By Janet Ekstract NEW YORK – On April 29, Amnesty International’s annual report was released, accusing Israel of acting with “specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza, thus committing genocide.” The report said that Israel “live-streamed genocide” in Gaza by engineering a humanitarian disaster and forcibly displacing the greater majority of Gaza’s populace. Amnesty’s report further states: “Since 7 October 2023, when Hamas perpetrated horrific crimes against Israeli citizens and others and captured more than 250 hostages, the world has been made audience to a live-streamed genocide,” written by the Secretary-General of Amnesty International Agnes Callamard. Callamard added: “States watched on as if powerless, as Israel killed thousands upon thousands of Palestinians, wiping out entire multigenerational families, destroying homes, livelihoods, hospitals and schools.” Further, the report stated that Israel’s campaign to wipe out Gaza and Palestinians had left most Palestinians of Gaza “displaced, homeless, hungry, at risk of life-threatening diseases and unable to access medical care, power or clean water.”
Amnesty International also said that during 2024, it “documented multiple war crimes by Israel, including direct attacks on civilians and civilian objects, and indiscriminate and disproportionate attacks.” The report also highlighted that because of Israel’s actions that 1.9 million Palestinians, close to 90% of Gaza’s population was left homeless and that Israel “deliberately engineered an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe.” The report noted that despite mass protests against Israel’s action in Western capitals, “the world’s government individually and multilaterally failed, repeatedly, to take meaningful action to end the atrocities and were slow even in calling for a ceasefire.” Amnesty warned against Israel’s actions in the occupied Palestinian territory of the West Bank and stated that Israel uses a system of “apartheid” when it comes to Palestinians. The report read in part: “Israel’s system of apartheid became increasingly violent in the occupied West Bank, marked by a sharp increase in unlawful killings and state-backed attacks by Israeli settlers on Palestinian civilians.” Amnesty International’s director for the middle East and North Africa region, Heba Morayef denounced Israel’s actions: “the extreme levels of suffering that Palestinians in Gaza have been forced to endure on a daily basis over the past year” as well as “the world’s complete inability or lack of political will to put a stop to it.”
