(Jerusalem) – Israeli authorities have intentionally deprived Palestinian civilians in Gaza of adequate access to water since October 2023, most likely resulting in thousands of deaths and thus committing the crime against humanity of extermination and acts of genocide, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. 

In the 179-page report, “Extermination and Acts of Genocide: Israel Deliberately Depriving Palestinians in Gaza of Water,” Human Rights Watch found that Israeli authorities have intentionally deprived Palestinians in Gaza of access to safe water for drinking and sanitation needed for basic human survival. Israeli authorities and forces cut off and later restricted piped water to Gaza; rendered most of Gaza’s water and sanitation infrastructure useless by cutting electricity and restricting fuel; deliberately destroyed and damaged water and sanitation infrastructure and water repair materials; and blocked the entry of critical water supplies.

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Human Rights Watch determined that Israeli forces carried out the attack using an air-dropped bomb equipped with a United States-produced Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) guidance kit. The US government should suspend weapons transfers to Israel because of the military’s repeated, unlawful attacks on civilians, for which US officials may be complicit in war crimes.

“Israel’s use of US arms to unlawfully attack and kill journalists away from any military target is a terrible mark on the United States as well as Israel,” said Richard Weir, senior crisis, conflict and arms researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The Israeli military’s previous deadly attacks on journalists without any consequences give little hope for accountability in this or future violations against the media.”

The attack took place in the early morning at the Hasbaya Village Club Resort in Hasbaya, a town in southern Lebanon, where more than a dozen journalists had been staying for over three weeks. Human Rights Watch found no evidence of fighting, military forces, or military activity in the immediate area at the time of the attack. Information Human Rights Watch reviewed indicates that the Israeli military knew or should have known that journalists were staying in the area and in the targeted building. After initially stating that its forces struck a building where “terrorists were operating,” the Israeli military said hours later that “the incident is under review.”

Human Rights Watch interviewed eight people who were staying at or near the resort, including three injured journalists and the resort’s owner. Human Rights Watch also visited the site on November 1 and verified 6 videos and 22 photos of the attack and its aftermath, plus satellite images. There has been no response to letters sent to the Israeli military on November 14 with findings and questions and to the Lebanese military on November 5 with questions.

The attack on the building in which the journalists were staying took place just after 3 a.m., based on interviews and CCTV footage with the same time code. Most of the journalists were sleeping. Zakaria Fadel, 25, an assistant cameraman for Lebanon-based ISOL for Broadcast, a Lebanese satellite and broadcast services provider, said he was brushing his teeth when the blast threw him into the air.

A munition struck the single-story building and detonated upon hitting the floor. The blast killed Ghassan Najjar, a journalist and cameraman, and Mohammad Reda, a satellite broadcast engineer, both from Al Mayadeen TV, and Wissam Kassem, a cameraman from the Hezbollah-owned outlet Al Manar TV. Al Mayadeen is a Lebanon-based pan-Arab television station politically allied with Hezbollah and the Syrian government.

Human Rights Watch verified videos taken minutes after the attack which show the targeted building completely destroyed and nearby buildings damaged. The strike collapsed a wall in the adjacent building, seriously injuring Hassan Hoteit, 48, a cameraman for ISOL for Broadcast, and substantially damaged the wall of a small building about 10 meters away, injuring other journalists, including Ali Mortada, 46, a camera operator for Al Jazeera.

Mortada said he woke to the blast and pieces of concrete falling on him, injuring his face and his right arm. When the debris stopped falling, he went to see if his colleagues were okay. He and others found Hoteit injured, and the building struck destroyed. Mortada said he saw the bodies of Kassem and Najjar nearby. They found Reda’s remains further away.

Soon after, the resort’s concierge approached them, saying he had found two human legs in one bedroom. Ehab el-Okdy, a reporter for Al Jazeera who was staying at the resort, said that he also saw the bodies and body parts of the dead reporters. “We saw the bodies,” he said. “We saw Mohammad Reda was shattered all over the place.”

Anoir Ghaida, the resort’s owner, said the journalists had arrived on October 1, following an evacuation order from the Israeli military for an area south of Hasbaya. The journalists had been reporting from Ibl al-Saqi, an area included in the evacuation order.

The journalists said that from October 1 until the day of the attack, they made routine and repeated trips, reporting from the Hasbaya area, frequently doing live television reports from a hilltop that overlooked large parts of southern Lebanon. The journalists and Ghaida said they would leave the resort in the morning and return in the evening, about the same time each day. Most of the vehicles at the resort were marked “Press” or “TV.”

The journalists and Ghaida said they constantly heard the buzzing of aerial drones in the area, indicating it was most likely under Israeli surveillance. Prior to October 25, there had been no attacks on Hasbaya town.

Since the current hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah began on October 8, 2023, the Israeli military has attacked and killed journalists and targeted Al Mayadeen TV. On October 23, Israeli forces attacked and destroyed an office used by Al Mayadeen in Beirut. Al Mayadeen had evacuated their staff from the building.

Israeli strikes killed at least six Lebanese journalists between October 8, 2023, and October 29, 2024, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Human Rights Watch found that the October 13, 2023 attack, which killed the Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah and injured six other journalists, was an apparent war crime. On November 21, 2023, an Israeli strike killed two Lebanese journalists reporting for Al Mayadeen TV, Rabih al-Maamari and Farah Omar, and their driver, Hussein Akil, in Tayr Harfa in southern Lebanon.

“Journalism Targeted,” Digital, Dream / Dreamland v3, 2024

Human Rights Watch verified a photo and video from Najjar’s funeral that showed his casket wrapped in a Hezbollah flag and buried in a southern Beirut cemetery where Hezbollah fighters are buried, near the grave of al-Maamari. A Hezbollah spokesperson told Human Rights Watch on November 14 that Najjar had asked to be buried near his friend and colleague al-Maamari, but that Najjar “was just a civilian” and “had no involvement whatsoever in any military activities.”

Human Rights Watch found remnants at the attack site and reviewed photographs of remnants collected by the resort owner and determined that they were consistent with a JDAM guidance kit assembled and sold by the US company Boeing. Human Rights Watch identified one remnant as part of the guidance kit’s actuation system that moves the fins. It bore a numerical code identifying it as having been manufactured by Woodard, a US company that makes components for guidance systems on munitions, including the JDAM. The JDAM is affixed to air-dropped bombs and allows them to be guided to a target by using satellite coordinates, making the weapon accurate to within several meters.

