GENEVA: The UN Human Rights Chief accused Israel on Wednesday of showing an unprecedented disregard for human rights in its military actions in Gaza and said Hamas had violated international law.
“Nothing justifies the appalling manner in which Israel has conducted its military operations in Gaza which consistently breached international law,” said Volker Turk, while presenting a new report on the human rights situation in Gaza, the Israeli-occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem to the Human Rights Council in Geneva.
The report by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) also accused Hamas of grave violations since October 7.
“Hamas has indiscriminately fired projectiles into Israeli territory — amounting to war crimes,” Turk said.
Hamas-led fighters killed 1,200 people and captured more than 250 hostages in an attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, according to Israeli tallies. An Israeli retaliatory assault laid waste to most of Gaza and killed more than 48,000 Palestinians, according to the enclave’s health officials.
Israel did not send a delegate to take to the floor to share their comments, which the representative of Chile said was regretful.
Israel previously strongly denied allegations of war crimes and breaches of international law in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, saying that its operations targeted Hamas militants and aimed to reduce civilian harm.
“The level of devastation in Gaza is massive — from homes, to hospitals to schools,” Turk said, adding that “restrictions imposed by Israel ... have created a humanitarian catastrophe,” Turk told the Council.
Turk told the 58th Council that the report highlighted grave concerns that Hamas “may have committed other breaches of humanitarian law in Gaza, including the intentional co-location of military objectives and Palestinian civilians.”
He called for all violations to be investigated independently. However, he raised doubts about the will of the Israeli justice system to deliver full accountability — in line with international standards, and said he was unaware of any measures taken by Hamas and other groups to punish those responsible for rights breaches.
The OHCHR report said it had not received a response from Israel to its request for full access to Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory to investigate violations by all parties.
The Palestinian representative at the Council accused Israel of committing war crimes and genocide against Palestinians, as well as denying aid to the enclave. Israel has repeatedly denied such accusations.
“Tents have been denied together with model homes. It has impeded access of food and medicines,” the Palestinian ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Ibrahim Khraishi told the council.
He also strongly denounced settler violence and Israeli military operations in the West Bank, mentioned in the report. At least 40,000 Palestinians have left their homes in Jenin and the nearby city of Tulkarm in the northern West Bank since Israel began its operation last month after reaching a ceasefire agreement in Gaza after 15 months of war.
“The litany of unspeakable horrors perpetrated against the Palestinians is unprecedented,” said Frankye Bronwen Levy, the representative for South Africa.
The European Union supported the report’s call for an independent investigation, condemned Hamas’ attack, as well as Israeli escalation in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq reiterated calls for an end to the war and the realization of a Palestinian state.
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Israel has shown ‘unprecedented disregard for human rights’ in Gaza, UN human rights chief says
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Israel has shown ‘unprecedented disregard for human rights’ in Gaza, UN human rights chief says
- Israel previously strongly denied allegations of war crimes and breaches of international law in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, saying that its operations targeted Hamas militants and aimed to reduce civilian harm
UN: Sudan war civilian death toll more than doubled in 2025
- Rights chief Volker Turk says RSF paramilitaries inflicted "carnage” in attacks last year on Zamzam campand El-Fasher in Darfur
- Recent drone attacks in Kordofan region and elsewhere have 'killed or injured nearly 600 civilians'
GENEVA: Killings of civilians in Sudan’s war more than doubled in 2025 compared with the previous year, the United Nations rights chief said Thursday, warning that thousands more dead are unidentified or remain missing.
Since April 2023, Sudan has been engulfed in a conflict between the army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) that has killed tens of thousands, displaced 11 million people and triggered one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
“This war is ugly. It’s bloody and it’s senseless,” Volker Turk told the UN Human Rights Council, blaming both warring sides, which have so far rejected any form of humanitarian truce. He also blamed foreign sponsors funding what he called a “high-tech” conflict.
“In 2025, my office’s documentation points to an over two and a half times increase in killings of civilians compared with the previous year. Many thousands are still missing or unidentified,” Turk said.
There have been no official figures on the overall death toll in the conflict.
Turk condemned what he called the “heinous and ruthless” brutalities committed, including sexual violence, summary executions and arbitrary detentions.
