SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
");background-position:center;background-size:19px 19px;background-repeat:no-repeat;background-color:#222;padding:0;width:var(--form-elem-height);height:var(--form-elem-height);font-size:0;}:is(.js-newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter_bar.newsletter-wrapper) .widget__body:has(.response:not(:empty)) :is(.widget__headline, .widget__subheadline, #mc_embed_signup .mc-field-group, #mc_embed_signup input[type="submit"]){display:none;}:is(.grey_newsblock .newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter-wrapper) #mce-responses:has(.response:not(:empty)){grid-row:1 / -1;grid-column:1 / -1;}.newsletter-wrapper .widget__body > .snark-line:has(.response:not(:empty)){grid-column:1 / -1;}:is(.grey_newsblock .newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter-wrapper) :is(.newsletter-campaign:has(.response:not(:empty)), .newsletter-and-social:has(.response:not(:empty))){width:100%;}.newsletter-wrapper .newsletter_bar_col{display:flex;flex-wrap:wrap;justify-content:center;align-items:center;gap:8px 20px;margin:0 auto;}.newsletter-wrapper .newsletter_bar_col .text-element{display:flex;color:var(--shares-color);margin:0 !important;font-weight:400 !important;font-size:16px !important;}.newsletter-wrapper .newsletter_bar_col .whitebar_social{display:flex;gap:12px;width:auto;}.newsletter-wrapper .newsletter_bar_col a{margin:0;background-color:#0000;padding:0;width:32px;height:32px;}.newsletter-wrapper .social_icon:after{display:none;}.newsletter-wrapper .widget article:before, .newsletter-wrapper .widget article:after{display:none;}#sFollow_Block_0_0_3_0_0_0_1{margin:0;}#sSHARED_-_Social_Desktop_0_0_13_0_0_1.row-wrapper{margin:40px auto;}#sBoost_post_0_0_1_0_0_0_1_0{background-color:#000;color:#fff;}.boost-post{--article-direction:column;--min-height:none;--height:auto;--padding:24px;--titles-width:100%;--image-fit:cover;--image-pos:right;--photo-caption-size:12px;--photo-caption-space:20px;--headline-size:23px;--headline-space:18px;--subheadline-size:13px;--text-size:12px;--oswald-font:"Oswald", Impact, "Franklin Gothic Bold", sans-serif;--cta-position:center;overflow:hidden;margin-bottom:0;--lora-font:"Lora", sans-serif !important;}.boost-post:not(:empty):has(.boost-post-article:not(:empty)){min-height:var(--min-height);}.boost-post *{box-sizing:border-box;float:none;}.boost-post .posts-custom .posts-wrapper:after{display:none !important;}.boost-post article:before, .boost-post article:after{display:none !important;}.boost-post article .row:before, .boost-post article .row:after{display:none !important;}.boost-post article .row .col:before, .boost-post article .row .col:after{display:none !important;}.boost-post .widget__body:before, .boost-post .widget__body:after{display:none !important;}.boost-post .photo-caption:after{content:"";width:100%;height:1px;background-color:#fff;}.boost-post .body:before, .boost-post .body:after{display:none !important;}.boost-post .body :before, .boost-post .body :after{display:none !important;}.boost-post__bottom{--article-direction:row;--titles-width:350px;--min-height:346px;--height:315px;--padding:24px 86px 24px 24px;--image-fit:contain;--image-pos:right;--headline-size:36px;--subheadline-size:15px;--text-size:12px;--cta-position:left;}.boost-post__sidebar:not(:empty):has(.boost-post-article:not(:empty)){margin-bottom:10px;}.boost-post__in-content:not(:empty):has(.boost-post-article:not(:empty)){margin-bottom:40px;}.boost-post__bottom:not(:empty):has(.boost-post-article:not(:empty)){margin-bottom:20px;}@media (min-width: 1024px){#sSHARED_-_Social_Desktop_0_0_13_0_0_1_1{padding-left:40px;}}.donation_banner{position:relative;background:#000;}.donation_banner .posts-custom *, .donation_banner .posts-custom :after, .donation_banner .posts-custom :before{margin:0;}.donation_banner .posts-custom .widget{position:absolute;inset:0;}.donation_banner__wrapper{position:relative;z-index:2;pointer-events:none;}.donation_banner .donate_btn{position:relative;z-index:2;}#sSHARED_-_Support_Block_0_0_16_0_0_3_1_0{color:#fff;}#sSHARED_-_Support_Block_0_0_16_0_0_3_1_1{font-weight:normal;}.sticky-sidebar{margin:auto;}@media (min-width: 