Amnesty says Israel carrying out ‘genocide’ in Gaza

A Palestinian woman, displaced from Beit Lahia, arrives in Jabalia in northern Gaza on December 4. Amnesty International accused Israel of “committing genocide.” (AFP)
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Updated 05 December 2024
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Amnesty says Israel carrying out ‘genocide’ in Gaza

  • Israel has treated Palestinians in Gaza as subhuman group unworthy of human rights, says Amnesty 
  • Rights group releases 300-page report featuring satellite images showing devastation in Gaza, ground reports

Amnesty International accused Israel Thursday of “committing genocide” against Palestinians in Gaza since the start of the war last year, saying its new report was a “wake-up call” for the world
The London-based human rights group said its findings were based on satellite images documenting devastation, fieldwork and ground reports from Gazans as well as “dehumanizing and genocidal statements by Israeli government and military officials.”
Israel angrily dismissed the findings as “entirely false,” denouncing the report as “fabricated” and “based on lies.”

A State Department spokesman said the US disagreed with the report, saying "allegations of genocide are unfounded."
Amnesty’s Israel branch said it was not involved in the report and “does not accept” the allegation of genocide.
Amnesty chief Agnes Callamard accused Israel of treating the Palestinians in Gaza “as a subhuman group unworthy of human rights and dignity, demonstrating its intent to physically destroy them.”
“Our damning findings must serve as a wake-up call to the international community: this is genocide. It must stop now,” she said in a statement.
Palestinian militant group Hamas, which has been fighting Israel in Gaza, welcomed the report as a “message to the international community... on the need to act to bring an end to this genocide.”
The group’s unprecedented October 7, 2023 attack which triggered the war resulted in the deaths of 1,208 people in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 44,580 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run health ministry which the United Nations considers reliable.

Independent UN human rights experts have accused Israel of genocide several times, and South Africa brought a case against Israel to the UN’s top court in December 2023 accusing it of “violating the genocide convention by promoting the destruction of Palestinians living in Gaza.” The case is still ongoing.
But Israeli officials have repeatedly and forcefully denied all such allegations, accusing Hamas of using civilians as human shields.
“The deplorable and fanatical organization Amnesty International has once again produced a fabricated report that is entirely false and based on lies,” the Israeli foreign ministry said.
“Israel is defending itself... acting fully in accordance with international law.”
But Callamard insisted at a press conference in The Hague that “the existence of military objectives does not negate the possibility of a genocidal intent.”
She said Amnesty had based its findings on the criteria set out in the UN Convention on the Prevention of Genocide.
But an Israeli army spokesperson said the report’s findings “fail to account for the operational realities” it has faced.
“The (military) takes all feasible measures to mitigate harm to civilians during operations. These include providing advance warnings to civilians in combat zones whenever feasible and facilitating safe movement to designated areas.”
While Amnesty Israel rejected the accusation of genocide, it said it was “concerned that serious crimes are being committed in Gaza” and called for an investigation and an immediate halt to the war.

Amnesty’s 300-page report points to “direct deliberate attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructures where there was no Hamas presence or any other military objectives” as well as the blocking of aid deliveries, and the displacement of 90 percent of Gaza’s 2.4 million people.
Palestinians have been subjected to “malnutrition, hunger and diseases” and exposed to a “slow, calculated death,” Amnesty said.
The rights group, which is also due to publish a report on the crimes committed by Hamas, cited 15 air strikes in Gaza between October 7, 2023 and April 20, which killed 334 civilians, including 141 children, for which the group found “no evidence that any of these strikes were directed at a military objective.”
The Amnesty report also referenced dozens of calls by Israeli officials and soldiers for the annihilation, destruction, burning or “erasure” of Gaza.
Such statements highlighted “systemic impunity” as well as “an environment that emboldens... such behavior.”
“Governments must stop pretending that they are powerless to terminate Israel’s occupation, to end apartheid and to stop the genocide in Gaza,” Callamard said.
“States that transfer arms to Israel violate their obligations to prevent genocide under the convention and are at risk of becoming complicit.”


