UN report on Israeli sexual abuses against Palestinians must lead to prosecutions, says Hamas

Hamas is calling on international bodies to follow up on the findings of a new United Nations report. The report indicates that Israel's systematic destruction of women's medical facilities in the Gaza Strip constitutes "acts of genocide."

The United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel, released a report on Thursday stating that Israel's systematic destruction of sexual and reproductive health facilities and restrictions on the supply of medical materials, leading to a surge in maternal mortality, amounts to the crime of extermination.

Hamas issued a statement on Thursday saying that the report "confirms" the "severity" of Israel's crimes and shows that Israel is engaged in "unprecedented violations of international law and humanitarian norms, infringing upon unarmed civilians." The report noted that Israel's direct targeting of women's medical facilities has had "irreversible long-term effects" on the psychological health, reproductive capacity, and fertility prospects of Palestinians.

The commission concluded that this constitutes two types of genocidal acts under the Rome Statute and the Genocide Convention, including deliberately creating living conditions to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinians, and imposing measures intended to prevent births. The report also found that since October 7, 2023, there has been an "outrageous increase in sexual and gender-based violence" against Palestinian women, men, girls, and boys in the occupied Palestinian territories, with the aim of "intimidating them and perpetuating a system of oppression that undermines their right to self-determination."

The report detailed some acts of sexual and gender-based violence, including forced public stripping, which has become part of the standard operating procedure of Israeli security forces. Other acts, including rape and violence against the genitals, were carried out under the "explicit orders or tacit encouragement" of Israel's highest civilian and military leaders. Hamas stated that the international community has been in a state of "indifference and negligence" towards Israel's infringement of the rights of Palestinians and needs to "take practical measures" to end these acts.

The Hamas statement read: "We call on the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, as well as all international and national judicial bodies around the world, to seriously follow up on the findings of this report." Hamas added that, coupled with previous UN reports documenting Israeli violations, international bodies must "prosecute the leaders of the occupation forces and treat them as war criminals."

The report showed that the lack of pain medication particularly affected women undergoing cesarean sections, who were forced to endure the surgery without pain relief. Medical personnel reported that the scarcity of space, medicine, and equipment has led to an increasing number of maternal deaths. The commission found that the number of female deaths in the Gaza Strip has surged since October, more than doubling the number of deaths in the 2008 conflict, mainly due to the increased use of fierce aerial bombardment and attacks targeting residential buildings, which disproportionately affected women. The report also noted that the surge in deaths may also be due to the Israeli military's strategy of targeting private residences with the aim of killing militants, resulting in entire families being killed together.