Human Rights Watch wrote to Boeing and to Woodard on November 14, but did not receive responses. Companies have responsibilities under the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, the OECD Guidelines on Multinational Enterprises on Responsible Business Conduct, and related guidance to stop, prevent, mitigate, or remediate actual and potential violations of international humanitarian law that they cause, contribute to, or are linked with. 

Given Israel’s record of widespread laws of war violations and lack of accountability, companies should end arms sales, recall already sold weapons wherever possible, and stop all support services for already sold weapons.

Human Rights Watch has previously documented the Israeli military’s unlawful use of US-equipped weapons in a strike in March that killed seven aid workers in southern Lebanon.

International humanitarian law, or the laws of war, prohibits attacks against civilians and civilian objects. Journalists are considered civilians and are immune from attack so long as they are not directly participating in hostilities. Journalists cannot be attacked for their work as journalists, even if the opposing party considers the media biased or being used for propaganda. When carrying out any attack, warring parties must take all feasible precautions to minimize civilian harm and damage to civilian objects. This includes taking all necessary actions to verify that targets are military objectives.

Individuals who commit serious violations of the laws of war with criminal intent—that is, intentionally or recklessly—may be prosecuted for war crimes. Individuals may also be held criminally liable for assisting in, facilitating, aiding, or abetting a war crime.

Lebanon should urgently accept the International Criminal Court’s jurisdiction to give the court’s prosecutor a mandate to investigate serious international crimes committed on the country’s territory.

Israel’s key allies—the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Germany—should suspend military assistance and arms sales to Israel, given the real risk that they will be used to commit grave abuses. US policy prohibits arms transfers to states “more likely than not” to use them in violations of international law.

“As evidence mounts of Israel’s unlawful use of US weapons, including in apparent war crimes, US officials need to decide whether they will uphold US and international law by halting arms sales to Israel or risk being found legally complicit in serious violations,” Weir said.

( Human Rights Watch ) – Removing civilians from harm’s way in advance of an attack is the right thing for warring parties to do if it’s the only way to protect them. But the laws of war stipulate that this can only be done in narrow circumstances as a temporary measure, and civilians should be given a safer location where their humanitarian needs are met.

Israel claims its evacuation orders in Gaza have done just that.

Not so.

Israeli military actions have utterly failed to keep fleeing and displaced Palestinians in Gaza safe and, in fact, have put them in danger.

We analysed 184 Israeli military evacuation orders and dozens of satellite images and found that inaccurate and inconsistent evacuation orders often served only to sow confusion and spread fear, if they even came in time to allow people to flee at all. The Israeli military repeatedly designated evacuation routes and safe zones — and then attacked them.

A 42-year-old woman with an 11-year-old son said, “Yes, the leaflets and recorded calls were what I understood to be evacuation orders, and yes, we wanted to follow them, but could not because the Israelis started bombing the area heavily even before the announcement. People were killed in huge numbers and in brutal ways.”

Things were no safer on her evacuation route. “There were airstrikes while we were walking but we followed people and survived.”

On 10 November 2023, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared, “We have established a safe zone.” The reality was the opposite.

‘We are living an animal life’

A 34-year-old man who was displaced with his children from Gaza City told me that he first fled south to a supposedly safe area in Khan Younis. “The Israelis said Khan Younis was a safe place,” he said. “But they started bombing this area … I took a decision to leave and go to Rafah.”

The man and his family sought refuge in the so-called “humanitarian zone” in al-Mawasi, staying in a small tent near the beach. He said an Israeli airstrike hit a building near a humanitarian agency approximately 300 meters from his tent.

“The emotional state of the kids, what they witnessed in the last area — they are in shock, they are terrified,” he said. “They jump at small sounds now. It was so hard for me to get my family from the last place to here. Most of the areas were closed by the Israelis as they were considered battle areas.”

Under international law, safe areas are required to be — of course — safe, but displaced people must also have access to food and water, health care, sanitation, and shelter.

But this man told me that he and his family had been sleeping on the ground in a tent with 10 others, using a shared outdoor toilet serving about 70-80 people and that humanitarian aid, so far, had consisted of two bags of flour. “We are living an animal life,” he said.

“Expelled,” Digital, Midjourney / Clip2Comic, 2024

The laws of war also require evacuation to be temporary. Israel is duty-bound to facilitate the displaced person’s return to their home as soon as possible after the end of the hostilities in the area.

But the Israelis have reduced many of the displaced civilians’ home areas to rubble, intentionally or recklessly destroying or severely damaging swaths of housing and civilian infrastructure — including controlled demolitions after hostilities have largely ceased.

Step in and stand up for the law

The intentional forced displacement of a civilian population in an occupied territory is a war crime. Nowhere is this organised, deliberate displacement clearer than in areas of Gaza that have been razed, extended, and cleared for buffer zones along the border with Israel and in a security corridor that bifurcates Gaza.

The intention of the Israeli authorities appears to be to permanently empty and cleanse these areas of Palestinians and keep them under the occupation and control of Israel.

Multiple statements by senior Israeli officials show that the forced displacement in Gaza is intentional and is Israeli state policy. Because it is also widespread and systematic, this forced displacement qualifies not only as a war crime but as a crime against humanity, which the International Criminal Court‘s prosecutor should investigate.

We can expect these crimes against Palestinians to continue unless and until Israel’s allies demand for it to end.

US President-elect Donald Trump is likely to empower Israel to double down, given that he said on the campaign trail that it should “finish the job.”

That leaves the rest of the world to step in and stand up for the law and the human beings these laws are meant to protect. This shouldn’t be allowed to get worse. It needs to stop now.

Via Human Rights Watch

(Jerusalem) – Israeli authorities have caused the massive, deliberate forced displacement of Palestinian civilians in Gaza since October 2023 and are responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The report is being published at the time of an ongoing Israeli military campaign in northern Gaza that has most likely created a new wave of forced displacement of hundreds of thousands of civilians.

The 154-page report, “‘Hopeless, Starving, and Besieged’: Israel’s Forced Displacement of Palestinians in Gaza,” examines how Israeli authorities’ conduct has led to the displacement of over 90 percent of the population of Gaza—1.9 million Palestinians—and the widespread destruction of much of Gaza over the last 13 months. Israeli forces have carried out deliberate, controlled demolitions of homes and civilian infrastructure, including in areas where they have apparent aims of creating “buffer zones” and security “corridors,” from which Palestinians are likely to be permanently displaced. Contrary to claims by Israeli officials, their actions do not comply with the laws of war.