980px){.main:has(.sticky-sidebar){overflow:visible;}}@media (min-width: 980px){.row:has(.sticky-sidebar){display:flex;overflow:visible;}}@media (min-width: 980px){.sticky-sidebar{position:-webkit-sticky;position:sticky;top:100px;transition:top .3s ease-in-out, position .3s ease-in-out;}}#sElement_Post_Layout_Press_Release__0_0_2_0_0_11{margin:100px 0;}.grey_newsblock .newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter-wrapper.sidebar{background:linear-gradient(91deg, #005dc7 28%, #1d63b2 65%, #0353ae 85%);}.black_newsletter{background:linear-gradient(91deg, #005dc7 28%, #1d63b2 65%, #0353ae 85%);}.black_newsletter .newsletter_bar.newsletter-wrapper{background:none;}
To donate by check, phone, or other method, see our More Ways to Give page.
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
The Project On Government Oversight (POGO) is submitting to Congress
a number of actions it should take that would fix many of the systemic
problems that have long plagued the federal government and that spurred
POGO's creation 29 years ago. POGO submitted a similar list to Congress
in 2007, and is pleased to report that Congress made progress
addressing several of the issues we raised. For example, Congress has
passed legislation to create a database that addresses federal
contractor misconduct and established the Senate Ad Hoc Subcommittee on
Contracting Oversight and the Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq
and Afghanistan that are trying to fix the broken federal contracting
system.
But
Congress has not adequately addressed many of the important issues we
outlined three years ago. Despite the tireless efforts of a bipartisan
group of Members, Congress has not passed the Whistleblower Protection
Enhancement Act. Nor has Congress reoriented its defense
spending priorities to the troops and national security mission rather
than defense contractors, as evidenced by the numerous earmarks in the
most recent defense appropriations bill, including $2.25 billion for
the C-17 Globemaster airlifters the Department of Defense doesn't want.
And because of such emergent problems as the financial crisis and the
H1NI scare, additional issues have arisen that demand Congress's
immediate attention.
1. Pass Whistleblower Protection Law
Frequently the first people to discover corruption and misconduct
are federal employees. By seeking to fix the problems they uncover,
these employees play a vital role in making sure the government is
accountable and effective. Unfortunately, whistleblowers are almost
always reprimanded, fired, and/or harassed instead of feted, even if
they have not "gone public" and even after their allegations are proven
to be true. The federal Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989 is grossly
inadequate in protecting federal workers and government contractors who
expose waste, fraud, and abuse from retaliation by their supervisors.
Until federal employees can expose wrongdoing without fear of
retaliation, they will lack the incentive to report wrongdoing.
Congress should immediately pass the Whistleblower Protection
Enhancement Act of 2009 (H.R. 1507), the bipartisan bill sponsored by
Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) and Rep. Todd Platts (R-PA) that creates
strong, comprehensive federal whistleblower protections giving all
federal employees and contractors a functional administrative process
and access to trials.
2. Create an Independent Audit Agency
Auditors are on the front lines of rooting out wasteful spending in
federal agencies. Experience has shown that increased funding for
auditors ultimately results in greater savings for taxpayers, making it
essential for these offices to have the funding, independence,
staffing, and other resources they need to do their job. Unfortunately,
investigations into the General Services Administration (GSA), Minerals
Management Service (MMS) at the Department of the Interior, and the
Defense Contract Audit Agency (DCAA) have found that auditors lack the
independence from their agencies they need to effectively do their
jobs. As a result, auditors' findings have been ignored or altered, and
in some cases have resulted in retaliation or demotion.
