Soaring Gaza civilian toll casts doubt on Israeli claims of compliance with law of war

Since Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza began on Oct. 27, there have been numerous incidents in which civilians have been killed. (AFP)
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Updated 04 June 2024
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Soaring Gaza civilian toll casts doubt on Israeli claims of compliance with law of war

  • Since Israel’s ground invasion began, there have been numerous incidents in which innocent lives have been lost
  • Soaring civilian toll could tip the scales of justice if Israel’s wartime leaders end up in the dock in The Hague

LONDON: In August 1949, just 15 months after its foundation, the State of Israel became a signatory to the UN’s Treaty No. 973.

On the same day, the UN member states ratified three other conventions, updating and strengthening international agreements that had been put in place for the protection of sick, wounded and captured combatants in time of war.

But it was the still-raw memory of the multiple horrors that had been endured by millions of civilians during the long years of the Second World War, in which non-combatants accounted for more than 60 percent of all deaths, that prompted the need for the new convention.

Never before in the history of modern warfare had so much barbarity been visited upon so many civilians, including that meted out by the Nazis during the German occupation of much of Europe between 1939 and 1945.




A Palestinian girl who received treatment at a WHO-supported stabilization centre after being diagnosed with severe acute malnutrition and dehydration. (WHO)

In 1949, few states had better cause to support the adoption of the so-called Fourth Geneva Convention than Israel, which since the war had become home to tens of thousands of European Jews who had survived the Holocaust, but who would carry with them forever the memory of the 6 million members of their community who had not escaped the Nazis’ “final solution.”

Small wonder, then, that on Aug. 12, 1949, Dr. Menahem Kahany, Israel’s delegate at Geneva, put his hand eagerly to Treaty No. 973, the “Geneva Convention relative to the protection of civilian persons in time of war.”

The convention is exhaustively comprehensive, its 159 articles describing and proscribing almost every imaginable humanitarian outrage an armed force might commit against defenseless civilians.

For the avoidance of any doubt about the humanitarian responsibilities of armies in occupied territory, an amendment was later added. This was “Protocol 1” specifically prohibiting “indiscriminate attacks,” which it defined as “incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated.”

Fast-forward 75 years to 2024 and to what even the US, Israel’s staunchest supporter, considers to be the unacceptable scale of destruction and loss of civilian life in Gaza at the hands of the Israeli army.

Since Israel’s retaliatory ground invasion of Gaza began on Oct. 27, there have been numerous incidents in which its heavy-handed warmongering has cost civilian lives.

One of the most widely publicized of these — ironically, perhaps, given that six of the seven victims were Westerners, and only 25-year-old Saifeddin Abutaha was a Palestinian — was the attack on a World Central Kitchen aid convoy on April 1.




Never before in the history of modern warfare had so much barbarity been visited upon so many civilians. (AFP)

The Israeli army, aware that the eyes of the world were on it, carried out a hasty internal inquiry. Its report concluded that its drone team responsible had mistaken a bag for a gun, but managed also to include some victim-blaming, claiming the vehicles’ large rooftop markings were not visible at night.

The army admitted the attack was a “grave accident” and sacked a colonel and a major it deemed responsible.

Barely a month later, on May 27, a week after the UN’s International Court of Justice ordered Israel to halt its offensive in Rafah, an airstrike on a camp for refugees in the city set fire to tents and killed at least 45 people, including women and children, and wounded dozens more.

Faced with global revulsion, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the airstrike had been a “tragic mishap.”

But as distressing as such individual incidents are, it is the sheer scale of the death and destruction visited upon Gaza and its civilians that would tip the scales of justice should the International Criminal Court have its way and Israel’s leaders end up in the dock in The Hague.

According to the latest figures from the Palestinian Ministry of Health — issued on Sunday, June 2 —  since Oct. 7 more than 36,000 Palestinians, including over 15,000 children, have been killed in Gaza. More than 10,000 are missing, presumed buried under rubble, and more than 80,000 have been wounded.

Even if the war stopped tomorrow, Israel’s systematic campaign of destruction has left Gaza mostly in ruins, with more than half its homes, over 200 mosques and most of its schools and hospitals damaged or destroyed.




Israel attacked a World Central Kitchen aid convoy on April 1, killing seven. (AFP)

On May 20, Karim Khan, the prosecutor of the ICC, issued applications for arrest warrants for five individuals on charges of war crimes. The first three were for Yahya Sinwar, head of Hamas in the Gaza Strip; Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri (also known as Deif), commander-in-chief of Hamas’ military wing; and Ismail Haniyeh, head of the Hamas Political Bureau.