Egypt’s FM heads to Washington for talks with US officials: ministry

Updated 09 February 2025
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Egypt’s FM heads to Washington for talks with US officials: ministry

CAIRO: Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty traveled to Washington on Sunday for talks with senior officials from the new Trump administration and members of Congress, his ministry said.
The ministry’s statement said the visit aimed “to boost bilateral relations and strategic partnership between Egypt and the US,” and would include “consultations on regional developments.”


Israeli official says force withdrawal from key Gaza corridor has begun, as part of ceasefire deal

Updated 39 min 8 sec ago
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Israeli official says force withdrawal from key Gaza corridor has begun, as part of ceasefire deal

TEL AVIV: An Israeli official said Sunday that Israeli forces have begun withdrawing from a key Gaza corridor, part of a ceasefire deal with Hamas that is moving ahead.

Israel agreed as part of the truce to remove its forces from the Netzarim corridor, a strip of land that bisects northern Gaza from the south. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss troop movement with the media.

At the start of the ceasefire, Israel began allowing Palestinians to cross Netzarim to head to their homes in the war-battered north and the withdrawal of forces from the area will fulfill another commitment to the deal.

It was not clear how many troops Israel had withdrawn on Sunday.

The 42-day ceasefire is just past its halfway point and the sides are supposed to negotiate an extension that would lead to more Israeli hostages being freed from Hamas captivity. But the agreement is fragile and the extension isn’t guaranteed.

The sides are meant to begin talks on the truce’s second stage but there appears to have been little progress.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was sending a delegation to Qatar, a key mediator in talks between the sides, but the mission included low-level officials, sparking speculation that it won’t lead to a breakthrough in extending the truce. Netanyahu is expected to convene a meeting of key Cabinet ministers this week on the second phase of the deal, but it was not clear when.

During the first phase of the ceasefire, Hamas is gradually releasing 33 Israeli hostages captured during its Oct.7, 2023, attack in exchange for a pause in fighting, freedom for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and a floor of humanitarian aid to war-battered Gaza. The deal stipulates that Israeli troops will pull back from populated areas of Gaza and that on day 22, which is Sunday, Palestinians will be allowed to head north from a central road that crosses through Netzarim, without being inspected by Israeli forces.

In the second phase, all remaining hostages would be released in return for a complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and a “sustainable calm.”


2 mass graves with bodies of nearly 50 migrants found in southeastern Libya

Updated 09 February 2025
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2 mass graves with bodies of nearly 50 migrants found in southeastern Libya

CAIRO: Libya authorities uncovered nearly 50 bodies this week from two mass graves in the country’s southeastern desert, officials said Sunday, in the latest tragedy involving people seeking to reach Europe through the chaos-stricken North African country.
The first mass grave with 19 bodies was found Friday in a farm in the southeastern city of Kufra, the security directorate said in a statement, adding that authorities took them for autopsy.
Authorities posted images on its Facebook page showing police officers and medics digging in the sand and recovering dead bodies that were wrapped in blankets.
The Al-Abreen charity, which helps migrants in eastern and southern Libya, said that some were apparently shot and killed before being buried in the mass grave.
A separate mass grave with at least 30 bodies was also found in Kufra after raiding a human trafficking center, according to Mohamed Al-Fadeil, head of the security chamber in Kufra. Survivors said nearly 70 people were buried in the grave, he added. Authorities were still searching the area.
Migrants’ mass graves are not uncommon in Libya. Last year, authorities unearthed the bodies of at least 65 migrants in the Shuayrif region, 350 kilometers (220 miles) south of the capital, Tripoli.
Libya is the dominant transit point for migrants from Africa and the Middle East trying to make it to Europe. The country plunged into chaos following a NATO-backed uprising that toppled and killed longtime autocrat Muammar Qaddafi in 2011. Oil-rich Libya has been ruled for most of the past decade by rival governments in eastern and western Libya, each backed by an array of militias and foreign governments.
Human traffickers have benefited from more than a decade of instability, smuggling migrants across the country’s borders with six nations, including Chad, Niger, Sudan Egypt, Algeria and Tunisia.
Once at the coast, traffickers pack desperate migrants seeking a better life in Europe into ill-equipped rubber boats and other vessels for risky voyages on the perilous Central Mediterranean Sea route.
Rights groups and UN agencies have for years documented systematic abuse of migrants in Libya including forced labor, beatings, rapes and torture. The abuse often accompanies efforts to extort money from families before migrants are allowed to leave Libya on traffickers’ boats.
Those who have been intercepted and returned to Libya — including women and children — are held in government-run detention centers where they also suffer from abuse, including torture, rape and extortion, according to rights groups and UN experts.