Congress should consider establishing an independent federal
contract audit agency. Until then, we hope that Congress provides
rigorous oversight to ensure that agency heads allow auditors to
operate independently, and warn them that officials who interfere with
auditors' independence will be held accountable.
3. Improve Economic Recovery Efforts
Congress has committed $700 billion to the Treasury Department's
Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) in response to the subprime
mortgage crisis and the ensuing freeze in the nation's credit markets.
Additional entities such as the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit
Insurance Corporation (FDIC) are also lending and guaranteeing
trillions of dollars in public funds to encourage lending and to assist
banks in dealing with mortgage-backed loans and securities. To ensure
the success of these commitments, Congress must take additional action:
4. Put the Teeth Back in Financial Regulatory Agencies
In recent months there has been widespread bipartisan agreement
about the need to strengthen the nation's financial regulatory agencies
in order to prevent future economic crises. In particular, the
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Financial Industry
Regulatory Authority (FINRA) have been failing in their missions to
protect investors from securities fraud.
Congress should reevaluate the government's reliance on FINRA and
other financial self-regulatory organizations (SROs) as frontline
overseers of financial products. FINRA's claim that self-regulation
saves taxpayers money is belied by the fact that taxpayers still have
to pay for the SEC to conduct regular oversight of SROs. FINRA's recent
failure to detect the Bernie Madoff and Allen Stanford Ponzi schemes
should call into serious question whether self-regulators are deserving
of any new regulatory authority.
Congress should also instruct the SEC to fully implement the
hundreds of unimplemented recommendations made by the Inspector General
(IG) over the past two years, which would help address many of the
long-standing systemic problems that have hindered the agency's
effectiveness as a regulator.
5. Uncover the Hidden Costs of Privatizing Government
Under previous administrations, vast swaths of the federal
government have been shifted into the private sector in an effort to
reduce the size of the federal government. From 2000 to 2008, the
amount of federal money spent on contracting increased by over 150
percent-the majority of which is money spent on service contracts. The
great promise that privatizing government would save money by engaging
a more "efficient" private sector hasn't materialized. In fact,
overzealous outsourcing created numerous concerns about whether the
federal government can adequately control its spending and fulfill its
mission. Contractors are now protecting embassies in war zones,
participating in covert intelligence operations, and creating budgets,
public policy, and government programs that are integral to government
missions.
Reversing the trend of outsourcing of government jobs became a hot
issue in 2009. Congress should closely examine the dramatic increase in
the government's use of service contracts and the resultant weakening
of agencies' ability to accomplish their missions and the taxpayers'
ability to hold these agencies accountable. To better track the work of
the federal government, Congress should require all federal agencies to
account for the number of contractor employees working for the
government using a process similar to FAIR Act inventories of
government employees filed by federal agencies.
6. Ensure Taxpayers Get Their Fair Share of Revenues from Royalty Collection
Congress needs to pass legislation that ends the Royalty-In-Kind
(RIK) program. Royalties on oil and gas from our nation's public lands
is one of the largest sources of government revenue. Evidence from the
Government Accountability Office (GAO) and the Interior Inspector
General (IG) suggests that the RIK program is an "honor system" that
likely results in significant royalty underpayments by the oil and gas
industry. In order to ensure that taxpayers are getting their fair
share of income from the country's natural resources, Congress must
pass legislation to make Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's
administrative decision to end the RIK program permanent.
7. Increase Government Accountability and Transparency
The press and the public may play the most important oversight role
in holding the government and its contractors accountable. However, the
tools the press and public need-such as databases being created to
track information about past instances of misconduct by federal
government contractors and to track the revolving door between the
Pentagon and industry-cannot be accessed by the public. Congress should
pass legislation to make both of these databases publicly accessible.
USAspending.gov should become the one-stop shop for government
officials and the public for all spending information. This includes
actual copies of each contract, delivery or task order, modification,
amendment, other transaction agreement, grant, and lease. Additionally,
proposals, solicitations, award decisions and justifications (including
all documents related to contracts awarded with less than full and open
competition and single-bid contract awards), audits, performance and
responsibility data, and other related government reports should be
incorporated into USAspending.gov.
