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'Shameful Assault on Human Rights': Trump Sanctions Palestinian Orgs That Called for UN to Investigate Israeli War Crimes
The former executive director of Human Rights Watch said Trump's "answer to Israeli atrocities is to censor reporting on them rather than to stop them."
Sep 05, 2025
Human rights groups around the world are reacting with horror after the Trump administration sanctioned three leading Palestinian human rights monitors who sought to bring evidence of Israeli war crimes before the International Criminal Court (ICC).
The three groups—Al-Haq in the West Bank and the Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) and Al Mezan Center for Human Rights—are considered among the leading human rights monitors in the region.
In an announcement on Thursday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the sanctions were imposed on these groups because they "directly engaged in efforts by the international criminal court to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute Israeli nationals, without Israel's consent."
In November 2023, the three groups petitioned the ICC to issue arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other top Israeli officials—including President Isaac Herzog and then-Defense Minister Yoav Gallant—for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.
They cited Israel's widely documented use of indiscriminate airstrikes against densely populated civilian areas and its near-total blockade of humanitarian aid entering the Gaza Strip—acts that, over the next nearly two years, have made Gaza virtually uninhabitable and brought it to the point of mass starvation.
The ICC would eventually issue warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant in November 2024, which was met with threats of sanctions by the administration of then-President Joe Biden, who called the warrants "outrageous." Despite Netanyahu and his officials having visited multiple ICC member countries, which are obliged to carry out the court's warrants, no arrests have been made.
Since retaking office, US President Donald Trump has followed through on threats against the ICC, placing sanctions on the court as a body and threatening to sanction anyone who assisted in its prosecution or investigation into Israel or other US allies.
In August, as much of the world had begun to isolate Israel as it moved forward with an explicit ethnic cleansing campaign, the administration also sanctioned four of the ICC's judges, including the one who authorized the warrants against Israel's leaders.
Now, just days after the world's leading group of genocide scholars voted overwhelmingly for a resolution stating that Israel's actions meet the legal definition for the crime, the Trump administration is attempting to cripple the groups that are documenting those actions.
Former BBC radio journalist Sangita Myska noted that "this type of action is normally reserved for terrorists and drug traffickers," adding that it will "severely damage the organizations' ability to advocate for Palestinians."
It is not the first time the Trump administration has sanctioned a Palestinian human rights group. In June, it sanctioned Adameer, a Ramallah-based group focused on the rights of prisoners in Israel's brutal detention system.
At the time, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said the sanctions "would make day-to-day operations harder and harder, including for their employees, assisted communities, and service suppliers. This will also negatively affect their engagement with their partner organizations, locally and internationally, including US-based groups."
Kenneth Roth, the former executive director of Human Rights Watch, said that the administration was acting "as if the answer to Israeli atrocities is to censor reporting on them rather than to stop them."
In a joint statement issued Thursday, Al Haq, Al Mezan, and the PCHR described it as "a coward[ly], immoral, illegal, and undemocratic act."
"As the world moves to impose sanctions and arms embargoes on Israel," the groups said, "its ally, the US, is working to destroy Palestinian institutions working tirelessly for accountability for the victims of Israel's mass atrocity crimes."
(Video: Al Jazeera)
"They want to silence Palestinian voices," said PCHR's Basel Al-Sourani in an interview with Al Jazeera. "They want to silence anyone who stands up to Israeli crimes, anyone who tries to advocate for Palestinian rights, anyone who tries to bring perpetrators to justice."
Other human rights groups around the world have joined them in condemning the decision.
Erika Guevara-Rosas, a director at Amnesty International, described the sanctions against these groups as a "shameful assault on human rights and the global pursuit of justice."
"These organizations carry out vital and courageous work, meticulously documenting human rights violations under the most horrifying conditions," Guevara-Rosas continued. "They have steadfastly continued to do so in the face of war, genocide, and the oppressive reality of Israel's apartheid regime, as well as malicious attempts to discredit their findings and cripple their funding with spurious terrorism accusations. They are the voice of Palestinian victims, amplifying stories of human suffering and injustice that would otherwise remain unheard."
The Israeli human rights group B'Tselem, which in July joined the growing international consensus that Israel is perpetrating a genocide, said it stands "in full solidarity with our colleagues and partners working for human rights between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea."
The group described the US sanctions as "yet another move aimed at erasing fundamental norms of protecting human beings designed to enable Israel to continue harming Palestinians without restraint."