“The Israeli government cannot claim to be keeping Palestinians safe when it kills them along escape routes, bombs so-called safe zones, and cuts off food, water, and sanitation,” said Nadia Hardman, refugee and migrant rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Israel has blatantly violated its obligation to ensure Palestinians can return home, razing virtually everything in large areas.”

Human Rights Watch interviewed 39 displaced Palestinians in Gaza, analyzed Israel’s evacuation system, including 184 evacuation orders and satellite imagery confirming the widespread destruction, and verified videos and photographs of attacks on designated safe zones and evacuation routes.

Human Rights Watch: “Gaza: Israel’s Crimes Against Humanity in Gaza”

The laws of armed conflict applicable in occupied territory permit displacement of civilians only exceptionally, for imperative military reasons or for the population’s security, and require safeguards and proper accommodation to receive displaced civilians. Israeli officials claim that, because Palestinian armed groups are fighting from among the civilian population, the military has lawfully evacuated civilians to attack the groups while limiting civilian harm. Human Rights Watch research shows this claim to be largely false.

There is no plausible imperative military reason to justify Israel’s mass displacement of nearly all of Gaza’s population, often multiple times, Human Rights Watch found. Israel’s evacuation system has severely harmed the population and often served only to spread fear and anxiety. Rather than ensure security for displaced civilians, Israeli forces have repeatedly struck designated evacuation routes and safe zones.

Evacuation orders have been inconsistent, inaccurate, and frequently not communicated to civilians with enough time to allow evacuations, or at all. The orders did not consider the needs of people with disabilities and others who are unable to leave without assistance.

As the occupying power, Israel is obliged to ensure adequate facilities to accommodate displaced civilians, but the authorities have blocked all but a small fraction of the necessary humanitarian aid, water, electricity, and fuel from reaching civilians in need in Gaza. Israeli attacks have damaged and destroyed resources that people need to stay alive, including hospitals, schools, water and energy infrastructure, bakeries, and agricultural land.

Israel is also obliged to ensure the return of displaced people to their homes as soon as hostilities in the area have ceased. Instead, it has left swathes of Gaza uninhabitable. Israel’s military has intentionally demolished or severely damaged civilian infrastructure, including controlled demolitions of homes, with the apparent aim of creating an extended “buffer zone” along Gaza’s perimeter with Israel and a corridor which will bifurcate Gaza. The destruction is so substantial that it indicates the intention to permanently displace many people.

Israel should respect the right of Palestinian civilians to return to the areas in Gaza from which it has displaced them. For almost eight decades, Israeli authorities have denied the right to return of the 80 percent of Gaza’s population who are refugees and their descendants who were expelled or fled in 1948 from what is now Israel, in what Palestinians call the “Nakba,” or the catastrophe. This ongoing violation looms over the experience of Palestinians in Gaza, with many of those interviewed speaking of living through a second Nakba.

From the first days of the hostilities, senior officials in the Israeli government and the war cabinet have declared their intent to displace the Palestinian population of Gaza, with government ministers stating that its territory will decrease, that blowing up and flattening Gaza is “beautiful,” and that land will be handed to settlers. In November 2023, Israeli Minister of Agriculture and Food Security Avi Dichter said, “We are now rolling out the Gaza Nakba.”

Human Rights Watch found that forced displacement has been widespread, and the evidence shows it has been systematic and part of a state policy. Such acts also constitute crimes against humanity.

The Israeli authorities’ organized, violent displacement of Palestinians in Gaza, who are members of another ethnic group, is likely planned to be permanent in the buffer zones and security corridors. Such actions of the Israeli authorities amount to ethnic cleansing.

Victims of serious abuses in Israel and Palestine have faced a wall of impunity for decades. Palestinians in Gaza have been living under an unlawful blockade for 17 years, which constitutes part of the continuous crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution that Israeli authorities have been committing against Palestinians.

Governments should publicly condemn Israel’s forced displacement of the civilian population in Gaza as a war crime and crime against humanity, and pressure it to immediately halt those crimes and comply with the International Court of Justice’s multiple binding orders and with the obligations laid out in its July advisory opinion.

The International Criminal Court prosecutor should investigate Israel’s forced displacement and prevention of the right to return as a crime against humanity. Governments should also publicly condemn efforts to intimidate or interfere with the court’s work, officials, and those cooperating with the institution.

Governments should adopt targeted sanctions and other measures, including reviewing their bilateral agreements with Israel, to press the Israeli government to comply with its international obligations to protect civilians.

The United States, Germany, and other countries should immediately suspend weapons transfers and military assistance to Israel. Continuing to provide arms to Israel risks complicity in war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other grave human rights violations.

“No one can be in denial about the atrocity crimes the Israeli military is committing against Palestinians in Gaza,” Hardman said. “Transfer of additional weapons and assistance to Israel by the United States, Germany, and others is a blank check for further atrocities and increasingly puts them at risk of complicity.”

As of October 25, Israeli attacks have killed at least 163 health and rescue workers across Lebanon over the past year and damaged 158 ambulances and 55 hospitals, according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health. The Israeli military should immediately halt unlawful attacks on medical workers and healthcare facilities, and Israel’s allies should suspend the transfer of arms to Israel given the real risk that they will be used to commit grave abuses.

“The Israeli military’s unlawful attacks on medical workers and hospitals are devastating Lebanon’s already frail health care system and putting medical workers at grave risk,” said Ramzi Kaiss, Lebanon researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Strikes on medical workers and healthcare facilities also compound risks to injured civilians, severely hindering their ability to receive urgently needed medical attention.”

The United Nations should urgently establish, and UN member countries should support, an international investigation into the recent hostilities in Lebanon and northern Israel, and ensure that it is dispatched immediately to gather information and make findings as to violations of international law and recommendations for accountability.

Human Rights Watch interviewed eight people, including paramedics, civil defense, and hospital officials, and visited the site of the attack on the Islamic Health Committee’s civil defense center, where it additionally interviewed three residents and witnesses to the attack. Human Rights Watch also analyzed photographs, videos, and satellite imagery of the attacks. Human Rights Watch sent a letter outlining its findings and posing questions to the Israeli military on October 7 but has not received a response. On October 21, Human Rights Watch sent a letter outlining its research findings and posing questions to the Islamic Health Committee, which responded on October 23.

