UN-commissioned experts say Gaza ceasefire has not stopped Israel from committing genocide

JERUSALEM: A ceasefire agreement in Gaza has not stopped what a group of independent experts commissioned by the UN say is genocide carried out by Israel in the territory, the team said in a new report Monday (Oct 26). They also accused Israeli forces of crimes against humanity, including torture and rape, in the West Bank.

In response, Israel's mission in Geneva called for the commission's dissolution and said on X the report marked an example of the body's “misinformation campaign to demonise the state of Israel and portray its very existence as criminal."

Israel has long criticised the commission's output and denied accusations of genocide in Gaza and sexual assault by its forces.

The Associated Press could not independently corroborate multiple graphic accounts described in the report of sexual assaults by prison guards and soldiers on Palestinian detainees since October 2023. In one, female guards strip-searched a pregnant Palestinian, touching inside her anus and vagina. In another, guards beat a detainee and hurled sexist slurs while denying her access to the toilet and sanitary pads. She bled onto her clothes and interrogation chair.

The findings by the Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, which seeks to document in minute detail the allegations and evidence of crimes to bolster accountability for perpetrators, could be used by prosecutors at the International Criminal Court or in other jurisdictions to try to bring justice to victims and their relatives.

The report Monday said Israel was “continuing to commit genocidal acts with the genocidal intent to destroy, in whole or in part, the Palestinians in Gaza”.

Much of the harm has come from Israel’s expansion deeper into Gaza during the ceasefire period, the report says. Since October 2025, when the ceasefire was signed, Israeli forces have gone from controlling 53 per cent of Gaza to at least 60 per cent, the commission said.

In that time, Israeli fire across the advancing front has killed at least 196 Palestinians - including 18 women, 32 boys and 11 girls, the commission said.

The report also accused Israeli soldiers and prison guards of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the West Bank, including extermination, torture, rape and other forms of sexual violence and persecution against civilians.

The commission said that it had recently documented six cases where Israeli guards were sexually violent toward male detainees from Gaza in the Sde Teiman military prison.

In one case, it says guards raped a Palestinian detainee with a stick, then forced him to put the stick in his mouth until he vomited. It also recalled another episode in which guards instructed a Palestinian man to urinate as they tied a plastic cord around his genitals.

The ceasefire scaled down a devastating war started by the Hamas-led attacks on Israel on Oct 7, 2023, when the militants killed 1,200 people and took 251 hostages. Israel responded with a campaign that has killed over 74,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's Health Ministry.