Al-Sourani said that the sanctions were "not a surprise, given the US administration being a partner in Israel's genocide."
Trump has endorsed Israel's stated goal to permanently displace most Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, with reporting earlier this week detailing plans to replace the destroyed enclave with a sprawling real-estate development.
Some of the developers of the plan are Israelis involved in the administration of the US-Israeli-run Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), where over a thousand Palestinian aid seekers have been killed, often in deliberate massacres by Israeli troops, in recent months.
Despite the new dangers they will impose, Al-Sourani said, "these sanctions, they will not deter us."
"We will continue documenting the Israeli crimes that are happening on the ground," Al-Sourani said. "We will continue our engagement with the ICC. We will continue advocating for justice, for the rule of law, and for the protection of the ICC judges and the prosecutors."
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'A Pattern of Genocide': Report Details Israel's Systematic Destruction of Gaza Health System
The Palestinian group Al-Haq outlined the "targeting of hospitals and health centers, the denial of adequate medical provisions into and around the Gaza Strip, and the abduction, torture, and killing of medical personnel."
Jan 23, 2025
Less than a week into a fragile cease-fire between Hamas and Israel in the Gaza Strip, the Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq on Thursday released a report detailing how "Israel has systematically targeted and attacked the healthcare system to the point of its collapse in a campaign of genocide."
The new report—titled The Systematic Destruction of Gaza's Healthcare System: A Pattern of Genocide—builds on previous publications, including from United Nations entities, and testimonies from medical professionals who have worked in Gaza since Israel launched its U.S.-backed assault in retaliation for the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack.
"The Israeli occupying forces' (IOF) targeting of hospitals and health centers, the denial of adequate medical provisions into and around the Gaza Strip, and the abduction, torture, and killing of medical personnel is evidence of Israel's genocidal intent to: (i) inflict conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip, and (ii) impose measures intended to prevent Palestinian births in the Gaza Strip," states the 116-page report.
"The concerted policy to destroy the healthcare system in Gaza is directly and causally linked to statements made by Israeli officials," the document continues, offering various examples and highlighting how it wasn't just hospitals—Israel also attacked "civilian residences, schools, shelters, mosques, churches, and other protected areas under international humanitarian law."
The report argues that "Israel's systematic campaign against Gaza's healthcare infrastructure as a whole is exemplified by the targeted destruction of al-Shifa Hospital," which is the largest hospital in the occupied Palestinian territory and "older than Israel." The document also addresses Israel's attacks on Adwan, al-Amal, al-Aqsa, al-Awda, Indonesian, Kamal, and Nasser hospitals.
Along with offering a summary of facts and legal analysis of "Israel's systematic attacks on Gaza's healthcare system as acts of genocide," war crimes, and violations of international humanitarian law, the publication features recommendations for other countries and blocs, international tribunals, U.N. experts, companies, and healthcare professionals.
Al-Haq called on the international community to "name and condemn Israel's ongoing genocide," impose an arms embargo, support the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, and demand the release of Palestinian political prisoners and those who have been arbitrarily detained by Israel, including healthcare workers.
The report was published as the death toll in Gaza continues to grow, as displaced residents of the Palestinian enclave return to the remnants of their homes and communities decimated by more than 15 months of Israeli bombings and raids.
The Gaza Ministry of Health said Thursday that the official death toll rose to 47,283, after 120 bodies "were recovered from under the rubble" in the past 24 hours, and 111,472 people have been injured. Global experts warn the true death toll is likely far higher.
Israel faces a genocide case led by South Africa at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over its military assault and restrictions on the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza. The International Criminal Court (ICC) has also issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leader Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri.
Al-Haq's report notes both the ICC warrants and the ICJ case, urging other governments to formally support the latter effort.
Throughout the 15-month assault on Gaza, Israeli settlers and troops also targeted Palestinians in the illegally occupied West Bank—where Al-Haq is based. However, since the cease-fire took effect Sunday, attacks in the West Bank have sparked fresh alarm.
In addition to pushing for the investigation of Israel's assault on Gaza, the new report urges a U.N. commission to probe "genocidal acts in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, including but not limited to killings of Palestinians, causing serious bodily or mental harm to Palestinians, and deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of the Palestinian people."
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Rights Group Finds Israel Uses Gaza 'Safe Zones' to 'Hide a Genocide'
The analysis was published a day before Israeli forces bombed yet another "safe zone," killing at least 12 Palestinians, including children.
