By Stephanie van den Berg
THE HAGUE – Human Rights Watch said Thursday that Israel has killed thousands of Palestinians in Gaza by denying them clean water, which it said legally amounts to genocide and extermination.
“This policy, carried out in the context of a mass killing of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, means that the Israeli authorities have committed the crime against humanity of extermination, which is still ongoing. This policy also amounts to an ‘act of genocide’ within the meaning of the 1948 Genocide Convention,” Human Rights Watch said in its report.
Israel has repeatedly rejected any accusations of genocide and said it respected international law and had the right to defend itself after Hamas’ cross-border attack from Gaza on October 7, 2023, which sparked the war.
In a statement to X, the Israeli Foreign Ministry wrote: “The truth is the complete opposite of HRW’s lies.”
“Since the beginning of the war, Israel has enabled the continuous flow of water and humanitarian aid to Gaza, despite facing constant attacks from the terrorist organization Hamas,” the statement said.
Although the report described the water deprivation as an act of genocide, it noted that proving the crime of genocide against Israeli officials would also require establishing their intent. She cited statements by some senior Israeli officials that they “want to destroy the Palestinians,” meaning that depriving them of water “could amount to the crime of genocide.”
“We have found that the Israeli government is intentionally killing Palestinians in Gaza by denying them the water they need to survive,” Lama Fakih, Middle East director of Human Rights Watch, said at a news conference.
In response, Israel said it had ensured that water infrastructure remained operational. It said international partners had sent water tankers through Israeli border crossings, including last week, and that Israel had facilitated the entry of more than 1.2 million tons of humanitarian supplies into the Gaza Strip.
Human Rights Watch is the second major human rights group in a month to use the word genocide to describe Israel’s actions in Gaza, after Amnesty International released a report finding that Israel is committing genocide.
Both reports came just weeks after the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense chief for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity. They deny the allegations.
The 1948 Genocide Convention, enacted following the mass murder of Jews in the Nazi Holocaust, defines the crime of genocide as “acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group “. .
The 184-page report by Human Rights Watch said the Israeli government stopped water pipes to Gaza and cut off electricity and restricted fuel, meaning Gaza’s own water and sanitation facilities could not be used.
As a result, Palestinians in Gaza in many areas only have access to a few liters of water per day, well below the 15 liter limit for survival, the group said.
Israel began its air and ground war in Gaza after Hamas-led militants attacked Israeli communities across the border 14 months ago, killing 1,200 people and returning more than 250 hostages to Gaza, according to Israel.
The Israeli campaign has killed more than 45,000 Palestinians, displaced most of the 2.3 million residents and reduced much of the coastal enclave to rubble.
