Following the 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis, [1] the United Nations Human Rights Council voted on 27 May 2021 to set up a United Nations fact-finding mission to investigate possible war crimes and other abuses committed in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian territories, [2] the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory including East Jerusalem, and Israel.
Navi Pillay (South Africa), serves as chair, Miloon Kothari (India) and Chris Sidoti (Australia) serve as members of the commission. [3] [4]
The commission will report to the Human Rights Council annually from June 2022. [3] Unlike previous fact finding missions the inquiry is open ended and will examine "all underlying root causes of recurrent tensions, instability and protraction of conflict, including systematic discrimination and repression based on national, ethnic, racial or religious identity." [2]
Manpower was reduced from 24 to 18 persons following a US-Israel campaign to reduce the Commission budget. [5] On 17 February 2022, Israel said it will not cooperate with the commission, alleging bias. [6] At the end of March, 68 US senators signed a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken calling for the Biden administration to use its influence to quash the inquiry. [7] In June 2023, United States and Israel joined 25 countries in condemning the open-ended nature of the UN investigation and "the long-standing disproportionate attention given to Israel in the council." Responding, Kothari said "There seems to be no sunset clause recommended to Israel to end the occupation.... as long as the occupation continues the UN needs to investigate the occupation...we would like to see the end of the occupation." [8]
The first annual report (A/HRC/50/21) to the General Assembly was released on 7 June 2022. [9] [10] The report said that ending the occupation would be insufficient. It said that the root cause of the problems lay in "perpetual occupation" with no intent to end it and that Israel wanted "complete control" over the occupied area. Israel refused access to Israel or the Palestinian territories, Palestinian and Israeli testimony was collected in Geneva and Jordan. Israel’s Foreign Ministry and the U.S State department rejected the report as biased. [11] [12] [13] When the report was formally presented to the 50th session of the Human Rights Council on 13 June 2022, the United States representative read out a statement objecting to the mandate given to the Committee, saying that it was unfair scrutiny of Israel. Including the United States and Israel, twenty-two countries, most not UNHRC members, signed the statement. [14] Addressing the Council, Navi Pillay said "Given a clear refusal by Israel to take concrete measures to implement the findings and recommendations of past commissions, the international community must urgently explore new ways of ensuring compliance with international law." She also criticized the Palestinian Authority for its failure to hold legislative and Presidential elections and leaders in Gaza for their failure to uphold human rights standards. [15] [16]
On 20 October 2022, the commission released a report (A/77/328) [17] to the United Nations General Assembly, calling on the Security Council to end Israel’s "permanent occupation" and on individual UN member states to prosecute Israeli officials. The report found "reasonable grounds" to conclude that the occupation "is now unlawful under international law due to its permanence" and Israel's "de-facto annexation policies." [18] [19] The commission has requested that an International Court of Justice advisory opinion declaring the occupation illegal be obtained. [20] Israeli prime minister Yair Lapid said the report is "biased, false, inciting and blatantly unbalanced" and tweeted that "Not all criticism of Israel is anti-Semitism, but this report was written by anti-Semites … and is a distinctly anti-Semitic report". [21]
On 2 June 2023, the commission presented a report (A/HRC/53/CRP.1) accusing Israel of silencing civil society and Palestinian NGOs and intends to probe Israeli settler violence and its link to West Bank annexation, "We are very disturbed that violent settler activity has increased in the last months...It’s becoming a means through which annexation is ensured beyond occupation." [21] [22]
The second annual report (A/78/198) to the General Assembly was published on 5 September 2023 [23] and states "The commission finds the increasingly militarised law enforcement operations of Israel and repeated attacks by Israel on Gaza are aimed at maintaining its unlawful 56-year occupation." [24]
On 19 June 2024, the commission presented its first report on the Gaza war to the United Nations Human Rights Council during its 56th regular session. The report was the UN's first in-depth investigation of the conflict and covered the period from 7 October to 31 December 2023. [25] [26] In its report (A/HRC/56/26) [27] the Commission affirmed that both Hamas and Israel committed war crimes and that Israel's actions also constituted crimes against humanity. [28] [29] The report found that the military wing of Hamas and six other Palestinian armed groups, are responsible for the war crimes of intentionally directing attacks against civilians, murder or willful killing, torture, inhuman or cruel treatment, destroying or seizing the property of an adversary, outrages upon personal dignity, and taking hostages, including children. [30] [31] In relation to Israeli military operations and attacks in Gaza, the commission concluded that Israeli authorities are responsible for the war crimes of starvation as a method of warfare, murder or willful killing, intentionally directing attacks against civilians and civilian objects, forcible transfer, sexual violence, torture and inhuman or cruel treatment, arbitrary detention and outrages upon personal dignity. It also found that Israel committed numerous crimes against humanity, including carrying out the extermination of Palestinians and gender persecution targeting Palestinian men and boys. [32] [33] [34] The commission said that they had submitted 7,000 pieces of evidence to the International Criminal Court related to crimes committed by Israel and Hamas, as part of the International Criminal Court investigation in Palestine. [35]
The third annual report (A/79/232) to the General Assembly was published on 11 September 2024 and examines the treatment of detainees and hostages and attacks on medical facilities and personnel from 7 October 2023 to August 2024 in Gaza. [36]
On 13 March 2025, the commission submitted a report (A /HRC/58/CRP.6) [37] to the Human Rights Council on the systematically use of sexual, reproductive and other gender-based violence carried out since 7 October 2023 by the Israeli Security Forces and Israeli settlers. [38] The report found that certain forms of sexual and gender-based violence, including forced public stripping and nudity, sexual harassment, threats of rape, and sexual assault are part of "standard operating procedures" of Israel's security forces. [39] The report concludes that "the frequency, prevalence and severity of sexual and gender-based crimes perpetrated across the Occupied Palestinian Territory [suggest] that sexual and gender-based violence is increasingly used as a method of war by Israel to destabilise, dominate, oppress and destroy the Palestinian people". [38] The Commission also finds, that the Israeli justice system "does not meet international standards of justice with respect to its application to Palestinians [as it is] used to persecute Palestinians and exculpate perpetrators". [38]
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