Jan 02, 2025
A report published on Wednesday details how Israel forcibly expels Palestinians in the Gaza Strip in order to facilitate—and hide—genocidal attacks in evacuated areas, while forcing refugees into alleged humanitarian "safe zones" that are "intentionally designed to ensure the destruction of all life sheltering there."
The Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq published the report, titled How to Hide a Genocide, which examines "the role of evacuation orders and safe zones in Israel's genocidal campaign in Gaza."
According to the report:
Since the very first week of its genocide, Israel has methodically cleared vast stretches of the Gaza Strip of its inhabitants through its unlawful issuance of evacuation orders. Israel presents these evacuation orders to the public as proof of its efforts to minimize civilian casualties and to support its alleged compliance with fundamental principles of international humanitarian law. However, they achieve the direct opposite. Over 90% of Gaza's population... has been forcibly displaced from their homes and temporary shelters, the majority of them multiple times, to alleged safe zones.
Contrary to their label, these zones are anything but safe. With insufficient space, shelter, sanitation facilities, food, or water sources, and medical care, these safe zones are intentionally designed to ensure the destruction of all life sheltering there. What's more, the safe zones—despite their unilateral establishment by Israel—are routinely targeted by Israeli occupying forces (IOF) by air, land, and sea. Crowded together with nowhere to flee, Palestinians in Gaza are either killed by Israeli strikes, severely physically and mentally injured by the IOF's physical and psychological warfare, or subject to a slow death as a result of starvation, dehydration, a complete lack of crucial medical care, or the rampant spread of infectious diseases in the densely populated, unsanitary zones.
Al-Haq said: "As shown throughout the report, by applying humanitarian terms to its practice of forcibly transferring Palestinians, without any legal basis and in a manner that breaches international law, and labeling areas as safe zones despite being constantly attacked and lacking in all essentials for survival, Israel argues that it is acting in accordance with its legal obligations when in fact it is providing further evidence of its genocidal intent as it uses these measures to commit and contribute to the genocidal acts of killing, causing serious bodily and mental harm, and creation of conditions calculated to destroy Palestinians in Gaza."
The Al-Haq report was published shortly after Sila Mahmoud Al-Faseeh, a 3-week-old baby girl,
died from hypothermia in the al-Mawasi safe zone in southern Gaza. She is one of at least eight people—seven of them infants or children—who have reportedly frozen to death in Gaza in recent weeks.
The report was also published a day before Israeli forces bombed a tent encampment in al-Mawasi, killing at least 12 Palestinians including three children and wounding at least 15 others.
It was one of numerous Israeli strikes on the al-Mawasi safe zone, which have killed or wounded at least hundreds of Palestinians. In the deadliest of these, at least 90 Palestinians including many women and children were killed—some of them burned alive in their tents—and hundreds of others were injured when eight 2,000-pound bombs, at least one of which was supplied by the United States, were dropped on the humanitarian zone on July 13, 2024 in order to assassinate Hamas leader Mohammed Deif. Israeli forces then attacked and killed rescue workers arriving at the site of the strike.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinkencalled the death toll from the strike "unacceptably high." However, just weeks later, the Biden administration approved approximately $20 billion worth of new U.S. weapons for Israel.
The International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands is currently weighing whether Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
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NGOs Urge UK Labour Government to End 'Complicity in Israeli Crimes' in Gaza
"We are asking this government for leadership and to take a just decision, for the sake of Palestinians in Gaza who are living through 'hell on Earth,'" said six rights groups.
Jul 12, 2024
A week after the British Labour Party won control of the United Kingdom's government, six rights organizations called on Prime Minister Keir Starmer to bring the country "back from the brink" and restore its "credibility on the international stage" by ending its military support for Israel.
"The Labour Party now has the chance to start restoring some credibility by ensuring the U.K. abides by international law, thereby extricating the U.K. from the indelible stain of complicity in Israeli crimes that deeply shock the conscience of humanity," wrote the British Global Legal Action Network (GLAN) and Al-Haq, based in Palestine.
The groups wrote the letter with the support of the International Center of Justice for Palestinians, War on Want, the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT), and the Palestine Solidarity Campaign.