An overnight Israeli strike on October 3 struck a civil defense center in the Bashoura neighborhood of central Beirut, killing seven paramedics. The center belonged to the Islamic Health Committee, a civil defense and ambulance organization affiliated with Hezbollah. In Lebanon, the civil defense is a civilian force whose duties include providing emergency medical and rescue services and assisting with the evacuation of the civilian population. On October 4, the Israeli military struck an Islamic Health Committee ambulance near the entrance of Marjayoun Hospital in southern Lebanon, killing seven other paramedics and forcing the hospital to evacuate its staff and shut down. That same day, the Israeli military struck Salah Ghandour Hospital in the southern Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil, around two and a half hours after issuing an evacuation warning by phone to local officials.

The Israeli government has accused Hezbollah of using ambulances to transport fighters and hospitals to hide weapons and equipment. Human Rights Watch did not find any evidence indicating use of these three facilities for military purposes at the time of the attacks that would justify depriving them of their protected status under international humanitarian law.

In the absence of military justification for the attacks on the facilities, the attacks are unlawful. Such attacks directed against medical facilities, if carried out with criminal intent—that is, intentionally or recklessly—would be war crimes.

Membership or affiliation with Hezbollah, or other political movements with armed wings, is not a sufficient basis for determining an individual to be a lawful military target. Guidance by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) sets out that people who have exclusively non-combat functions in armed groups, including political or administrative roles, or are merely members of or affiliated with political entities that have an armed component, such as Hezbollah, may not be targeted at any time unless and only for such time as they, like any other civilian, directly participate in the hostilities. Medical personnel affiliated with Hezbollah, including those assigned to civil defense organizations, are protected under the laws of war.

On October 21, a strike near Rafik Hariri University Hospital reportedly killed 18 people, including 4 children, and damaged the hospital.

Under the laws of war, doctors, nurses, paramedics, and other health and medical personnel must be permitted to do their work and be protected in all circumstances. They lose their protection only if they commit, outside their humanitarian function, “acts harmful to the enemy.”

Likewise, ambulances and other medical transportation must be allowed to function and be protected in all circumstances. They could lose their protection only if they are being used to commit “acts harmful to the enemy,” such as transporting ammunition or healthy fighters in service. The attacking force must issue a warning to cease this misuse and can only attack after such a warning goes unheeded.

Under international humanitarian law, all parties to the conflict are under a duty, at all times, to distinguish between combatants and civilians and to target only combatants. Individuals who commit serious violations of the laws of war with criminal intent—that is, intentionally or recklessly—may be prosecuted for war crimes. Individuals may also be held criminally liable for assisting in, facilitating, aiding, or abetting a war crime. All governments that are parties to an armed conflict are obligated to investigate alleged war crimes by members of their armed forces.

In November 2023, Human Rights Watch called for investigations into the Israeli military’s repeated, apparently indiscriminate attacks on medical facilities in Gaza. Human Rights Watch has called on Israel’s key allies to suspend military assistance and arms sales to Israel, given the real risk that they will be used to commit grave abuses.

“With more than a hundred health workers killed, Israeli strikes in Lebanon are putting civilians, including medical workers, at grave risk of harm,” Kaiss said. “Medical workers should be protected, and countries should take action to prevent further atrocities, including by suspending arms sales and military assistance to Israel.”

As of October 28, 2024, Israeli attacks in Lebanon have killed at least 2,710 people and injured more than 12,592 people since October 2023, according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health.

As of October 25, the Ministry of Public Health said Israeli strikes in Lebanon had damaged 51 emergency medical centers and facilities tied to various governmental and nongovernmental health organizations, including the Lebanese Red Cross, the General Directorate of the Lebanese Civil Defense, the Amel Association International, the Islamic Risala Scout Association, the Islamic Health Committee, and the Lebanese Succour Association. The ministry stated that the attacks had damaged a total of 158 ambulances belonging to these groups and that 55 hospitals were damaged in strikes that killed 12 people and injured 60, as of October 25. On October 25, the UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon said that, since October 2023, “27 attacks targeted ambulances used by first responders.”

On October 3, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) director general said that 28 on-duty medics were killed in Lebanon in the span of 24 hours. The WHO warned on October 8 about disease outbreaks in Lebanon following the partial or full closure of at least nine hospitals in addition to crowded conditions in shelters for displaced persons. On October 8, an official with the Islamic Health Committee told Human Rights Watch that Israeli strikes had killed 60 of the committee’s paramedics since the escalation of hostilities in mid-September. 

Human Rights Watch did not independently verify the circumstances of each of these cases.

Since October 2023, Hezbollah has launched thousands of rockets and missiles into towns in northern Israel, killing at least 16 civilians. In July, 12 children were killed in an attack on the town of Majdal Shams, in the occupied Golan Heights. Israeli and United States officials said that Hezbollah was responsible for the attack, which the group denies.

The Israeli military has repeatedly claimed that Hezbollah is using civilian infrastructure for military purposes. In a speech before the UN General Assembly on September 27, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Hezbollah of hiding rockets and missiles in hospitals. In March, Israel’s Arabic-language military spokesperson, Avichay Adraee, accused Hezbollah and the Lebanese Amal Movement of using ambulances “for terrorist purposes,” including to transport personnel and combat equipment. In October, the spokesperson reiterated these claims in a post to his X account, warned medical crews to stay away from Hezbollah members, and called on them not to cooperate with the group. He did not distinguish between Hezbollah combatants and other civilian members of the group’s institutions or political office. He said that “any vehicle proven to have an armed saboteur using it for terrorist purposes, regardless of its type, will have appropriate measures taken against it to prevent its military use.”

The claims made by the Israeli military spokesperson are contested. Human Rights Watch has not been able to corroborate them.

Methodology

Human Rights Watch spoke to members of the Islamic Health Committee; the Islamic Risala Scout Association, a civil defense and ambulance organization affiliated with the Amal Movement, a Lebanese political party and Hezbollah ally; and officials at Mays al-Jabal Hospital, Marjayoun Hospital, and Salah Ghandour Hospital in southern Lebanon.

Human Rights Watch also spoke with three officials from the General Directorate of the Lebanese Civil Defense and reviewed statements provided by the Islamic Health Committee and the Islamic Risala Scout Association pertaining to attacks on their centers and crews.

On October 3, Human Rights Watch visited the site of the attack on the Islamic Health Committee’s civil defense center and interviewed residents and witnesses to the attack. On October 7, Human Rights Watch interviewed an individual who operated an art studio in the same building as the civil defense center in Beirut.

