By SAM MEDNICK, Associated Press
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Two prominent Israeli rights groups on Monday said their country is committing genocide in Gaza, the first time that local Jewish-led organizations have made such accusations against Israel during nearly 22 months of war.
The claims by B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel add to an explosive debate over whether Israel’s military offensive in Gaza — launched in response to Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7, 2023 terrorist attack — amounts to genocide.
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The Palestinians, their supporters and international human rights groups make that claim, and the International Court of Justice is hearing a genocide case filed by South Africa against Israel.
But in Israel, founded in the wake of the Holocaust, even the government’s strongest critics have largely refrained from making such accusations.
That’s because of the deep sensitivities and strong memories of the Nazi genocide of Europe’s Jews, and because many in Israel view the war in Gaza as a justified response to the deadliest attack in the country’s history and not an attempt at extermination.
Shattering a taboo in Israel
The rights groups, while prominent and respected internationally, are considered in Israel to be on the political fringe, and their views are not representative of the vast majority of Israelis. But having the allegation of genocide come from Israeli voices shatters a taboo in a society that has been reticent to criticize Israel’s conduct in Gaza.
Guy Shalev, director of Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, said the Jewish-Israeli public often dismisses accusations of genocide as antisemitic or biased against Israel.
“Perhaps human rights groups based in Israel, and coming to this conclusion, is a way to confront that accusation and get people to acknowledge the reality,” he said.
Israel asserts that it is fighting an existential war and abides by international law. It has rejected genocide allegations as antisemitic.
It is challenging such allegations at the International Court of Justice, and it has rejected the International Criminal Court’s allegations that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant committed war crimes in Gaza. Both face international arrest warrants.
Israel’s government on Monday didn’t immediately comment on the reports by B’Tselem and PHRI. Israeli officials largely blame civilian deaths in Gaza on Hamas, saying it uses civilians as shields by embedding militants in residential areas.
The reports echo international claims
The rights groups, in separate reports released jointly, said Israel’s policies in Gaza, statements by senior officials about its goals there and the systematic dismantling of the territory’s health system contributed to their conclusion of genocide.
Their claims echoed those of previous reports from international rights groups like Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.
Like other rights groups, B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel have not been allowed into Gaza during the war. Their reports are based on testimonies, documents, eyewitnesses and consultations with legal experts.
Hamas’ attack on Israel that started the war sparked a shift in the country’s policy toward Palestinians in Gaza from “repression and control to destruction and annihilation,” B’Tselem said.
The group has long been outspoken about Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. It halted cooperation with the military nearly a decade ago, saying the army’s investigations into wrongdoing weren’t serious, and it has accused Israel of being an apartheid state.
The PHRI report was a detailed, legal-medical analysis focusing on what it called the step-by-step dismantling of Gaza’s health and life-sustaining systems including electricity, clean water and access to food.
Its report says Israel has committed three of the acts of genocide defined by international law, including “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”
The Israeli rights groups said repeated statements by Israeli officials and the military endorsing the total destruction, starvation and permanent displacement of Palestinians in Gaza, combined with policies on the ground, have demonstrated that Israel is intentionally trying to destroy Palestinian society.
A ‘painful’ conclusion
The term “genocide” strikes a chord in Israel, where Israelis grow up learning about the Holocaust and hearing survivors’ harrowing stories, while promising it would never happen again.
The 1948 Convention of the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was drawn up in the aftermath of World War II and the murder by Nazi Germany of 6 million Jews. It defines genocide as acts “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.”
“As the grandson of a Holocaust survivor, it’s very painful for me to be reaching this conclusion,” said Shalev from PHRI. But after growing up in a society where the Holocaust was so important, it demands some kind of responsibility, he said.
Until now, Israeli criticism of the war in Gaza has been focused on Netanyahu and whether his wartime decision-making has been politically motivated and delayed the return of hostages — 50 of them still in Gaza.
Broader scrutiny of Israel’s conduct in Gaza has been limited for multiple reasons. Despite the vast destruction and death in the territory and Israel’s growing international isolation, most Israelis have believed for much of the war in its righteousness.
And with most Jewish Israelis serving in the army, it’s difficult for most people to fathom that their relatives in uniform could be carrying out genocide. Some soldiers, however, have refused to fight in the war.
Jeffrey Herf, a historian who has published much on antisemitism, said the allegation of genocide doesn’t take into account that there is a war between two parties. He said it ignores Hamas as a military force and Israel’s right to defend itself.
Israelis’ focus is on the hostages, not Palestinians
After groups like B’Tselem in recent years accused Israel of apartheid, more mainstream voices in Israel also picked up the claim, although in less sweeping ways.
Israeli historian Tom Segev said he’s not sure the new reports and their allegations will have an impact on the public.
“The major thing for Israelis is a question of the hostages, not necessarily the fate of the population in Gaza,” he said. But he said what’s happening in Gaza is undermining the ideological and moral justification for the existence of Israel.
The rights groups said the international community hasn’t done enough to protect Palestinians and are calling on the world, including Israelis who have stayed silent, to speak up.
“We have an obligation to do everything we can to speak the truth about this, to stand by the victims,” said Sarit Michaeli, the international director for B’Tselem.