He highlighted “carnage” inflicted by the RSF during an attack on the Zamzam displacement camp in April, and again in October in El-Fasher, which was the army’s last foothold in western Darfur.
Sexual violence, including rape, gang rape, sexual torture and slavery, has also surged, Turk said, with more than 500 victims documented in 2025. “The bodies of Sudanese women and girls have been weaponized to terrorize communities.”
He added that he is “extremely worried these crimes may be repeated.”
- ‘Madness’ -
Since the fall of El-Fasher, the fighting has moved deeper into neighboring Kordofan where drone strikes have killed dozens at a time.
Since January, escalating drone attacks in the southern Kordofan region and beyond have “killed or injured nearly 600 civilians,” Turk said, including in attacks on humanitarian aid convoys.
The UN’s resident and humanitarian coordinator for Sudan, Denise Brown, said on Thursday that access to the cities of Kadugli and Dilling in South Kordofan — long cut off by an RSF siege until the army recently lifted it — had been effectively impossible.
“We were not able to get supplies in. We had to remove our staff for their own safety,” she said, after stepping off the first UN flight to Khartoum since the war began on Thursday.
Famine was declared last November in the North Darfur capital El-Fasher and in Kadugli, the capital of South Kordofan, according to a UN-backed assessment. The same assessment said Dilling in South Kordofan is also likely facing famine conditions.
Turk said both the army and the RSF continued to use “explosive weapons in densely populated areas, often without warning — showing utter disregard for human life.”
Turk highlighted the “increased use of advanced long-range drones,” which has “expanded harm to civilians in areas far from the front lines that were previously peaceful.”
Turk also voiced concern over “the growing militarization of society,” including the recruitment of children and young people into the fighting.
Since April 2023, Sudan has been engulfed in a conflict between the army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) that has killed tens of thousands, displaced 11 million people and triggered one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
“This war is ugly. It’s bloody and it’s senseless,” Volker Turk told the UN Human Rights Council, blaming both warring sides, which have so far rejected any form of humanitarian truce. He also blamed foreign sponsors funding what he called a “high-tech” conflict.
“In 2025, my office’s documentation points to an over two and a half times increase in killings of civilians compared with the previous year. Many thousands are still missing or unidentified,” Turk said.
There have been no official figures on the overall death toll in the conflict.
Turk condemned what he called the “heinous and ruthless” brutalities committed, including sexual violence, summary executions and arbitrary detentions.
He highlighted “carnage” inflicted by the RSF during an attack on the Zamzam displacement camp in April, and again in October in El-Fasher, which was the army’s last foothold in western Darfur.
Sexual violence, including rape, gang rape, sexual torture and slavery, has also surged, Turk said, with more than 500 victims documented in 2025. “The bodies of Sudanese women and girls have been weaponized to terrorize communities.”
He added that he is “extremely worried these crimes may be repeated.”
- ‘Madness’ -
Since the fall of El-Fasher, the fighting has moved deeper into neighboring Kordofan where drone strikes have killed dozens at a time.
Since January, escalating drone attacks in the southern Kordofan region and beyond have “killed or injured nearly 600 civilians,” Turk said, including in attacks on humanitarian aid convoys.
The UN’s resident and humanitarian coordinator for Sudan, Denise Brown, said on Thursday that access to the cities of Kadugli and Dilling in South Kordofan — long cut off by an RSF siege until the army recently lifted it — had been effectively impossible.
“We were not able to get supplies in. We had to remove our staff for their own safety,” she said, after stepping off the first UN flight to Khartoum since the war began on Thursday.
Famine was declared last November in the North Darfur capital El-Fasher and in Kadugli, the capital of South Kordofan, according to a UN-backed assessment. The same assessment said Dilling in South Kordofan is also likely facing famine conditions.
Turk said both the army and the RSF continued to use “explosive weapons in densely populated areas, often without warning — showing utter disregard for human life.”
Turk highlighted the “increased use of advanced long-range drones,” which has “expanded harm to civilians in areas far from the front lines that were previously peaceful.”
Turk also voiced concern over “the growing militarization of society,” including the recruitment of children and young people into the fighting.
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