“Israel continues to commit genocide by targeting children in Gaza, UN inquiry finds

Independent report says by aiming at children Israel is undermining capacity of Palestinian people to exist

Oliver Holmes
Tue 23 Jun 2026 19.56 BST

Israel continues to commit genocide by deliberately targeting Palestinian children in Gaza, an ⁠independent UN inquiry has found.

The report by the UN independent international commission of inquiry examined violations against Palestinian children since the start of the war in Gaza, and said about 30% of the people killed by Israeli forces have been children.

A previous report by the commission in September found that Israel had committed genocide in Gaza and that Israeli officials, including the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, incited these acts. Netanyahu is separately wanted by the international criminal court (ICC) for war crimes.

The Israeli mission in Geneva said Israel rejected the commission’s “libellous sham”. Israel has fought hard against allegations of genocide, while receiving critical diplomatic support from its allies, including the US and the UK.

A significant body of research by legal and rights experts has concluded that Israel is intent on destroying Palestinians, including analyses by UN investigators, rights bodies such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, and genocide scholars worldwide.

Genocide, which became a crime after the second world war and the Holocaust, is considered the most serious international crime.

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Israeli forces continued to use high-payload munitions and weapons with widespread effects in densely populated residential areas, despite mounting child casualties, the commission said.

“This indicates that ‌such attacks, which killed children in such high numbers, were intentional,” it said. It added that it believed children were targeted collectively because the Israeli security forces considered the civilian population as a whole to be associated with Hamas and other armed groups.

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Conditions Israel imposed on Gaza, including widespread attacks, repeated displacement, and starvation caused by its blockade of aid, food and medicine, severely harmed children’s health and development, resulting in preventable deaths and trauma, the report said.

The inquiry also found that attacks ⁠on healthcare and reproductive facilities affected newborns’ survival and the reported increase in miscarriages, and that nearly all children in Gaza were reported to be in need of psychological support.

Israel’s rebuttal accused Hamas of systematically diverting humanitarian aid and fuel for hospitals. Hamas has rejected such accusations, while Israel has been accused of blocking aid and fuel from reaching Gaza.

The report focused not only on Gaza but also the occupied West Bank, which Israel continues to control despite the international court of justice declaring its occupation unlawful.

In the ‌West Bank, including East Jerusalem, the commission found a sharp increase in violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinian children, and documented evidence of torture, including sexual and gender-based violence, during mass arrests and detention.

[…]

Reuters contributed to this report”

• Full report “Israel continues to commit genocide by targeting children in Gaza, UN inquiry finds” on the website of the Guardian (last checked in July 2026).

• Note also report “ICJ sets next phase of South Africa’s Gaza genocide case” from 3 March 2026 by the Mail & Guardian in the ‘International Context’ section of this website.

• See also essay “As a former IDF soldier and historian of genocide, I was deeply disturbed by my recent visit to Israel”. Essay by Israeli-American historian Omer Bartov, Brown University, USA, published in the Guardian on 13 August 2024, in the ‘International Context’ section of this website.

• See also report “Namibia Welcomes ICJ Ruling on Israeli Occupation” from 22 July 2024 by the Windhoek Observer in the ‘Media Reports’ section of this website.

• See also report “ICJ says Israel must prevent genocide in Gaza” from 26 January 2024 by BBC in the ‘International Context’ section of this website.

• Note also ICJ’s Order in genocide case brought by South Africa against Israel regarding occupied Palestine of 26 January 2024 in the ‘Primary Sources’ section of this website.