One paramedic with the Lebanese Civil Defense, whom Human Rights Watch interviewed, was subsequently killed in an Israeli strike on a civil defense center in the southern Lebanese town of Dardghaya on October 9.

Human Rights Watch analyzed 57 photographs and videos posted on social media platforms or shared directly with researchers. The images were taken in Beirut, southern Lebanon, and the Bekaa governorate. Human Rights Watch analyzed satellite imagery from Salah Ghandour Hospital and Marjayoun Hospital recorded before and after the attacks. Human Rights Watch visited the site of the strike on the civil defense center in Beirut but did not visit the sites of the strikes at the hospitals in southern Lebanon.

Strike on the Islamic Health Committee Civil Defense Center

Shortly after midnight, on October 3, an Israeli strike hit the Islamic Health Committee’s civil defense center in central Beirut, on the second floor of a residential building. A statement published that day by the committee said that the strike killed seven paramedics. Those victims, according to the committee, included two volunteer paramedics, the head of the committee’s civil defense in Beirut, the head of operations in Beirut, the head of equipment in the Beirut area, the head of machinery and maintenance, and the head of rescue work.

The Ministry of Public Health said that the attack killed nine people and that DNA tests on recovered body parts are ongoing to verify the identity of the remaining unidentified victims. Two witnesses said that among the victims were bystanders who were near the building at the time of the strike.

On the October 3 visit to the site, Human Rights Watch observed damage indicating that at least two munitions detonated in rooms containing the Islamic Health Committee’s offices and blast damage on the floors above and below. Researchers also observed primary and secondary fragmentation damage on adjoining and adjacent apartment buildings, businesses, and al-Bashoura Islamic Cemetery, across the street.

The Islamic Health Committee’s civil defense director general said in a statement provided to Human Rights Watch that the center has 13 employees and 45 volunteers, who provided rescue and first aid services to residents and displaced people from the south and the southern suburbs of Beirut.

One neighborhood resident, who was at his shop at the time of the attack, said he immediately rushed to the building after the strike to help those injured. He said he saw three lifeless bodies, including one that was severely mutilated. “Everybody knows it’s a medical center,” he said. “They help everyone here.”

Mahmoud Karaki, an Islamic Health Committee spokesperson, said that the paramedics at the center at the time of the strike had gone there to rest after a day of rescue work in Beirut’s southern suburbs, after a series of Israeli strikes overnight.

“All of the people who were in the office were paramedics,” Karaki said. “Some were managers, but all are paramedics.” He said the center was established in the Bashoura neighborhood since 2009.

Human Rights Watch reviewed two images circulating on social media that showed one paramedic killed in the strike, Wissam Mahmoud Salhab, in military clothes on martyr posters that are highly similar to those issued by Hezbollah’s military wing, in addition to a video of Salhab firing an assault rifle. Another photo reviewed by Human Rights Watch showed another paramedic killed in the strike, Sajid Shirri, in military clothes donning a Hezbollah patch.

“Hospital,” Digital, Dream / Dreamland v3 / PS Express / Crop2Comic, 2024.

Human Rights Watch noticed discrepancies in the martyr posters, including the use of two separate photos, ranks and pseudonyms for the same person. The same camouflage and scarf used in Sahlab’s posters were found on other apparent martyrs’ posters circulating online. In its response to a letter from Human Rights Watch, the Islamic Health Committee denied that the martyr posters for Salhab were issued by Hezbollah’s military wing, and said instead that “such posters, often are designed by family members and friends of those killed who consider photos in military clothes post-martyrdom to be a source of pride.”

Human Rights Watch could not verify the source of the martyr posters. The statement said that Hezbollah’s military wing did not issue those posters on its Telegram channel, which Human Rights Watch confirmed, and said that Salhab had worked for more than 10 years as the head of emergency operations and logistics at the civil defense center in Beirut. The Islamic Health Committee also said that Shirri was “never a member of Hezbollah’s military wing and has never held a role in that regard … and his work was limited to health, rescue and emergency services.” It said that the military clothes worn by Shirri in the circulated photos could have belonged to his relatives or have been bought from a store, and that such military clothes do not necessarily belong to Hezbollah. Human Rights Watch could not verify this claim.

The Islamic Health Committee further said that none of the paramedics killed in the Bashoura strike and the strike on a group of paramedics near Marjayoun Hospital had held a combat function or mission in the military wing of Hezbollah since joining the committee. It denied that the committee has any ties to military operations and stated that there is a “complete separation between the military wing [of Hezbollah] and the social services wing.”

Maria Hibri, an artist who owns a workshop on the ground floor of the same building said that the building was made up of three blocks, with 27 families living in each block, and that the targeted floor was solely occupied by the civil defense center. “There was no evacuation warning given to anyone in the building,” she said. “Why? They would have left. Nobody wanted to die.”

Strikes on Ambulance Near Marjayoun Hospital

In an October 4 statement, the Islamic Health Committee said that seven of the group’s paramedics had been killed “in a direct attack on the ambulance crew at Marjayoun Hospital.”

Shoshan Hassan Mazraani, the emergency room head nurse at the hospital, said she witnessed the strike while she was drinking coffee outside the entrance of the hospital’s emergency room. She said that the strike was “directly on the ambulances,” three of which were on the road leading to the hospital’s entrance at the time of the attack.

“I ran to the ambulances and told people that they hit the paramedics,” she said. “Once I got to the road I couldn’t continue. Staff at the hospital were saying don’t go near the ambulances, they might strike again. And the injured paramedics were calling out for me to help them.”

Mazraani, who is usually responsible for providing death tolls from the hospital to the Ministry of Public Health, said that seven paramedics were killed and five were injured.

“These guys, we knew them,” she said. “For a year they were bringing injured people to the hospital. We became familiar with them. They are paramedics, just like any other ambulance crew.”

In statements to the media on October 4, the Marjayoun Hospital director, Dr. Moanes Kalakish, said that the hospital’s main entrance “was targeted as paramedics were approaching” and that the hospital was not warned before the attack. Mazraani also said that neither she nor other hospital staff received evacuation warnings.

The hospital was evacuated and shut down after the strike that day, news reports and Mazraani said. One photograph taken on October 4 and geolocated by Human Rights Watch to approximately 150 meters from the hospital shows a burned ambulance and a truck on fire under a burned palm tree. Human Rights Watch analyzed satellite imagery from October 11 of the area around Marjayoun Hospital showing the burned vehicles.