Congress should ensure that basic information about how the federal
government functions be made public, such as a list of how to contact
employees concerning specific matters at each agency. Each agency
should post a calendar for meetings of top-level officials. Similarly,
visitor logs from executive branch policy meetings with lobbyists and
outside groups should be made publicly available at least every three
months, taking into account the need for exemptions for privacy issues.
The public should have online access to a list of all FOIA requests,
which includes links to any documents released as a result of a
request. Similarly, unclassified versions of all IG reports should
become publicly available.
Congress should also ensure that all communications between agencies
and Congress are publicly available, such as responses to inquiries and
reports mandated by Congress.
In the face of the Obama Administration's Open Government Directive,
which mandates increased public access to agency information, Congress
should similarly open its doors. One important step would be for
Congress to make conference reports and marked-up bills publicly
available at least 72 hours prior to the vote.
Additionally, Congress should mark up and pass Senate Resolution
118, which would allow Senators to officially provide public internet
access to all non-classified Congressional Research Service (CRS)
products, some of the best research conducted by the federal government.
8. End Wasteful Defense Spending
The Pentagon has begun to demonstrate an increased willingness to
balance priorities around realistic threats and instill discipline in
weapons acquisitions. Unfortunately, Congress continues to fill the
Defense Appropriations bill with pet projects and earmarks for programs
the Department of Defense (DoD) neither wants nor needs, such as the
C-17. These earmarks divert money away from more urgent national
security priorities. Congress should make sure that Defense
Appropriations bills reflect spending based solely upon national
security needs instead of parochial interests.
Congress must
also make sure that the Pentagon truly is committed to responsible
acquisitions. The Pentagon often issues waivers to key program
milestones and requirements because Congress rarely, if ever, holds
them accountable for failing to follow their own rules. Congress should
use its oversight and appropriations authority to make sure the DoD
does not allow weapons system programs to ramp up production until
after the weapon technology is proven through independent Operational
Test and Evaluation.
9. Make Government Watchdog Organizations More Accountable
Inspectors
General require an extraordinary degree of independence to effectively
perform their duties. But they also need to be held accountable for
misconduct and inadequate work performance. In some cases such
accountability will necessitate that an IG be removed from his or her
post. As demonstrated by recent events, the process of removing an IG
can create a considerable chilling effect on the entire Inspector
General community when the justification for that removal is not fully
transparent.
To ensure that the entire IG community has trust that presidential
decisions to remove IGs are motivated by legitimate causes rather than
retaliation or politics, Congress should amend the Inspector General
Reform Act of 2008 to include a provision that would allow the
President to remove an Inspector General only for cause. The provision
should also require that the President inform Congress in writing of
the full justification for the decision.
10. Drag the Nuclear Complex Out of the Cold War, and Ensure Oversight of Lab Contractors
The people who are running the nuclear weapons complex at the
Department of Energy (DOE) operate as though the Cold War is not over.
Congress should prioritize efforts to secure vulnerable fissile
material around the world and in the U.S., instead of letting the
Administration pour billions of dollars into expanding nuclear
bomb-making materials, weapons, and facilities spread across the
country. For example, the Administration is continuing to store
approximately 250 metric tons of highly-enriched uranium (HEU) in World
War II-era buildings, creating a security risk and requiring billions
of dollars for the construction of new facilities and millions of
dollars for security.
Congress should push DOE to declare as excess and downblend the
growing stocks of HEU into low-enriched uranium which, unlike HEU,
poses no security risk. Furthermore, LEU can be sold as fuel for
nuclear power reactors, generating at least $26 billion in new revenues
for the government. In addition, Congress should look into why DOE has
been dragging its feet in dismantling the thousands of warheads that
have already been declared excess, and are in queue at both Pantex and
the Y-12 National Security complex. Inexplicably, the 2011 budget for
this effort has been cut in half. This funding shortfall both increases
security vulnerabilities and creates unnecessary costs that could
otherwise have been converted to revenue.
