Israeli authorities and security forces deliberately targeted Palestinian children, leading to genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza, and war crimes in the occupied West Bank, an independent United Nations investigation said Tuesday.
The report of the United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel investigated violations against Palestinian children since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas on October 7, 2023.
About 30 percent of those killed in the Gaza war were children, a report found.
The commission’s previous report in September found that Israel committed genocide in Gaza and that senior Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, instigated the actions, accusations that Israel called slanderous.
Israel’s mission in Geneva said Israel rejected what it called a “second defamation report”.
“Israel rejects this terrible hoax,” it said in a statement, adding that “every child deserves to be protected” and claiming that the report ignored “the brutal tactics of Hamas”.
