UN experts say Gaza ceasefire has not stopped Israeli genocide

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UN-commissioned experts say Gaza ceasefire has not stopped Israel from committing genocide independent.co.uk

Israel is 'continuing to commit genocidal acts with the genocidal intent to destroy, in whole or in part, the Palestinians in Gaza' despite the ceasefire, independent experts commissioned by the UN said in a report published Monday. The Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory found that much of the harm since the truce has come from Israel's expansion deeper into Gaza. Israel denies the genocide claims, and did not immediately respond to the report's publication.

The commission — an independent body that documents crimes in minute detail so that prosecutors at the International Criminal Court or in other jurisdictions can use its evidence — accuses Israeli forces of war crimes and crimes against humanity in both Gaza and the West Bank: extermination, torture, rape and other forms of sexual violence, and persecution of civilians. It says it recently documented six cases in which guards at the Sde Teiman military prison were sexually violent toward male detainees from Gaza; in one, the report says, guards raped a detainee with a stick, then forced him to put the stick in his mouth until he vomited. Other accounts describe female guards strip-searching a pregnant Palestinian woman, and a detainee denied toilet access and sanitary pads until she bled onto her clothes and interrogation chair. The Associated Press could not independently corroborate the sexual assault accounts. Israel denies the sexual assault claims as well.

The ceasefire scaled down a war that began with the Hamas-led attacks of October 7, 2023, in which militants killed 1,200 people and took 251 hostages. Israel's campaign has since killed more than 74,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. The commission drew its conclusions in part from seven investigated cases, between November 2023 and June 2026, in which Israeli forces caused bodily harm to Palestinians — often children — who did not appear to be posing a threat.

Since the truce was signed in October 2025, Israeli control of Gaza has grown from 53 percent to at least 60. The commission counts at least 196 Palestinians killed by Israeli fire across the advancing front in that time, including 18 women, 32 boys and 11 girls.