Addressing Starmer along with newly appointed Foreign Secretary David Lammy and Secretary of State for Business and Trade Jonathan Reynolds, the groups reminded the prime minister that following his election, he promised Britons that the "sunlight of hope was shining once again" after 14 years of Conservative rule, and called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to say there is a "clear and urgent need for a cease-fire."
"Calls for a cease-fire are evidently not enough, in particular when the U.K. is arming one party to the conflict," wrote the groups, pointing out that earlier this week Palestinians in northern Gaza reported that recent bombing there has "matched October 2023 in its intensity—with levels of destruction not witnessed since World War II, nearly all civilian infrastructure is completely destroyed."
"We are asking this government for leadership and to take a just decision, for the sake of Palestinians in Gaza who are living through 'hell on Earth,'" they wrote. "The world should have put an end to their unimaginable suffering a long time ago. Labour must suspend, revoke, and refuse all arms licenses for Israel now."
The U.K. licensed about £859,381 ($1.09 million) of weapons to Israel in the last three months of 2023, as the Israel Defense Forces relentlessly attacked Gaza and blocked nearly all humanitarian aid, leading to what 10 independent United Nations experts this week said is now famine across the enclave.
"The new Labour government's calls for a cease-fire are meaningless while it continues to arm Israel. British weapons have killed too many Palestinians," said GLAN lawyer Charlotte Andrews-Briscoe. "This government knows that the only lawful and moral decision is to stop arming Israel. Britons have voted for change: This government must deliver that change."
On social media, GLAN amplified a video posted by Starmer on Sunday in which he pledged to "restore politics as a force for good."
"We are calling on Keir Starmer to put these words into action," said the legal group.
When the war on Gaza's population of 2.3 million people ends, said the groups, Starmer's government must expect that there will be "a reckoning in which Israel will be found to have committed mass atrocities."
But the organizations called on Starmer—who, months before he called on Netanyahu to agree to a cease-fire, said Israel had "the right" to withhold power and water from Gaza—to see that ending military support for Israel "is not only the legal obligation of the U.K., it is a moral obligation."
"Schoolchildren will learn about this period for years to come, just as we have all learned about past genocides and wondered how they could be allowed to happen," reads the letter. "Will they read about a new Labour government that acted with respect for the sanctity of all human life?"
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Federal Court Hears Appeal in Case Accusing Biden of Complicity in Gaza Genocide
"Genocide can never be a legitimate foreign policy choice," argued one plaintiffs' attorney.
Jun 10, 2024
Following the dismissal earlier this year of a federal lawsuit accusing senior Biden administration officials of failing to prevent Israel's U.S.-backed genocide in Gaza, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco on Monday began hearing an expedited appeal by Palestinian plaintiffs in the case.
Arguing that U.S. leaders "have a legal duty to prevent, and not further," genocide, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) first filed a lawsuit last November in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in Oakland on behalf of the rights groups Defense for Children International-Palestine (DCI-P) and al-Haq, as well as a group of individual Palestinians in Gaza and the United States.
"Genocide can never be a legitimate foreign policy choice," CCR senior staff attorney Katie Gallagher argued during Monday's proceedings.
The suit—which names President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin as defendants—seeks to force the U.S. administration to stop "providing further arms, money, and diplomatic support to Israel" as it wages a war of annihilation in which more than 132,000 Palestinians have been killed, maimed, or left missing; nearly 90% of Gaza's population has been forcibly displaced; and at least hundreds of thousands of people are starving.
Palestinian American writer Laila al-Haddad, a plaintiff in the case, lost her aunt and three of her cousins to a November Israeli airstrike on a United Nations school in the Jabalia refugee camp that killed more than 30 people.
"I promised my surviving family members in Gaza that I would do everything in my power to advocate on their behalf," al-Haddad wrote in an article published Monday by The Nation.
"Although I knew the case would be an uphill battle, I testified to make a record of Israel's horrific slaughter of my family, the displacement and dispossession and starvation of the surviving members, the deliberate destruction of my hometown and everything that sustains life there, and ethnic cleansing of my people," she continued.
"As a Palestinian, I struggle to balance the disgust and impotence I feel knowing that my tax dollars are being used to kill my family members in Gaza with an urgency to do everything in my power to demand an end to this administration's complicity in genocide," al-Haddad added.
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White ruled on January 31 that the case fell "outside the court's limited jurisdiction" and rejected the suit on technical grounds—even as he wrote that "the current treatment of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip by the Israeli military may plausibly constitute a genocide in violation of international law."
