determined that the Israeli Army’s 162nd Division operated in the area (where Hind last was in the Gaza Strip) and was responsible for killing the family of seven, shelling the ambulance and killing the two paramedics inside. This “constitutes the war crimes of willful killing and an attack against civilian objects”.
According to Gaza’s health ministry in September, at least 1,000 people working in the Palestinian health sector were killed.
The report said attacks on medical facilities in Gaza, particularly those devoted to pediatric and neonatal care, have “led to incalculable suffering of child patients, including newborns”.
“Of all the killing, the killing that gets me most is the killing of kids,” said Chris Sidoti, member of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel, who was also at the news briefing on Thursday.
Sidoti said that as of last week, 13,319 children had been killed in Gaza, of whom 786 were under the age of 1. In addition, 165 children had been killed in the West Bank.
Widening strikes
In the latest developments on the battlefield, Israel bombarded the Gaza Strip and Beirut’s southern suburbs on Friday, a day after a renewed but so far fruitless push to end the fighting between Israel and Hamas and Hezbollah.
Lebanon’s prime minister accused Israel of rejecting a ceasefire after the Israeli military bombed the Hezbollah stronghold of south Beirut for the first time this week on Friday.
Israel’s “renewed expansion of the scope of its aggression” and “its repeated threats to the population to evacuate entire cities and villages” are “all indicators of Israel’s rejection of all efforts” to reach a cease-fire, Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said during his meeting with Aroldo Lazaro Saenz, chief of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon.
At least 10 strikes hit the southern suburbs before dawn after the Israeli military issued evacuation warnings, with AFPTV footage showing explosions and clouds of smoke.
“The raids left massive destruction in the targeted areas, as dozens of buildings were leveled to the ground, in addition to the outbreak of fires,” Lebanon’s National News Agency reported, adding that strikes also targeted Aley, southeast of the capital, and Bint Jbeil in the country’s south.
In the Gaza Strip, overnight, 47 Palestinians were killed and dozens more injured in Israeli strikes on the city of Deir Al-Balah, the Nuseirat camp and the town of Al-Zawayda in the central Gaza Strip, the Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.
Addressing graduating Israeli troops on Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that “agreements, documents, proposals are not the main point”.
“The main point is our ability and determination to enforce security, thwart attacks against us, and act against the arming of our enemies, as necessary and despite any pressure and constraints,” he said.
His office said he relayed a similar message to US envoys Amos Hochstein and Brett McGurk in Israel on Thursday.
On Friday, Israel’s Cabinet approved a 2025 wartime budget on Friday, detailing measures and tax increases to bolster military spending for ongoing operations in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.
The 607.4-billion-shekel ($162 billion) budget still faces three rounds of voting in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, with final approval anticipated by the end of January 2025. Certain tax hikes, however, are expected to be approved separately in advance.
In another development, Iran stressed on Thursday that it reserves the right to legitimate self-defense against Israel’s recent attack on certain targets in the country, the official news agency IRNA reported.
Agencies and Xinhua News Agency contributed to this story.
jan@chinadailyapac.com