Additionally, Congress should conduct oversight of DOE's shift
towards a policy of self-policing for the contractors who manage the
eight facilities that comprise the nuclear weapons complex.
11. Disclose Conflicts of Interest in Scientific Research
One issue that POGO included in its 2007 Baker's Dozen list to
Congress has only partly been addressed. A few years ago, press reports
revealed that a number of researchers at the National Institutes of
Health's (NIH) central facility in Bethesda also served as paid
consultants to drug and biotech companies while they were working for
the federal government. The serious conflicts of interest these
situations caused were resolved by simply abolishing all paid
consulting and other types of payments to NIH's intramural scientists
by private companies. However, many researchers at the nation's medical
schools and universities who receive NIH grants and contracts continue
to consult for private companies.
Congress should ensure that the NIH require its grantees to publicly
disclose their paid arrangements with pharmaceutical companies, as well
as their ownership of relevant stock and stock options, as a condition
of having their medical research funded by the government.
Furthermore, the public would also benefit from greater transparency
in the Department of Health and Human Service's programs, particularly
for vaccine production in a pandemic. The online posting of all
government contracts for vaccine production would be a good place to
start. We urge Congress to press for easy public accessibility to this
information.
12. And of Course: Fix the Broken Federal Contracting System
Since 1981, POGO has exposed numerous problems that are the result
of so-called procurement or acquisition "reforms," including cozy
negotiations, inadequate competition, lack of accountability, little
transparency, and risky contracting vehicles that are prone to waste,
fraud, and abuse. While there have been some fixes to the federal
government's contracting systems, there are many more that must be
implemented.
None of these issues are partisan. In fact, the solution to many of
these problems involve strengthening the watchdogs in the government, a
goal that should be shared by both sides of the aisle.
These issues also provide an opportunity for
Members of Congress and the President to work together to sign into law
good government bills that prevent waste, fraud, and abuse. Passing
those laws and actually conducting real oversight would be a
substantive response to taxpayers' concerns that the government does
not spend their money sensibly. Swift implementation of comprehensive
government oversight will reap benefits for taxpayers long past the
election cycle.
The Project On Government Oversight (POGO) is an independent nonprofit that investigates and exposes corruption and other misconduct in order to achieve a more effective, accountable, open and honest federal government.
One critic said the lawsuit was "a full frontal attack on free speech" that also "almost reads like a parody."
US President Donald Trump on Monday evening filed a defamation lawsuit against The New York Times that was quickly ridiculed by legal experts for entirely lacking merit.
In the lawsuit, Trump accused the Times of conspiring to prevent his victory in the 2024 election through a campaign of "election interference" that included, among other things, its editorial board's decision to endorse former Vice President Kamala Harris.
"It came as no surprise when, shortly before the election, the newspaper published, on the front page, highlighted in a location never seen before, its deranged endorsement of Kamala Harris with the hyperbolic opening line '[i]t is hard to imagine a candidate more unworthy to serve as president of the United States than Donald Trump,'" the lawsuit states.
Pointing to what it claimed was defamatory material published by the Times, the lawsuit singled out "a malicious, defamatory, and disparaging book written by two of its reporters and three false, malicious, defamatory, and disparaging articles, all carefully crafted by Defendants, with actual malice, calculated to inflict maximum damage upon President Trump."
The book in question is "Lucky Loser," written by Pulitzer Prize-winning Times reporters Russ Buettner and Susanne Craig, which did a deep examination of the president's finances and contrasted it with what it described as his false claims of unprecedented success in business.
The three articles cited by the lawsuit include one that quotes Trump's own former chief of staff, John Kelly, warning that he would rule "like a dictator" in his second term; a news analysis piece that described Trump as facing a well documented "lifetime of scandals"; and an article by Buettner and Craig that is an adapted excerpt from their book.
"The book and articles are part of a decades-long pattern by The New York Times of intentional and malicious defamation against President Trump," the complaint stated. "Defendants maliciously published the book and the articles knowing that these publications were filled with repugnant distortions and fabrications about President Trump."
The lawsuit then demanded the Times pay $15 billion in compensatory damages.