On February 27, the 9th Circuit Court granted a motion by CCR and co-counsel at Van Der Hout LLP to expedite plaintiffs' appeal amid soaring Palestinian civilian casualties and destruction wrought by Israel's assault on Gaza.
Last week, 9th Circuit Judge Ryan Nelson
recused himself from the new case following pressure from plaintiffs who questioned his impartiality after he visited Israel in March with 13 other federal judges on a trip sponsored by the World Jewish Congress meant to convince U.S. jurists of the legality of Israel's Gaza onslaught.
Genocide is defined under the 1948 Genocide Convention as killing or causing serious physical or psychological harm to members of a group, "deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part, imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group," or "forcibly transferring children of the group to another group."
At least hundreds of jurists and genocide experts around the world concur that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. The International Court of Justice is currently weighing a genocide case against Israel brought by South Africa and backed by more than 30 nations and regional blocs. Last month, International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan said he is seeking to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three Hamas leaders for alleged crimes including extermination.
As CCR noted:
Numerous Israeli government leaders have expressed clear genocidal intentions and deployed dehumanizing characterizations of Palestinians, including "human animals." At the same time, the Israeli military has bombed civilian areas and infrastructure, including by using chemical weapons, and deprived Palestinians of everything necessary for human life, including water, food, electricity, fuel, and medicine. Those statements of intent—when combined with mass killing, causing serious bodily and mental harm, and the total siege and closure creating conditions of life to bring about the physical destruction of the group—reveal evidence of an unfolding crime of genocide.
The Biden administration has provided Israel with billions of dollars in military aid and arms and ammunition sales, as well as diplomatic cover in the form of United Nations Security Council vetoes and genocide denial, as its forces continue to obliterate Gaza 248 days after the Hamas-led attacks on October 7 that left more than 1,100 Israelis and foreign nationals dead—at least some of whom were killed by so-called "friendly fire"—and over 240 others taken hostage.
"The U.S. courts have an opportunity in front of them: Judges can choose to take a minimal step towards allowing DCI-P and the other plaintiffs to have a chance at holding the Biden administration accountable for its role in the genocide of Palestinians, or they can sit back and refuse to carry out checks on the executive branch," DCI-P advocacy officer Miranda Cleland wrote in an opinion piece published Friday by Middle East Eye. "It is a choice, quite literally, between life and death."
"Israeli forces, emboldened by the so-called ironclad support of the Biden administration, have killed on average more than 60 Palestinian children every day since October 7," she continued. "That's more than 15,000 children who won't go back to school, or play with their friends, or hug their parents ever again. Those 15,000 children will not grow up and live in a free Palestine."
"If the U.S. courts continue to green-light Biden's impunity, more Palestinian children and their families will pay the price," Cleland added. "It is a price that I, alongside many other voters in the U.S., are not willing to accept."
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Palestinian Groups Condemn Silence of UN's Top Official on Genocide
"The glaring absence of any action in response to the sustained mass atrocities endured by Palestinians in Gaza raises significant concerns about the special adviser's capability to execute her mandate."
Feb 07, 2024
More than a dozen Palestinian human rights groups on Wednesday demanded an investigation into the United Nations Office of Genocide Prevention and its special adviser, Alice Wairimu Nderitu, over their near-total silence as the Israeli military continues its large-scale assault on Gaza's starving population.
In a letter to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, Al-Haq, and other organizations wrote that the "absence of any action in response to the sustained mass atrocities endured by Palestinians in Gaza raises significant concerns about the special adviser's capability to execute her mandate with due effectiveness and impartiality."
The groups argued that the silence from Nderitu is "particularly glaring" now that the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the U.N.'s highest legal body, has ruled that South Africa's genocide case against Israel is plausible and ordered the Israeli military to do everything in its power to prevent genocide.
Other U.N. experts have vocally warned that Palestinians in Gaza are facing a possible genocide at the hands of the Israeli military. In November, eight U.N. special rapporteurs issued a joint statement declaring that "time is running out to prevent genocide and humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza."
"The U.N. cannot afford to stay silent in the face of the genocide currently taking place in Gaza and must avoid repeating the mistakes of the past."
Nderitu, a Kenyan diplomat, expressed alarm on October 15 over "the loss of civilian lives resulting from Israeli bombardments" in Gaza but has not described Israel's actions as possibly genocidal. A review of the U.N. Office on Genocide Prevention's website shows that Nderitu has not issued a public statement on Gaza in nearly four months, even as she has condemned the intensification of violence in Sudan and other countries.