Human Rights Watch also analyzed one video and two photographs uploaded to X on October 11, showing a large crater blocking one of the main roads into Marjayoun Hospital.

Israeli strikes on roads leading to the hospital hindered hospital staff from returning to their homes, Mazraani said. For 12 days before the hospital shut down, hospital workers had been sleeping there, according to Mazraani.

“There was a lot of danger, and we knew that if we left, we won’t be able to go back to the hospital,” she said.

The Israeli military did not publicly provide any evidence that Marjayoun Hospital or the ambulances targeted near the entrance were being used to carry out hostile acts.

Strike on Salah Ghandour Hospital

The head of Salah Ghandour Hospital in Bint Jbeil, Dr. Mohammed Suleiman, said that the hospital was struck on October 4, two-and-a-half hours after they received an evacuation warning. Suleiman said that a local official in Bint Jbeil received a call, reportedly from an Israeli military official, at around 6 p.m. on October 4 informing him that the paramedics around the hospital should be evacuated within four hours as the hospital could be struck.

“We deemed that this warning did not concern the medical staff of the hospital, so we evacuated the paramedics and the area around the hospitals, but the staff stayed,” Suleiman said. “But we were surprised that 2.5 hours later … a strike took place at 8:30 pm before the end of the [four hour] warning period. The hospital was struck three times. One shell struck the on-call room and two shells struck the paramedics’ waiting room, [both] inside the hospital.”

Nine hospital workers were injured, including doctors and medical workers, three of whom are in critical condition, Suleiman said.

Lebanese media reported that after the attack, the Israeli military did not respond to requests from UNIFIL, the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, to allow a Lebanese Red Cross and Lebanese Army convoy to approach the hospital and help evacuate people. Suleiman said that the hospital staff were forced to evacuate injured people in their own cars.

On October 5, the Israeli military said that an Israeli Air Force aircraft attacked “Hezbollah terrorists who were operating within a command center that was located inside a mosque adjacent to the Salah Ghandour Hospital.” The military said that Hezbollah used the command center “to plan and execute terrorist attacks against IDF troops and the State of Israel,” referring to the Israeli military; and that “notices were sent to residents and conversations were held with significant parties” in villages with hospitals being used “in defiance of the laws of armed conflict.” The military said that it demanded that “any military activity carried out from the hospitals should stop immediately,” but did not give further details of what ‘terrorist activity’ took place from the Salah Ghandour Hospital.

Suleiman said that the military first struck the hospital from the side that is furthest away from the mosque, before striking the mosque afterwards. In the warning to the village, Suleiman said, no mention was made of the mosque or of its use by Hezbollah.

The Israeli military did not provide public evidence that either the hospital or the mosque were being used to commit hostile acts.

Human Rights Watch geolocated a photograph and a video posted to social media the day after the attack and received from a contact, showing the destroyed mosque adjacent to the hospital.

Low-resolution satellite imagery recorded on the morning of October 4 shows no signs of damage in Salah Ghandour Hospital, but an image collected 24 hours later, in the morning of October 5, confirms the site was struck.

A very high-resolution satellite image from October 11, analyzed by Human Rights Watch, shows the mosque completely destroyed, and heavy damage to the hospital’s northwestern side, facing the mosque, and smaller damage to the hospital rooftop on the opposite northeastern side.

Healthcare facilities are civilian objects that have special protections under the laws of war against attacks and other acts of violence, including bombing, shelling, looting, forced entry, shooting into, encircling, or other forceful interference such as intentionally depriving facilities of electricity and water. Healthcare facilities only lose their protection from attack if they are being used to commit “acts harmful to the enemy,” and after a required warning.

According to the ICRC, “prior to an attack against a medical unit which is being used to commit acts harmful to the enemy, a warning has to be issued setting, whenever appropriate, a reasonable time limit and that an attack can only take place after such warning has remained unheeded.”

Other Strikes on Health Centers, Medical Workers 

Human Rights Watch identified at least two other attacks, in the southern Lebanese towns of Sohmor and Kafra, that significantly damaged healthcare centers and vehicles and killed medical personnel.

On September 29, six members of the Islamic Health Committee were killed in Sohmor, in the Bekaa governorate, the Ministry of Public Health said. Videos taken from the site of the strike, posted on social media on September 30 and analyzed by Human Rights Watch, show a damaged civil defense car and two damaged ambulances with the logos of the committee, as well as a burning vehicle. Human Rights Watch geolocated the site of the strike to a building in the northeastern part of Sohmor but could not determine whether there were military targets present at the site.

The civil defense commissioner for the Islamic Risala Scout Association, Rabih Issa, said that a separate strike on September 30 hit a group of paramedics when they were changing shifts at one of the group’s assembly points in Kafra, in the Nabatieh governorate, damaging three ambulances belonging to the association and injuring several paramedics. Human Rights Watch analyzed two videos received from a contact and posted on social media on September 30 and geolocated them to the main road in Kafra. The videos show one destroyed ambulance in addition to two burned vehicles on a damaged road.

Evacuation Warnings to Medical and Civil Defense Centers

On September 30, Issa told Human Rights Watch that two other civil defense centers belonging to the Islamic Risala Scout Association in southern Lebanon received a phone call from the Israeli military the previous week ordering them to evacuate the centers within two hours. It is unclear whether the two centers were subsequently hit.

The head of the Lebanese Civil Defense Force in Tyre, Abdullah Moussawi, also told Human Rights Watch on September 30 that two civil defense centers in southern Lebanon received a phone call from the Israeli military ordering staff to evacuate their centers. He said that the centers were not attacked despite the evacuation warnings.

Moussawi and four other paramedics were killed in a strike “that targeted the civil defense center” in Dardghaya, near the southern Lebanese city of Tyre, on October 9, according to the General Directorate of the Lebanese Civil Defense.

The director of medical supplies at the Mays al-Jabal Hospital, Dr. Halim Saad, said that the hospital also received an evacuation warning on October 4 from the Israeli military, instructing the staff to leave immediately. Saad said that the attacks in the surrounding area since October 2023 had damaged the hospital. The hospital shut its doors on October 4 and evacuated its staff after the Israeli military reportedly ordered its evacuation.

It remained unclear whether Mays al-Jabal Hospital was directly attacked after the Israeli military’s evacuation warning.