But in a move that outraged the government of Israel, but surprised few even among the country’s friends, Khan went on to accuse Netanyahu, and Yoav Gallant, his minister of defense, of “war crimes and crimes against humanity committed on the territory of the State of Palestine (in the Gaza Strip) from at least 8 October 2023.”

The charges were brought under several articles of the ICC’s governing Rome Statute, which Israel signed in 2000 but later declared it would not ratify.

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Announcing the warrants and revealing the vast amount of evidence the court’s investigators had accrued, Khan said Israel’s crimes against humanity had been committed “as part of a widespread and systematic attack against the Palestinian civilian population pursuant to state policy.”

Israel had “intentionally and systematically deprived the civilian population in all parts of Gaza of objects indispensable to human survival.”

Like all states, he added, Israel had a right to take action to defend its population. But that right “does not absolve Israel or any state of its obligation to comply with international humanitarian law.

“Notwithstanding any military goals they may have, the means Israel chose to achieve them in Gaza — namely, intentionally causing death, starvation, great suffering, and serious injury to body or health of the civilian population — are criminal.”




The World Central Kitchen workers who were killed by Israeli airstrikes. (AFP)

The Israeli government has strongly rejected any comparison between its actions and those of Hamas.

Of course Hamas leaders are also, according to the ICC, guilty of war crimes. The rapes, murders and kidnapping during the assault on Israel on Oct. 7 shocked right-thinking people across the world, including in the Middle East.

But Israel is not a militant group. It is a state, a member of the UN and, according to its founding Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, committed to the historic moral mission of being “a light unto the nations.”

As such, say its critics, it should be held — and should hold itself — to a higher moral standard.

“Yes, Hamas’ behavior is a threat, but that doesn’t give you a right to do what Israel is doing in Gaza,” said Yossi Mekelberg, a professor of international relations and an associate fellow of the Middle East and North Africa Program at London-based policy institute Chatham House.

INNUMBERS

• 36,470+ Palestinians killed in Gaza since Israel launched assault, according to local health ministry.

• 120 Hostages seized by Hamas and allies who are still unaccounted for.

• 1,2000 People killed during Oct. 7 Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel.

“I don’t think it’s morally right and I think that in the long term it is counterproductive for Israel’s survival and well-being.”

The “terrible atrocities that have taken place,” he added, were a breach of the written — and unwritten — rules of civilized behavior.

“Israel benefits from being a so-called liberal democracy, with all the support and the trade agreements and the military support, and so on, that comes with it,” he said.

“It's like belonging to an exclusive club — it comes with adhering to certain rules of behavior.

“But Israel, especially after Netanyahu, wants to have its cake and eat it, and it will take years to recover Israel’s reputation.”




“Forewarned repeatedly, the prime minister (Benjamin Netanyahu) and the defense minister (Yoav Gallant) should be held accountable under international law,” said Daniel Seidemann, an Israeli lawyer. (AFP)

Many Israelis and their supporters find themselves conflicted in the wake of the ICC’s accusations.

“I think the decision is not justified,” said US-based Shaiel Ben-Ephraim, the host of podcasts Israel Explained and History of the Land of Israel.

“The ICC is there to deal with the most glaring violations of international law, such as the intentional targeting of civilians as a matter of policy. Meanwhile, Israel is running a war where the goals are military.

“Don’t get me wrong,” added Ben-Ephraim, who describes himself as a “liberal Zionist.”

“The IDF (Israel Defense Forces) has not always followed humanitarian law. Terrible mistakes have been made. In particular, the soldiers have not always been disciplined, and civilians have been killed when it may have been prevented.

“But I am confident that the overall Israeli policy remains one of avoiding disproportionate harm to civilians and many of us feel the ICC is unfairly singling out Israel.”

That said, he added, “Israel could have avoided this if it had been more careful. Netanyahu has always preferred to keep his domestic interests ahead of his international ones. Especially since his government was toppled in 1999 by the right, that is a mistake he has vowed never to repeat.




Since Israel’s retaliatory ground invasion of Gaza began on Oct. 27, there have been numerous incidents in which its heavy-handed warmongering has cost civilian lives. (AFP)

“But he has neglected foreign interests far too much in this war and is now paying the price for it. Indeed, he is said to be completely obsessed with these warrants and wishes he had done more to prevent them.”