Israeli forces have killed tens of thousands of Gazans since Nderitu's October 15 statement, and nearly the entire population of the enclave has been displaced in those intervening months.
"The gravity of the situation on the ground in Gaza and the urgency it commands intensify our concerns that the special adviser is in dereliction of her duties and responsibilities demanded by her mandate," the Palestinian groups wrote Wednesday. "This failure includes neglecting to raise awareness about Israel’s ongoing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza or, at the very least, to the alarming risk of genocide; failing to acknowledge the ICJ ruling that Israel is plausibly committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza along with the provisional measures ordered for Israel; and refusing to engage meaningfully, meet, or respond to requests from Palestinian human rights organizations."
The groups urged Guterres to launch an investigation into "the reasons behind the failure of both the special adviser and the Office on Genocide Prevention to fulfill their mandates" and to publicly disclose the findings.
"The failure of the international community, including Ms. Alice Wairimu Nderitu, to prevent Israel's genocide in Gaza has tangible consequences on the ground," the new letter reads. "This is evident in the tragic toll of 100,000 Palestinians who have been killed, injured, or are missing, constituting 4% of the total Gaza population. The ongoing mass atrocities in Gaza require an unequivocal response. The U.N. cannot afford to stay silent in the face of the genocide currently taking place in Gaza and must avoid repeating the mistakes of the past."
Nderitu has faced internal criticism at the U.N. over her lack of response to Israel's war on the Gaza Strip.
In late October, dozens of unnamed U.N. staffers signed an internal memo rebuking Nderitu for failing to sufficiently condemn Israel's indiscriminate bombing of Gaza and its yearslong blockade, which has denied food, water, and medicine to increasingly desperate Palestinians.
A petition calling for Nderitu's resignation, meanwhile, has garnered more than 21,000 signatures.
"With the official in charge of genocide prevention taking no action despite public pressure, statements by U.N. special rapporteurs, and thousands of civilians killed, including U.N. staff and their families, we demand Nderitu's immediate resignation and for her to be held accountable for her failure to act in response to mass atrocities in Gaza," states the petition, which was launched in December. "The world is watching, and history will remember the actions taken, or not taken, by the United Nations in response to a genocide unfolding in Gaza."
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Palestinian Groups Warn of Catastrophe as Israeli Forces Close in on Rafah
"Such an attack could result in an unprecedented loss of Palestinian lives," the organizations said.
Feb 05, 2024
A coalition of Palestinian human rights groups issued a joint statement Monday warning of impending catastrophe as Israel's military signaled plans to expand its ground assault to Rafah, the small city near Gaza's border with Egypt where hundreds of thousands of people have sought refuge from Israeli bombs.
Roughly half of Gaza's population of 2.2 million is currently in Rafah, with many living in makeshift tents and struggling to survive without adequate food, medicine, and clean water. The city is so crowded that humanitarian relief officials have said there is just one toilet for every 500 people, conditions that are accelerating the spread of infectious diseases.
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), Al Mezan, and Al-Haq appealed to the international community to intervene and prevent an attack on Rafah, warning that an Israeli incursion "would significantly exacerbate the ongoing genocidal acts perpetrated by the Israeli military and authorities against the Palestinian population in Gaza and blatantly violates the provisional measures order issued by the International Court of Justice on 26 January 2024."
"Recent statements from top Israeli military officials and the observed pattern on the ground strongly suggest an imminent assault on Rafah, reminiscent of the destructive actions witnessed in Khan Younis and throughout northern Gaza in the past four months," the groups said. "Such an attack could result in an unprecedented loss of Palestinian lives."
"The Israeli military has consistently shelled and bombed Rafah from air, sea, and land, with a recent attack killing 17 Palestinians, including children and women," they continued. "Notwithstanding this, a comprehensive ground invasion has not yet transpired. Nevertheless, statements from the Israeli defense minister, which include an expressed intention for Israel to control the border between Gaza and Egypt, coupled with the ongoing bombardments, heighten concerns about the imminent possibility of a ground invasion."
"Everywhere you go, people are desperate, hungry, and terrified."
Late last week, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant declared on social media that the "Khan Younis Brigade" of Hamas has been "dismantled" and that "we complete the mission and will continue to Rafah."
