An international investigation committee: “Israel’s systematic use of sexual and abandonment is more than human beings can bear.”

The new report it issued The Independent International Investigation Committee of the United Nations on the occupied Palestinian land, including East Jerusalem, and Israel It documents a “wide range of violations” against women, men, girls, and boys in all parts of the Palestinian territory occupied since October 7, 2023.

According to the report, these violations “constitute a major element in the mistreatment of the Palestinians and are part of the illegal occupation and the persecution of the Palestinians as a group.”

“The perpetuation of a repression system that undermines the right to self -determination”

The chair of the committee, Navi Pele, said: “The evidence gathered by the committee reveals an unfortunate increase in gender and a gender -based violence. There is no escape from the conclusion that Israel has used sexual and gender -based violence against the Palestinians to intimidate them and sustain a repression system that undermines their right to self -determination.”

The issuance of the report was accompanied by public hearing for two days held in Geneva on 11-12 March, during which the committee heard the victims and witnesses of sexual and abandonment violence and medical workers who helped them, in addition to representatives of civil society, academics, lawyers and medical experts.

The report concluded that sexual and gender -based violence – whose pace and intensity have risen – are committed throughout the occupied Palestinian land “A strategy of war for Israel to control and destroy the Palestinian people.”

Specific forms of that violence – such as forced public stripping, sexual harassment, including the threat of rape, as well as sexual assault – are part of the standard operating measures of the Israeli security forces towards the Palestinians.

A climate of impunity

The report stated that other forms of sexual and sexual violence, including rape and violence against genitals, “were committed either by explicit orders or with an implicit encouragement from the higher civil and military leadership in Israel.”

According to the report, a climate of impunity with regard to sexual and gender -based sexual crimes committed by Israeli settlers in the West Bank, with the aim of spreading fear in Palestinian society and expelling them.

Navi Pele said that “The statements and procedures justified by the Israeli leaders and the lack of effectiveness of the military justice system in the prosecution and the condemnation of the perpetrators sends a clear message to the Israeli security forces that they can continue to commit such acts without fear of accountability.”

In this context, Pillay referred to “The necessity of accountability through the International Criminal Court and the National Courts, through its local laws or the practice of the global judicial jurisdiction, if I want to adhere to the rule of law and provide justice to the victims.”

Destruction of health care facilities in Gaza

The International Committee found that the Israeli forces systematically destroyed sexual and reproductive health care facilities throughout Gaza. At the same time, it imposed a siege and prevented humanitarian aid, including providing the necessary medications and equipment to ensure pregnancy, safe birth, postpartum and newborn care.

The committee said that these actions violate the reproductive rights of women and the girl and their independence, as well as their right to life and health, the formation of a family, human dignity, physical and mental safety, freedom from torture and other cruel, inhuman or humiliating treatment, self -determination and the principle of non -discrimination.

The report reported the death of women and girls due to complications related to pregnancy and childbirth as a result of the circumstances imposed by the Israeli authorities, which prevented access to reproductive health care – “They are actions that rise to a crime against humanity, which is genocide.” According to the report.

The committee found that the Israeli authorities have partially destroyed the reproductive capacity of the Palestinians in Gaza as a group through the systematic destruction of sexual and reproductive health care, which amounts to two groups of genocide in the basic system of Rome andGenocratic ConventionIncluding the affiliate conditions of life to cause the physical destruction of the Palestinians and impose measures aimed at preventing births.

Long -term effects on mental health and reproductive prospects

The chair of the committee, Navi Pellet, said “Targeting reproductive health care facilities, including through direct attacks on the wings of birth and the main industrial pollination clinic in Gaza, in addition to the use of starvation as a war method, affected all aspects of childbearing. These violations did not cause severe physical and mental suffering for women and girls, but also in long -term effects irreversible on mental health, reproductive prospects and fertility for the Palestinians As a group.

The committee found an increase in the percentage of female deaths in Gaza, which occurred on an unprecedented scale “as a result of an Israeli strategy represented in deliberately targeting residential buildings and using heavy explosives in densely populated areas.”

The committee also documented cases in which women and girls of all ages were targeted, including patients in the departments of birth – “These are actions that rise to a crime against humanity, which is murder and a war crime that is premeditated killing.”According to the report.

Information about the committee

On May 27, 2021, the Human Rights Council held an extraordinary session on “the dangerous conditions of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem”, and adopted a decision on ensuring the respect of international human rights law and international humanitarian law in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and in Israel.

The council decided in His decision “To urgently establish an independent international investigation committee to investigate within the occupied Palestinian land, including East Jerusalem, and within Israel in all alleged violations of international humanitarian law and all the alleged violations and abuses of international human rights law that preceded April 13, 2021 and signed since this date.”