Egypt to host emergency Arab summit on Feb. 27 to discuss ‘serious’ Palestinian developments

Updated 09 February 2025
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Egypt to host emergency Arab summit on Feb. 27 to discuss ‘serious’ Palestinian developments

  • Egypt has been rallying regional support against US President Donald Trump’s plan to relocate Palestinians

CAIRO: Egypt will host a summit of Arab nations on February 27 to discuss “the latest serious developments” concerning the Palestinian territories, its foreign ministry said in a statement on Sunday.

The “emergency Arab summit” comes as Egypt has been rallying regional support against US President Donald Trump’s plan to relocate Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to Egypt and Jordan while establishing US control over the coastal territory.

Sunday’s statement said the gathering was called “after extensive consultations by Egypt at the highest levels with Arab countries in recent days, including Palestine, which requested the summit, to address the latest serious developments regarding the Palestinian cause.”

That included coordination with Bahrain, which currently chairs the Arab League, the statement said.

On Friday, Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty spoke with regional partners including Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to shore up opposition to any forced displacement of Palestinians from their land.

Last week, Trump floated the idea of US administration over Gaza, envisioning rebuilding the devastated territory into the “Riviera of the Middle East” after resettling Palestinians elsewhere, namely Egypt and Jordan.

The remarks have prompted global backlash, and Arab countries have firmly rejected the proposal, insisting on a two-state solution with an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel.


Israeli military says it is expanding West Bank operation

Updated 09 February 2025
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Israeli military says it is expanding West Bank operation

JERUSALEM: A pregnant 23-year-old Palestinian was killed by Israeli security forces on Sunday in the Nur Shams refugee camp in the West Bank as part of an expanded Israeli army operation in the occupied territory.

The Palestinian Health ministry said Sundos Jamal Mohammed Shalabi, who was eight months pregnant, was struck by Israeli gunfire, adding that the foetus also did not survive and that Shalabi's husband was critically injured.

The Israeli army said they expanded the military operation to four refugee camps in the West Bank.

In Nur Shams, a Palestinian refugee camp east of Tulkarm, Israeli forces had killed several “militants” and detained wanted individuals in the area, a military spokesperson said on Sunday.

Israel's military, police and intelligence services launched a counter-terrorism operation in Jenin in the West Bank on January 21. 

The operation expanded to Tulkarm, Al Faraa and Tamun, with the military saying it was targeting militants.

It is described by Israeli officials as a “large-scale and significant military operation”. 

Thousands of Palestinians have fled West Bank homes in the wake of the military campaign and the widespread destruction.
Palestinians have said the Israeli campaign is one of the most destructive in recent memory. Dozens of Palestinians have been killed, according to the Palestinian Authority’s Health Ministry. The Israeli military has said it has killed militants.
This month, the Israeli military released a video of a controlled demolition of buildings in the crowded Jenin refugee camp. It said the 23 buildings were used by militants.

(with AP and Reuters)