Since then, Israel’s military action has killed 63,000 people, damaged or destroyed most buildings in the territory and forced nearly all its residents to flee their homes at least once, according to local health authorities. A global hunger monitor relied on by the United Nations says parts of the territory are now suffering a man-made famine, which Israel also denies.
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The IAGS’s three-page resolution calls on Israel to “immediately cease all acts that constitute genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity against Palestinians in Gaza, including deliberate attacks against and killing of civilians including children; starvation; deprivation of humanitarian aid, water, fuel and other items essential to the survival of the population; sexual and reproductive violence; and forced displacement of the population”.
It also states that the Hamas attack on Israel which precipitated the war constituted international crimes.
The 1948 UN Genocide Convention, adopted after the mass murder of Jews by Nazi Germany, defines genocide as crimes committed “with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such”. It requires all countries to act to prevent and stop genocide.
Since the genocide scholars’ association was founded in 1994, it has passed nine resolutions recognising historic or ongoing episodes as genocides. It has also previously held that China’s treatment of the minority Muslim Uyghurs and Myanmar’s crackdown on Rohingya Muslims meet the threshold for genocide.
In 2006, the organisation said statements by then-Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in which he called for Israel to be “wiped off the map”, had “genocidal intent”.
Palestinians fleeing the northern Gaza Strip on Monday.Credit: AP
The IAGS publishes a journal and holds regular international conferences of scholars studying genocide, and is considered the largest academic group in the field.
Ismail Al-Thawabta, head of the Hamas-run Gaza government media office, welcomed the resolution’s “prestigious scholarly stance”, which he said “places a legal and moral obligation on the international community to take urgent action to stop the crime, protect civilians, and hold the leaders of the occupation accountable”.
Sergey Vasiliev, a professor of international law at the Open University in the Netherlands and who is not a member of the association, said the resolution showed that “this legal assessment has become mainstream within academia, particularly in the field of genocide studies”.
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Several international rights groups and some Israeli non-government organisations have already accused Israel of committing genocide. Last week, hundreds of UN staff at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk wrote to ask him to explicitly describe the Gaza war as an unfolding genocide, according to a letter reviewed by Reuters.
Meanwhile, Israel launched strikes across the Gaza Strip on Monday, killing at least 31 people as it presses ahead with a major offensive in the territory’s largest city, according to health officials in Gaza.
Airstrikes and artillery shelling have echoed through Gaza City since Israel declared it a combat zone last week. On the city’s outskirts and in the Jabaliya refugee camp, residents have observed explosive-laden robots demolishing buildings.
“Another merciless night in Gaza City,” said Saeed Abu Elaish, a Jabaliya-born medic sheltering in the north-western side of the city.
Israel says it only targets militants and blames Hamas for civilian casualties because the militant group – now largely reduced to a guerrilla organisation – operates in densely populated areas.
Reuters, AP
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