During a recent visit to Israeli troops in Khan Younis, Gallant said that "we are completing the mission in Khan Younis and we will reach Rafah, as well, and eliminate every terrorist there who threatens to harm us."
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA)—whose Gaza operations are at risk of total collapse after the U.S. and more than a dozen other countries cut off aid—said Monday that intense fighting in and around Khan Younis over the past two weeks has forced many Palestinians to "flee further south towards Rafah, which is severely overcrowded." U.N. experts last week described the city as a "pressure cooker of despair."
After visiting Rafah last month, UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini said that "everywhere you look is congested with makeshift shelters."
"Everywhere you go, people are desperate, hungry, and terrified," said Lazzarini. "People—and this is also something completely new—people are stopping aid trucks, taking the food, and eating it right away. This is how desperate and hungry they are. I witnessed this firsthand."
Israeli officials have said they will attempt to ensure that civilians evacuate from Rafah before any invasion of the city, but it's unclear to where hundreds of thousands of people will be able to safely flee. Israel's military has repeatedly instructed Gazans to evacuate to a certain area—including Rafah—shortly before attacking it.
In their joint statement on Monday, PCHR, Al Mezan, and Al-Haq called on the U.N. Security Council, the head of the U.N., the International Criminal Court, and other global institutions to "utilize all available means to prevent a new Nakba and bring an end to the ongoing Israeli genocide in Gaza."
They also emphasized the "potential complicity" of Israel's allies "in the crime of genocide through unwavering military and political support or failure to prevent genocide."
"We urge them to fulfill their legal obligations, act promptly to protect Palestinians, halt mass killings, and bring an end to the genocidal acts that have persisted for the past four months," the groups said.
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US Court Hears Case Alleging Biden Complicit in Israel's Genocide in Gaza
"We are watching a genocide unfold in Gaza in real time and, despite the government's view that a U.S. court can do nothing about it, CCR and our clients argue that it certainly can and it absolutely must!" said one advocate.
Jan 26, 2024
Calling for an emergency injunction to stop the Biden administration from aiding Israel in its bombardment of Gaza, which has so far killed more than 26,000 people and pushed roughly 2 million more to the point of starvation, human rights organizations and Palestinians in the U.S. on Friday took federal leaders to court to stop U.S. "complicity in the Israeli government's unfolding genocide."
The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in Oakland held a hearing on the case, in which the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) is representing groups including Defense for Children International - Palestine (DCIP) and Al-Haq in suing President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin.
The groups, joined by individual plaintiffs whose families in Gaza have been subjected to Israel's assault and decades of occupation, argue that the U.S. is violating domestic and international law and breaching the Genocide Convention, of which it is a a signatory.
The hearing was held hours after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) released its initial ruling in South Africa's case accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza. The ICJ found that Israel must "take all measures within its power" to prevent genocide.
Laila El-Haddad, one of the plaintiffs in the U.S. case, said the group entered the courtroom "proud and hopeful" on the heels of the ICJ ruling.
The CCR reported that the court's livestream was at capacity during the hearing, while outside the courtroom, supporters painted, "Biden complicit in genocide," and, "No bombs to Israel" on the street.
"A recording of the hearing will be made available by the court in due course," said CCR.
Dena Takruri of AJ+ reported that in the "unprecedented" hearing, a doctor testifying remotely from Rafah, Gaza told the court that "cases of childbirth in the streets are widespread at this time."
Along with relentless air and ground attacks by Israeli forces, Gazans have for nearly four months faced a near-total blockade on Gaza, with aid deliveries severely curtailed by Israel. Roughly 90% of Gaza residents are now frequently going without any meals for at least a full day.
South Africa's case at the ICJ outlined numerous statements of genocidal intent by top Israeli officials.
Despite the mounting evidence of ethnic cleansing, the Biden administration has called South Africa's accusations "meritless" and has continued to arm Israel without congressional approval.
"Our community mobilized to put Biden in power after [former President Donald Trump," Basim Elkarra, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) in the Sacramento Valley and another Palestinian American plaintiff, testified at the hearing. "It hurts. It hurts deeply."
The plaintiffs planned to hold a post-hearing press conference.
"The takeaway from today's court hearing," said CCR executive director Vince Warren, "is that we are watching a genocide unfold in Gaza in real time and, despite the government's view that a U.S. court can do nothing about it, CCR and our clients argue that it certainly can and it absolutely must!"
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