LONDON — Amnesty International has doubled down on its findings that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, stating that “two months of cruel and inhumane siege are further evidence of Israel’s genocidal intent” in the Palestinian enclave.
Last month, the human rights group said Israel has been committing a “live-streamed genocide” against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
Israeli forces in Gaza have violated the United Nations Genocide Convention with acts that include “causing serious bodily or mental harm to civilians” and “deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction”, the rights group said in its annual report.
Israel has repeatedly “denied, obstructed and failed to allow and facilitate” humanitarian access to Gaza, and invaded the southern city of Rafah, despite warnings by the international community and the International Court of Justice about the “devastating effect it would have on the civilian population”, it said.
Israeli air strikes have also frequently hit civilians who were following evacuation orders, while its forces continued to “arbitrarily detain and, in some cases, forcibly disappear Palestinians”, the human rights group said.
“Since 7 October 2023.. the world has been made audience to a live-streamed genocide,” Amnesty’s secretary-general, Agnes Callamard, said in the introduction to the report.
“States watched on as if powerless, as Israel killed thousands upon thousands of Palestinians, wiping out entire multigenerational families, destroying homes, livelihoods, hospitals and schools.”
Israel and “its powerful allies, first among them the USA, claimed that or acted as if international law did not apply to them”, Callamard said.
Since March 2, Israel has closed Gaza’s main crossings, halting the flow of food, medical aid, and other humanitarian supplies. This blockade has caused a severe and unprecedented decline in living conditions, with human rights organizations accusing Israel of using starvation as a weapon of war against Palestinians.
On Friday, the group said the Israeli blockade on Gaza, now in its third month, “constitutes a genocidal act, a blatant form of unlawful collective punishment, and the war crime of using starvation of civilians as a method of warfare.”
By blocking the entry of supplies critical for the survival of the population, “Israel continues its policy of deliberately imposing conditions of life on Palestinians in Gaza calculated to bring about their physical destruction; this constitutes an act of genocide.”
“The extent of human suffering in Gaza for the past 19 months has been unimaginable, and it is a direct consequence of Israel’s ongoing genocide. Apart from a brief respite during the temporary truce, Israel has relentlessly and mercilessly turned Gaza into an inferno of death and destruction,” said Erika Guevara Rosas, Senior Director for Research, Advocacy, Policy, and Campaigns at Amnesty International.
“For the past two months, Israel has completely cut off the supply of humanitarian aid and other items indispensable to the survival of civilians in a clear and calculated effort to collectively punish over two million civilians and to make Gaza unlivable. This is genocide in action.”
In addition to blocking entry of all aid, Israel’s decision to cut power to Gaza’s main desalination plant on 9 March has further crippled access to clean water. The plant was the only facility in Gaza reconnected to Israel’s electricity grid in November 2024, after a full electricity blackout had been imposed since 11 October 2023, the group noted.
It added expansive “evacuation” orders and no-go zones now engulf nearly 70% of the Gaza Strip, forcing people to abandon what is left of the scarce sources of sustenance and access to livelihoods for farmers and fishermen.
The consequences are irreversible damage to the Palestinian population. Basic food items -including fish and meat- have become prohibitively expensive, pushing countless families into hunger, Amnesty said, with most Gazans now can only rely on overcrowded community kitchens, where displaced people endure hours-long waits for minimal sustenance, often just a single meal per day.
“We don’t ask if food is nutritious or not, if it’s fresh or good; that’s a luxury, we just want to fill the stomachs of our children. I don’t want my child to die hungry,” one displaced parent said.
The crisis has had a particularly devastating impact on infants and breastfeeding and pregnant mothers. According to OCHA, 92% of infants aged 6-23 months and pregnant and breastfeeding mothers are not meeting their nutrient requirements.
Water scarcity, an endemic problem in Gaza due to Israel’s 17 year-long blockade, has now become critical, with some resorting to drinking seawater. Damaged infrastructure and fuel shortages have severely limited access to clean water. Residents in Beit Lahia said they had no water for domestic use for five consecutive days.
Amnesty International said it opposes “any attempts to weaponize aid, use it for forced displacement, or create discriminatory aid distribution zones, all of which would violate international law.”
C. QNN
