This is genocide. Amnesty International’s finding – after many, many months of painstaking investigation and forensic analysis – that Israel has committed and is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, must now lead to firm and decisive action to end the destruction of Palestinians. The time for words, however strong, has passed, and action is needed now if Gaza is not to become the graveyard of international law. For over a year, we have witnessed a shameful and seismic failure by the international community to bring an end to this atrocity. A continued failure to act now will forever be a stain on our collective conscience, a rejection of a common humanity which appears to be at risk of being eclipsed forever.
We have all heard the excuses from Israel and those who excuse Israel: self-defence; confronting terrorists; weaponised claims of anti-Semitism; and more. Hamas’s deadly attacks on October 7th still haunt us and have rightly been condemned as atrocity crimes. Hamas must be held accountable for their crimes and we implore them to release the hostages.
[ Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, Amnesty report saysOpens in new window ]
But nothing can justify the violent, deliberate destruction of the Palestinians in Gaza and, as our report shows, this must be recognised for what it is – a genocide against Palestinians in Gaza unfolding before our very eyes and beamed live into our livingrooms in graphic but all too familiar detail. The Palestinians of Gaza live in a nightmare. Utter carnage has unfolded and there is no end in sight.
Israel is intent on the destruction and obliteration of Palestinians
Palestinians have been bombed, starved and repeatedly displaced. Israel’s actions have wiped out entire multigenerational families. They have destroyed Palestinian homes and livelihoods, wreaked a dreadful havoc on their infrastructure and their ties to the land. They have pulverised civilian objects, agricultural areas, cultural and religious sites. Israel has rendered great areas of Gaza simply uninhabitable. Babies are born into unsafe, unsanitary conditions. Children are destroyed in air strikes. Israel’s military has also killed tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza and many more have been stripped of their dignity and denied life-saving humanitarian aid, ensuring a steady, unrelenting suffocation. All of that comes on top of years of apartheid, dispossession and unlawful military occupation. These crimes are, and continue to be, deliberate actions calculated to bring about the destruction of Palestinians in Gaza. This is genocide.
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While we pay homage, as we should, to the resilience of the Palestinian people in Gaza in the face of a genocide, States around the world can no longer sit on the fence (or indeed on the wrong side of it) and allow disregard for Palestinian lives to fuel this genocide. It is the total impunity enjoyed by Israel, and given so willingly to Israel by its allies, that has allowed the intentional killing of more than 42,000 people, more than 13,000 of them children. These killings, and the unprecedented level and speed of destruction in Gaza, becomes almost impossible to behold and we start to shy away from the truth. But the facts speak for themselves. Israel is intent on the destruction and obliteration of Palestinians.
Israel has the intent to physically destroy the Palestinian population in Gaza through killing, annihilation, displacement and starvation
It is not just the indiscriminate and wanton killings but the destruction and erasure of Palestinian infrastructure and all that makes life in Gaza possible. Yet many states – the USA and Germany chief among them – continue to actively transfer arms to Israel. They are violating their obligation to prevent genocide and are now at risk of becoming complicit. If another spur to action is needed by the international community, surely Amnesty International’s finding of genocide is just that.
Three of the five prohibited acts under the Genocide Convention were investigated by Amnesty International and documented in our comprehensive 300-page report. Our investigation shows that Israel is actively killing members of a group and causing serious bodily or mental harm; inflicting conditions of life to bring about the destruction of a population; and deliberately denying essential services and life-saving supplies. Alone, these findings are not enough, and it is crucial to demonstrate that Israel has done this with clear intent. Yes, Israel has military objectives but let us be clear, military objectives can coexist with genocidal intent. After months of investigation in the most difficult of conditions, our research proves that Israel does indeed have the intent to physically destroy the Palestinian population in Gaza through killing, annihilation, displacement and starvation. Over our nine-month investigation period, Israel persisted in committing genocidal acts, over and over again, fully aware of the irreparable harm it was inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza. All of this alongside the pre-existing context of dispossession, apartheid and unlawful military occupation in which these acts have been committed. Our call to the international community is loud and clear: every moment of further dither is a moment where countless more mothers, fathers and children will be senselessly forced to endure genocide.
The self-imposed “powerlessness” of states which have spoken up clearly and firmly to demand a ceasefire must end. The time to act is now. States which have called for a ceasefire must join with other like-minded states to create a common platform to end this genocide. They must be resolute; they must be relentless; they must be loud, clear and visible. This is genocide. This must stop. Here in Ireland, as our political leaders scramble to form a new government, we must all also accept the responsibility to demand from them, loudly and clearly: “What’s in it for Gaza?”
Stephen Bowen is executive director of Amnesty International Ireland
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