Daniel Seidemann, an Israeli lawyer and peace negotiator whose nongovernmental organization, Terrestrial Jerusalem, works to highlight illegal Jewish settlement activities in East Jerusalem, believes Israel “was well … within its rights to respond militarily to Oct. 7, and there can be no military action without inevitable civilian casualties.”

But “Israeli action in Gaza often went well beyond any reasonable interpretation of a proportional response. Forewarned repeatedly, the prime minister and the defense minister should be held accountable under international law.”


Syria militants, allies shell Aleppo in shock offensive

Updated 29 November 2024
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Syria militants, allies shell Aleppo in shock offensive

  • The violence has killed 242 people, according to a Syrian war monitor
  • Militants cut highway linking Aleppo to capital Damascus on Thursday

BEIRUT: Militants and their Turkish-backed allies shelled Syria’s second city Aleppo on Friday, in a major offensive against government troops that has sparked some of the deadliest fighting the country has seen in years.

The violence has killed 242 people, according to a Syrian war monitor, most of them combatants on both sides but also including civilians, including 24 dead, most of them in Russian air strikes.

The offensive began at a sensitive time for Syria and the region, with a fragile ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel taking effect earlier this week in neighboring Lebanon.

Syria’s civil war began when President Bashar Assad’s forces cracked down in 2011 on pro-democracy protests.

Since then, it has killed more than 500,000 people, displaced millions and battered the country’s infrastructure and industry.

Over the years, the conflict has morphed into a complex war drawing in militants and foreign powers, including Assad allies Russia, Iran and Hezbollah.

While the army regained control over most of the territory that it lost earlier in the war, the area where the militants and their allies are based has been subject to a truce since 2020.

This week, militants and factions backed by Turkiye, which neighbors Syria and supported the anti-Assad rebellion, launched a major surprise offensive against government forces.

On Friday, they shelled a university student residence in government-held Aleppo, northern Syria’s main city, according to state media, which reported four civilian deaths in the latest attack.

By Friday, they had wrested more than 50 towns and villages in northern Syria, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the biggest advances that anti-government factions had made in years.

The fighters had on Thursday cut the highway linking Aleppo to Syria’s capital Damascus, according to the Britain-based Observatory.

“The highway has now been put out of service, after it was reopened by regime forces years ago,” said the monitor, which has a network of sources inside Syria.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said “more than 14,000 people — nearly half are children — have been displaced” by the violence.

At a press conference earlier this week, Mohamed Bashir of the militant Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) said: “This operation aims to repel the sources of fire of the criminal enemy from the frontlines.”

HTS, led by Al-Qaeda’s former Syria branch, controls swathes of the northwest Idlib region as well as small parts of neighboring Aleppo, Hama and Latakia provinces.

The Idlib region is subject to a ceasefire, repeatedly violated but which had largely been holding, brokered by Turkiye and Russia after a Syrian government offensive in March 2020.

An AFP correspondent based in rebel-held areas said there were intense exchanges of fire in an area just seven kilometers (four miles) from the city of Aleppo.

HTS has close ties with Turkish-backed factions, and analyst Nick Heras of the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy said the fighters were “trying to preempt the possibility of a Syrian military campaign in the region of Aleppo.”

According to Heras, the Syrian government and its key backer Russia had been preparing for such a campaign.

Russia intervened in Syria’s civil war in 2015, turning the momentum of the conflict in favor of the president, whose forces at the time had lost control of most of country.

Turkiye, Heras said, may be “sending a message to both Damascus and Moscow to back down from their military efforts in northwest Syria.”

Other interests are also at stake.

As well as Russia, Assad has been propped up by Iran and allied militant groups, including Lebanon’s powerful Hezbollah.

Anti-government forces are, according to Heras, “in a better position to take and seize villages than Russian-backed Syrian government forces, while the Iranians are focused on Lebanon.”

A general in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards was killed in Syria on Thursday during the fighting, an Iranian news agency reported.

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said the deadly offensive was “part of a plan by the diabolical regime (Israel) and the US” and called for “firm and coordinated action to prevent the spread of terrorism in the region.”

During its war with Hezbollah in Lebanon, Israel intensified its strikes on Iran-backed groups in Syria including Hezbollah.

Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Observatory, said Assad’s forces “were totally unprepared” for the attack.

“It is strange to see regime forces being dealt such big blows despite Russian air cover and early signs that HTS was going to launch this operation,” Abdel Rahman said.

“Were they depending on Hezbollah, which is now busy in Lebanon?”