Human Rights Watch analyzed and geolocated seven photographs and one video provided by Saad that showed damage consistent with kinetic damage to the hospital’s facade, entrance doors, and windows facing south, as well as a remnant of an artillery-fired smoke projectile in the hospital’s yard. Saad said that the hospital depended on UNIFIL to deliver needed supplies, such as water, fuel, and medical supplies, but had been unable to receive supplies in the week before it closed.

“The strikes that have happened on and near the hospital since last year, in addition to the evacuation warnings we received and the inability to get medical supplies, water, and fuel to the hospital forced us to close our doors,” Saad said.

Customary international law prohibits “acts or threats of violence the primary purpose of which is to spread terror among the civilian population.” Statements that call for evacuating areas that are primarily intended to cause panic among residents would fall under this prohibition. Civilians, including medical workers, who do not evacuate following warnings are still fully protected by international humanitarian law.

Via Human Rights Watch

Since early October 2024, Israel has renewed mass evacuation orders for Gaza’s north, largely ordering civilians to move south, including to the “humanitarian” zone in al-Mawasi. The overcrowded area lacks adequate food, shelter, water, sanitation, and medical care. Israeli forces have also frequently attacked the zone, killing civilians. 

“Israeli forces in northern Gaza are issuing evacuation orders after having done everything to ensure that there is no safe place to go in Gaza,” said Lama Fakih, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “Unsafe evacuations are cruel and unlawful and a set up for further crimes against civilians.”

Israel, as the occupying power in Gaza, is under a duty to ensure that civilians are evacuated in satisfactory conditions of health and safety and with proper accommodation for the displaced. Its failure to do so makes the displacement unlawful. 

Israeli forces have been ordering Palestinians in northern Gaza to leave, including from schools turned shelters, detaining men and then burning, attacking, or militarily occupying those shelters. Reports allege and videos reviewed by Human Rights Watch also show that Israeli forces have killed civilians, including children, in these shelters in recent days. 

Photographs and videos posted to social media between October 19 and 23, verified by Human Rights Watch, show Israeli forces rounding up thousands of Palestinians in northern Gaza for evacuation or detention. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimates that more than 60,000 people have been further displaced in northern Gaza in October alone, primarily from Jabalia, Beit Lahia, and Beit Hanoun.

A series of videos from in and around one school compound in Jabalia, next to a small wastewater pond, which was being used as a shelter, shows the chaos and danger of the situation.

In one video taken next to the school shared on social media on October 21, the buzzing sound of what appears to be a drone can be heard as a broadcast announcement instructs people in Arabic to “head south to al-Awda street,” around which Israeli forces are staging and appear to be screening and detaining people. 

The incident matches descriptions from news and social media reports and evacuation orders from the day. Researchers were unable to find the video on social media before October 21. 

Israeli quadcopters were used to issue orders on October 21 to evacuate the school compound near the wastewater pond area, the BBC reported. Minutes later, a medic told the BBC that Israeli forces struck the compound.

The medic, Nevine al-Dawawi, who filmed the attack’s aftermath on her phone, said the quadcopter “descended on the school at nine in the morning, giving us an ultimatum to get out by 10.” Ten minutes later, she said, Israeli forces attacked. 

In response to a question about whether Hamas was using human shields, al-Dawawi said no, adding that “they were protecting us and standing with us.”

Posting added by Informed Comment:

📍#Gaza: The opening of northern crossings has allowed essential aid into Gaza, but WFP is unable to reach the people who need it most.

Thousands in the north are completely cut off & face horrific conditions.

WFP continues to call for safe, sustained access into & across Gaza. pic.twitter.com/669f5u9dA1

— World Food Programme (@WFP) October 25, 2024

Three videos shared on X on October 21 and analyzed by Human Rights Watch show a woman carrying a bag of medical supplies and filming the aftermath of an apparent attack on or near that same school complex. The videos show bloody and gravely injured and dead men, women, and children. A group of people can be seen walking away from the shelter with their belongings. In Beit Hanoun, northeast of Jabalia, the Israeli military had been rounding up Palestinians for evacuation or detention for days around al-Awda street near the Indonesian Hospital and a series of schools used as shelters. On October 19, the Israeli military’s Arabic-language spokesman, Avichay Adraee, shared drone footage on X showing Israeli forces rounding up Palestinians outside one of those schools, the Kuwait School.

By October 20, photographs posted to social media and verified by Human Rights Watch showed that school ablaze. In one photograph, three people with uniforms and equipment consistent with the Israeli military watch the school burn. Drone footage shared by Adraee on October 23 on X shows the ruined school blackened by fire with people amassed in front of it as others walk past flattened buildings, newly razed ground, and Israeli military vehicles.  

A photograph posted to X on October 21 and geolocated by Human Rights Watch shows the Aleppo School, on the opposite side of the street, also on fire.

Medics from the hospital said Israeli troops stormed a school next to the hospital and detained men, then set the school on fire, Reuters reported.

Satellite imagery captured on October 23 and analyzed by researchers shows several additional school compounds and other informal shelters across Jabalia with signs of razing, damage, and fires. Many were filled with tents on satellite imagery captured on October 14 and reviewed by Human Rights Watch. However, by October 23, satellite imagery shows that most tents are gone or damaged, and military vehicles are in or around the courtyards.

Satellite imagery from October 24, 2024 shows that tent shelters within a large camp along Salah al-Din Road have been removed, and Israeli military armored vehicles instead occupy the area. Imagery captured one day earlier shows large groups of people moving south along Salah al-Din Road in Gaza. However, by October 24, the road appears empty. In addition, agricultural fields on both sides of the road have been cleared compared to a satellite image 10  days earlier. A nearby school compound, which previously housed displaced civilians, now shows visible damage, with military vehicles stationed in the courtyard.

Photographs on social media and published by Israeli press on October 22 show Israeli military leaflets, said to be dropped over northern Gaza, warning people in hospitals and shelters that they “are in a dangerous combat zone” and ordering them to “move towards the Indonesian Hospital” via al-Awda Street. This is the same area where shelters appear to have been destroyed by fire the previous day.  

A video posted to the Qassam Brigades’ Telegram channel on October 22 shows an Israeli tank driving over what the caption claims is an explosive device approximately 100 meters away from the Indonesian Hospital.  

Satellite imagery collected in the early morning of October 23 shows crowds of people in the courtyard of the Kuwait School walking toward southern Gaza along the razed main road of Beit Lahia and Salah al-Din Road, flanked by Israeli armored vehicles. 

