There are “clear signs of ethnic cleansing” by Israel as it wages war in Gaza, according to a new report from Doctors Without Borders, which became the second group in a week to condemn the country’s conduct in the besieged enclave.
“Our firsthand observations of the medical and humanitarian catastrophe inflicted on Gaza are consistent with the descriptions provided by an increasing number of legal experts and organizations concluding that genocide is taking place in Gaza,” the aid group, also known as Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), said in the report published Thursday.
“In the north of the Strip in particular, the recent military offensive is a clear illustration of the brutal war the Israeli forces are waging on Gaza, and we are witnessing clear signs of ethnic cleansing as Palestinian life is being wiped off the area,” it said.
“While we don’t have legal authority to establish intentionality, the signs of ethnic cleansing and the ongoing devastation—including mass killings, severe physical and mental health injuries, forced displacement, and impossible conditions of life for Palestinians under siege and bombardment — are undeniable,” it added.
NBC News has asked the Israel Defense forces for comment on the report. It has strongly rejected accusations of genocide and ethnic cleansing in the past, while insisting that it does everything possible to limit the loss of human life.
Displaced Palestinian children desperately reach for bread at a food distribution site in Khan Younis.
Human Rights Watch, in a separate report also released Thursday, accused Israeli authorities of intentionally depriving Palestinians in Gaza of access to safe water for drinking and sanitation.
“Water is essential for human life, yet for over a year the Israeli government has deliberately denied Palestinians in Gaza the bare minimum they need to survive,” Tirana Hassan, the group’s executive director, said in a statement released alongside the report, “Extermination and Acts of Genocide: Israel Deliberately Depriving Palestinians in Gaza of Water.”
“This isn’t just negligence; it is a calculated policy of deprivation that has led to the deaths of thousands,” she added.
An IDF spokesperson said that it “firmly rejects allegations asserting it has deliberately targeted water infrastructure in the Gaza Strip,” adding that its strikes in Gaza are carried out in accordance with international law and with “all feasible efforts … taken to mitigate harm to civilians.”
The spokesperson added that the military was working to reactivate a desalination plant in Gaza’s southern city of Khan Younis, among other projects that include repairing damaged pipes.
But the reports add to a chorus of criticism from aid and rights groups. Amnesty International became the first major nonprofit group to accuse Israel of acts of genocide in the Gaza Strip in a report this month, echoing similar claims from numerous United Nations agencies.
At the time, an IDF spokesperson called Amnesty’s claims “entirely baseless.”
A Palestinian boy looks out from the aftermath of an Israeli strike in Gaza City.
While war crimes such as genocide are legal designations that would normally be made by a judge, the charities’ accusations will do little to dispel the charges already brought against the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant against Netanyahu for crimes against humanity, along with Yoav Gallant, his former defense minister, as well as Hamas military chief Mohammed Deif. Israel said it killed Deif, the head of the Qassam Brigades, in August.
Israel responded furiously to the warrants, with Netanyahu’s office branding them “antisemitic,” rejecting the charges as “absurd and false.” Oren Marmorstein, a spokesperson for Israel’s Foreign Affairs Ministry, told NBC News on Sunday that Israel had filed an appeal of the ICC warrants.
The war in Gaza has raged for 14 months and, according to local officials, more than 45,000 people have been killed in Israel’s military campaign there. Israeli forces entered Gaza in response to the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack, in which around 1,200 people Israelis were killed and around 250 people taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
Around 100 hostages are still being held by Hamas and other militant groups, although a third are thought to be dead.
While Israel has long justified the death toll and high levels of destruction in Gaza in the context of its war against the Iran-backed militia, there appears to be a limited response from Hamas in large parts of Gaza even as its campaign continues, according to Andreas Krieg, a senior lecturer at King’s College London’s school of security studies.
Injured civilians arrive at hospital in Gaza City after an Israeli airstrike on the Dar al-Arqam and Shaaban al-Rayes schools sheltering displaced people on Thursday.
“Certainly in part of the Gaza Strip in the north, I would concur with the observation that the intent there is no longer to fight Hamas because there isn’t much resistance left anyway, but it’s the intent of ethnic cleansing and depriving the local population of their livelihood, which is water, electricity, which then has an effect of intentionally killing people,” Krieg said.
The Israeli military has insisted that it does everything possible to limit the loss of human life. But many of its actions in Gaza would be “permissible, acceptable under any circumstance within a Western military,” Krieg told NBC News Friday, adding that it was important to make the legal distinction between genocide and acts of genocide.
“We always think about genocide being some sort of coherent strategy, like in Rwanda, for example, where the government was clearly giving permission to people to kill a particular group of people, and then it’s orchestrated more or less with central supervision,” he said. “That’s obviously not the case here, but the fact is that the IDF has been given an extremely permissive environment.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