Israeli tanks retreat from central Gaza camp, medics say 30 killed

Updated 29 November 2024
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Israeli tanks retreat from central Gaza camp, medics say 30 killed

  • Some tanks remained active in the western area of the camp
  • Freed Palestinians, detained during the war, have complained of ill-treatment and torture

CAIRO: Israeli military strikes killed at least 30 Palestinians overnight in the Gaza Strip, most of them in the Nuseirat camp at the center of the enclave, medics said on Friday after some tanks pulled back from an area they had raided.
Medics said they had recovered 19 bodies of Palestinians killed in the northern areas of Nuseirat, one of the enclave's eight long-standing refugee camps.
Some tanks remained active in the western area of the camp and the Palestinian Civil Emergency Service said teams were unable to respond to distress calls from residents trapped inside their houses.
The rest were killed in the northern and southern areas of the Gaza Strip, medics added. There was no fresh statement by the Israeli military on Friday, but on Thursday it said its forces were continuing to "strike terror targets as part of the operational activity in the Gaza Strip".
Meanwhile, the Israeli authorities released around 30 Palestinians whom it had detained during the ongoing offensive in Gaza in the past months. The released people arrived at a hospital in southern Gaza for medical checkups, medics said.
Freed Palestinians, detained during the war, have complained of ill-treatment and torture in Israeli detention after they were released. Israel denies torture.
Months of efforts to negotiate a ceasefire in Gaza have yielded scant progress, and negotiations are now on hold.
A ceasefire in the parallel conflict between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah, an ally of Hamas, took effect before dawn on Wednesday, bringing a halt to hostilities that had escalated sharply in recent months and had overshadowed the Gaza conflict.
Israel's campaign in Gaza has killed nearly 44,200 people and displaced nearly all the enclave's population at least once, Gaza officials say. Vast swathes of the territory are in ruins.
The Hamas-led militants who attacked southern Israeli communities 13 months ago, triggering the war, killed some 1,200 people and captured more than 250 hostages, Israel has said.


France envoy urges Lebanon to pick president

Updated 29 November 2024
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France envoy urges Lebanon to pick president

  • Jean-Yves Le Drian’s visit to Lebanon follows a fragile ceasefire to end the war between Israel and Hezbollah
  • Lebanon has been without a president since Michel Aoun’s term ended in October 2022

BEIRUT: France’s special envoy on Friday said it was urgent for Lebanon to elect a president, after a parliamentary vote to end over two years without a head of state was announced for January.
Jean-Yves Le Drian’s visit to Lebanon follows a fragile ceasefire to end the war between Israel and Hezbollah.
“I came to Lebanon immediately after the ceasefire announcement to signal France’s support for its full implementation and to stress the urgent need, more than ever, to elect a president and restart the institutional process,” he said on Friday.
He said he was in support of Thursday’s announcement by Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri of a presidential election to be held on 9 January.
Lebanon has been without a president since Michel Aoun’s term ended in October 2022, with neither of the two main blocs – the Iran-backed Hezbollah and its opponents – having the majority required to elect one.
However, Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem said in a wartime speech that Hezbollah would “bring an effective contribution to the election of a president.”
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Wednesday he hoped the ceasefire agreement would mark “a new page for Lebanon,” calling for a swift presidential election.
Le Drian held talks with Lebanese officials and foreign diplomats from the United States, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt – countries working to address Lebanon’s presidential crisis.
The special envoy has visited Lebanon several times since being appointed to the position by French President Emmanuel Macron in June 2023.


Syria militants, allies shell Aleppo in shock offensive

Updated 29 November 2024
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Syria militants, allies shell Aleppo in shock offensive

  • The violence has killed 242 people, according to a Syrian war monitor
  • The fighters had on Thursday cut the highway linking Aleppo to Syria’s capital Damascus

BEIRUT: Militants and their Turkish-backed allies shelled Syria’s second city Aleppo on Friday, in a major offensive against government troops that has sparked some of the deadliest fighting the country has seen in years.

The violence has killed 242 people, according to a Syrian war monitor, most of them combatants on both sides but also including civilians, including 24 dead, most of them in Russian air strikes.

The offensive began at a sensitive time for Syria and the region, with a fragile ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel taking effect earlier this week in neighboring Lebanon.

Syria’s civil war began when President Bashar Assad’s forces cracked down in 2011 on pro-democracy protests.

Since then, it has killed more than 500,000 people, displaced millions and battered the country’s infrastructure and industry.