The Times issued a brief response to the lawsuit in which it defended its reporting and labeled Trump's defamation allegations as baseless.
"This lawsuit has no merit," said the paper. "It lacks any legitimate legal claims and instead is an attempt to stifle and discourage independent reporting. The New York Times will not be deterred by intimidation tactics. We will continue to pursue the facts without fear or favor and stand up for journalists' First Amendment right to ask questions on behalf of the American people."
Some experts who examined the lawsuit were quick to side with the Times in this dispute, and many of them flat-out ridiculed Trump for filing the suit in the first place.
Holger Hestermeyer, chair of international and EU law at the Vienna School of International Studies, wrote on Bluesky that the lawsuit was "a full frontal attack on free speech" that also "almost reads like a parody."
In addition to lampooning the suit's specific defamation claims, Hestermeyer also mocked the suit for being loaded with hyperbolic statements, including one that said "The Apprentice" reality TV series "represented the cultural magnitude of President Trump's singular brilliance, which captured the zeitgeist of our time."
Attorney George Conway delivered an even pithier dismissal of the suit.
"Is it possible for a legal pleading to be psychotic?" he asked rhetorically. "I think we have an answer."
Chris Geidner, a journalist who publishes the "Law Dork" newsletter, similarly expressed astonishment at the contents of Trump's lawsuit.
"I honestly thought there was a chance that I'd fallen asleep and was dreaming the most absurd, childlike, ego-maniac lawsuit when I tried to read this Trump defamation complaint against the Times, Penguin Random House, and individual journalists," he wrote. "Like, seriously. What are we even doing here, folks?"
Bloomberg columnist Tim O'Brien, who was unsuccessfully sued by Trump for defamation over his 2005 book "TrumpNation," predicted that Trump's lawsuit against the Times would similarly end poorly for him.
"Trump says he plans to sue the Times for $15 billion," O'Brien wrote on Bluesky. "Been there, done that. He sued me for less—$5 billion. Discovery will be invasive and grueling—and involve Trump’s finances, family history and political machinations. And that’s just for starters."
"While the defendant was clearly expressing an animus toward UHC, and the health care industry generally," said the judge, "it does not follow that his goal was to ‘intimidate and coerce a civilian population.'"
A judge in New York City on Tuesday threw out a pair of charges against Luigi Mangione, the man accused of killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December of last year while he walked down a street in Manhattan.
Judge Gregory Carro did not throw out the entirety of the murder charges against Mangione, but said two of the most serious charges—murder in the first degree as a crime of terrorism and a second-degree charge related to terrorism—were not proven by the prosecution's case presented to a grand jury.
The judge indicated that just because Mangione may have been motivated by ideological opposition to the for-profit industry, that does not de facto make it terrorism under New York statute.
"While the defendant was clearly expressing an animus toward UHC, and the health care industry generally, it does not follow that his goal was to ‘intimidate and coerce a civilian population,’ and indeed, there was no evidence presented of such a goal,” Carro wrote in his decision.
In addition to state charges in New York, Mangione is also facing a federal murder case over the killing of Thompson, with the federal prosecutors seeking the death penalty. The accused has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
“To do nothing is not neutrality,” said the head of the commission. “It is complicity.”
A commission of independent experts at the United Nations on Tuesday said Western countries must stop providing military aid to Israel as it released an extensive report confirming that the Israeli government is carrying out a genocide in Gaza—joining international and Israeli human rights groups and numerous genocide experts that have come to the same conclusion in recent months.
"The commission concludes on reasonable grounds that the Israeli authorities and Israeli security forces have committed and are continuing to commit the following actus reus of genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip," said the UN Commission of Inquiry, citing four of the five "genocidal acts" defined under the 1948 Genocide Convention.
In its bombardment of Gaza, the three-member panel found, Israel has killed members of a group, caused serious bodily and mental harm, deliberately inflicted conditions to destroy the group, and acted to prevent births.
The only genocidal act classified under the Genocide Convention that the commission did not find evidence of in Gaza was the forcible transfer of children from one group to another.