Over the years, the conflict has morphed into a complex war drawing in militants and foreign powers, including Assad allies Russia, Iran and Hezbollah.

While the army regained control over most of the territory that it lost earlier in the war, the area where the militants and their allies are based has been subject to a truce since 2020.

This week, militants and factions backed by Turkiye, which neighbors Syria and supported the anti-Assad rebellion, launched a major surprise offensive against government forces.

On Friday, they shelled a university student residence in government-held Aleppo, northern Syria’s main city, according to state media, which reported four civilian deaths in the latest attack.

By Friday, they had wrested more than 50 towns and villages in northern Syria, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the biggest advances that anti-government factions had made in years.

The fighters had on Thursday cut the highway linking Aleppo to Syria’s capital Damascus, according to the Britain-based Observatory.

“The highway has now been put out of service, after it was reopened by regime forces years ago,” said the monitor, which has a network of sources inside Syria.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said “more than 14,000 people — nearly half are children — have been displaced” by the violence.

At a press conference earlier this week, Mohamed Bashir of the militant Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) said: “This operation aims to repel the sources of fire of the criminal enemy from the frontlines.”

HTS, led by Al-Qaeda’s former Syria branch, controls swathes of the northwest Idlib region as well as small parts of neighboring Aleppo, Hama and Latakia provinces.

The Idlib region is subject to a ceasefire, repeatedly violated but which had largely been holding, brokered by Turkiye and Russia after a Syrian government offensive in March 2020.

An AFP correspondent based in rebel-held areas said there were intense exchanges of fire in an area just seven kilometers (four miles) from the city of Aleppo.

HTS has close ties with Turkish-backed factions, and analyst Nick Heras of the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy said the fighters were “trying to preempt the possibility of a Syrian military campaign in the region of Aleppo.”

According to Heras, the Syrian government and its key backer Russia had been preparing for such a campaign.

Russia intervened in Syria’s civil war in 2015, turning the momentum of the conflict in favor of the president, whose forces at the time had lost control of most of country.

Turkiye, Heras said, may be “sending a message to both Damascus and Moscow to back down from their military efforts in northwest Syria.”

Other interests are also at stake.

As well as Russia, Assad has been propped up by Iran and allied militant groups, including Lebanon’s powerful Hezbollah.

Anti-government forces are, according to Heras, “in a better position to take and seize villages than Russian-backed Syrian government forces, while the Iranians are focused on Lebanon.”

A general in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards was killed in Syria on Thursday during the fighting, an Iranian news agency reported.

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said the deadly offensive was “part of a plan by the diabolical regime (Israel) and the US” and called for “firm and coordinated action to prevent the spread of terrorism in the region.”

During its war with Hezbollah in Lebanon, Israel intensified its strikes on Iran-backed groups in Syria including Hezbollah.

Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Observatory, said Assad’s forces “were totally unprepared” for the attack.

“It is strange to see regime forces being dealt such big blows despite Russian air cover and early signs that HTS was going to launch this operation,” Abdel Rahman said.

“Were they depending on Hezbollah, which is now busy in Lebanon?”


Israeli military says Lebanese prohibited from moving south to several villages

Updated 29 November 2024
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Israeli military says Lebanese prohibited from moving south to several villages

  • Israel opened fire on Thursday toward what it called ‘suspects’ with vehicles arriving at several areas in the southern zone

DUBAI: Lebanese residents are prohibited from moving south to a line of villages and their surroundings until further notice, Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee said on X on Friday.
Israel said it opened fire on Thursday toward what it called “suspects” with vehicles arriving at several areas in the southern zone, saying it was a breach of the truce with Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah, which came into effect on Wednesday.
Hezbollah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah in turn accused Israel of violating the deal.
“The Israeli enemy is attacking those returning to the border villages,” Fadlallah told reporters, adding “there are violations today by Israel, even in this form.”
The Israeli military also said on Thursday the air force struck a facility used by Hezbollah to store mid-range rockets in southern Lebanon, the first such attack since the ceasefire took effect on Wednesday morning.
In his recent post, Adraee called on Lebanese residents to not return to more than 60 southern villages, saying anyone who moves south of the specified line “puts themselves in danger.”
The Lebanese army earlier accused Israel of violating the ceasefire several times on Wednesday and Thursday.
The exchange of accusations highlighted the fragility of the ceasefire, which was brokered by the United States and France to end the conflict, fought in parallel with the Gaza war. The truce lasts for 60 days in the hope of reaching a permanent cessation of hostilities.