Under the Convention, committing just one or more genocidal act constitutes a genocide.
The report cited an Israeli attack on Gaza's largest fertility clinic in December 2023, which reportedly destroyed 4,000 embryos and 1,000 sperm samples and fertilized eggs, as evidence that Israel has acted to prevent Palestinian births in Gaza. More than 18,000 Palestinian children have also been killed in Israel's assault.
Navi Pillay, the commission chair and former UN high commissioner for human rights, emphasized the key finding that Israeli officials have demonstrated their "intent" to commit genocide.
"It is clear that there is an intent to destroy the Palestinians in Gaza through acts that meet the criteria set forth in the Genocide Convention," said Pillay in a statement.
The commission report cited comments by former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in October 2023, when he said Israel would impose "a complete siege" on Gaza with "no electricity, no water, no food, no fuel" entering the exclave in retaliation for the Hamas-led attack on October 7, 2023.
"We are fighting human animals, and we act accordingly," said Gallant at the time. The near-total blockade on humanitarian aid that resulted from his order has killed more than 400 people including at least 145 children so far, with many dying in recent months.
Gallant's comments were just one example of Israeli officials' intent to hold Gaza's entire population of 2.2 million Palestinians accountable for the actions of Hamas in October 2023. Israeli President Isaac Herzog explicitly said that the entire group was "responsible" and said there were no "civilians who were not aware and not involved" in the attack on southern Israel.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also called on Israeli soldiers to "remember what Amalek did to you," a reference to the Amalekites in the Hebrew Bible, whom God commanded the Israelites to exterminate.
"The responsibility for these atrocity crimes lies with Israeli authorities at the highest echelons who have orchestrated a genocidal campaign for almost two years now with the specific intent to destroy the Palestinian group in Gaza,” Pillay said in a statement.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have killed more than 65,000 Palestinians since beginning the assault on Gaza—attacking hospitals, schools, and refugee camps while claiming that Hamas operates out of civilian infrastructure. Doctors have reported operating on many children who have gunshot wounds to the head and chest—suggesting they were deliberately targeted. Israeli soldiers have also described being ordered to shoot civilians.
Pillay said in an interview with Zeteo that, under the Genocide Convention, countries are legally obligated to step in and take action to stop Israel from continuing the genocide.
"It's not a choice," said Pillay. "It's an obligation that states have under the Genocide Convention, and they are all parties to that."
In an op-ed at The New York Times, Pillay wrote: "Every state has an obligation to prevent genocide wherever it occurs. That obligation requires action: halting the transfer of weapons and military support used in genocidal acts, ensuring unimpeded humanitarian assistance, stopping the mass displacement and destruction, and using all available diplomatic and legal means to stop the killing."
"To do nothing is not neutrality," she said. "It is complicity."
The report was released as the IDF launched a ground offensive to take control of Gaza City, killing at least 68 Palestinians in the city on Tuesday.
Forty percent of the city's residents have been forced to flee south to a coastal encampment in al-Mawasi, which has repeatedly been struck by Israeli forces despite being declared a "safe zone." Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are living in the tent encampment without access to sanitation, safe water, or basic services.
"They have to run out of their homes in the middle of the night with nothing other than the clothes that they’re wearing, seeking shelter towards the coast of Gaza City," reported Al Jazeera's Hani Mahmoud in a dispatch from Gaza City on Tuesday. "Fighter jets are hovering at a very dangerously low level in the past hour or two. The sky remains filled with the constant hum of drones, leaving residents unable to rest."
"What we are witnessing is a systematic, unfolding terror inflicted on this population," said Mahmoud. "They live in constant fear that their building will be next and they will lose everything and find themselves on the road again to displacement."
The offensive in Gaza City comes weeks after Netanyahu confirmed that his government is planning a full takeover of the Gaza Strip, defying international law.
The UN commission's findings on Tuesday could be used by prosecutors at the International Criminal Court, which has a warrant out for the arrests of Netanyahu and Gallant and has accused them of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and the International Court of Justice, which is hearing a genocide case brought by South Africa against Israel.