A photograph and video shared on social media on October 22 and 23 by Israeli journalists show Israeli soldiers blindfolding and detaining barefoot Palestinian men, dressed in white jumpsuits with hands bound behind their backs, in front of the Kuwait School.

“Exodus,” Digital, Dream / Dreamland v3 / Clip2Comic, 2024.

As of October 23, satellite imagery also shows that a large camp for displaced Palestinians set up in July next to Salah al-Din Road has been razed and replaced by Israeli military vehicles; agricultural fields have been also razed along both sides of the road compared with a satellite image 10 days earlier.

Palestinians across Gaza have faced scores of evacuation orders over the past year. Recent Human Rights Watch reporting shows that previous evacuation orders did not take into account the needs of children and adults with disabilities. 

Yet Israeli authorities deliberately cut off access to humanitarian assistance in northern Gaza for two weeks in October, and only a trickle of aid has entered since. The World Health Organization on October 23 cancelled a polio vaccination campaign in northern Gaza due to “intense bombardments, mass displacement, and lack of access.”  

Human Rights Watch has documented Israel’s use of collective punishment and starvation as a weapon of war, which are war crimes. 

The laws of war require parties to a conflict to “take all feasible precautions” to avoid or minimize the incidental loss of civilian life and damage to civilian objects. These precautions include doing everything feasible to verify that the objects of attack are military objectives and not civilians or civilian objects, giving “effective advance warning” of attacks when circumstances permit, and avoiding locating military objectives in or near densely populated areas. 

Even if an evacuation order or warning has been given or a military objective is present, the attacking party is not relieved from its obligation to take into account the risk to civilians, including the duty to avoid causing disproportionate harm. Civilians who do not evacuate do not lose their status as civilians and their protections under international humanitarian law.

Temporary evacuations may be lawful if required by imperative military necessity or civilian safety. However, evacuations that are not justified under those grounds or fail to ensure safety, basic necessities, and the ability to return as soon as possible, are prohibited as forced displacement. Forced displacement with criminal intent—intentionally or recklessly—is a war crime. Several Israeli officials have called for new Jewish settlements in Gaza and “taking territory” from the Palestinians.

“Forcing people to evacuate again without ensuring their safety is unlawful, and intentional forced displacement is a war crime,” Fakih said. “When a party that has committed war crimes makes statements and takes action suggesting it’s willing to commit more crimes, we need to see a more serious response from the international community.”

Via Human Rights Watch

( Human Rights Watch ) – Israeli authorities should withdraw proposed legislation in parliament aimed at preventing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) from operating in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and halt their campaign to destroy the UN’s most important aid agency for Palestinian refugees in Gaza and elsewhere.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the proposal to evict UNRWA from areas under Israeli control and revoke its privileges and immunities “would be a catastrophe,” calling the agency “indispensable” and “irreplaceable.” European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the laws would have “disastrous consequences” if implemented. United States Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield also voiced “deep concern.”

Israel has long campaigned against UNRWA and called for its closure, claiming earlier this year that as many as around 1,200 Gaza staff were linked to Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

In August, the UN said that nine UNRWA staff members may have been involved in the Hamas-led attacks in southern Israel on October 7, 2023, in which armed groups killed hundreds of civilians and took many others hostage. The UN found no evidence to back Israeli allegations about other staff. The accused staff, who were either fired by the UN or have since died, represent a tiny fraction – roughly 0.03 percent – of UNRWA’s total staff of more than 30,000 across Palestine, Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon.

“Expelling UNRWA,” Digital, ChatGPT

UNRWA is mandated to protect the rights of Palestinian refugees. The proposed legislation would not only threaten aid for Gaza but undermine its regional capacity to provide humanitarian assistance, education, and other essential services. At least 226 UNRWA staff have been killed in Gaza since October 2023.

Israeli authorities have also publicly attacked the UN secretary-general, in what appears to be a campaign against different parts of the UN. Recently Foreign Minister Israel Katz announced Guterres was barred from entering Israel. A letter signed by 104 UN member states initiated by Chile voiced support for Guterres and condemned Israel’s move. The US, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, and Australia were among those who did not sign it.

Israel should let UNRWA and other humanitarian agencies do their work in Gaza, where the population faces famine due to Israeli authorities’ use of starvation as a weapon of war, a war crime. Governments, including the US, which has yet to resume its UNRWA funding, should publicly support and fully fund UNRWA and demand Israel withdraw its draft legislation.

Via Human Rights Watch

Company Should Address Root Causes of Censorship of Palestine Content

( Human Rights Watch ) – Earlier this month, Meta’s Oversight Board found that three Facebook posts containing the phrase “From the River to the Sea” did not violate Meta’s content rules and should remain online.

The majority of the Oversight Board members concluded that the phrase, widely used at protests to show solidarity with Palestinians, is not inherently a violation of Meta’s policies on Hate Speech, Violence and Incitement, or Dangerous Organizations and Individuals (DOI). In line with Human Rights Watch’s submission, it affirmed that while the phrase can have different meanings, it amounts to protected speech under international human rights law and should not, on its own, be a basis for removal, enforcement, or review of content under Meta’s policies. Meta created the board as an external body to appeal moderation decisions and provide non-binding policy guidance.

A minority of board members recommended imposing a blanket ban on use of the phrase unless there are clear signals it does not constitute glorification of Hamas. Such a ban would be inconsistent with international human rights standards, amounting to an excessive restriction on protected speech.

The board’s decision upholds free expression, but Meta has a broader problem of censoring protected speech about Palestine on its platforms. A 2023 Human Rights Watch report found that Meta was systemically censoring Palestine content and that broad restrictions on content relating to groups that Meta puts on its DOI list often resulted in the censorship of protected speech. Meta has said that core human rights principles have guided its crisis response measures since October 7. But its heavy reliance on automated detection systems fails to accurately assess context, even when posts explicitly oppose violence.

Digital imagining of “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free,” Dream / Dreamland v3 / Clip2Comic, 2024.

For instance, on July 19, Human Rights Watch posted a video on Instagram and Facebook with a caption in Arabic that read: “Hamas-led armed groups committed numerous war crimes and crimes against humanity against civilians during the October 7 assault on southern Israel.” Meta’s automated tools “incorrectly” removed the post for violating its DOI policy. Formal appeals were unsuccessful, and the content was only restored after informal intervention.

Meta should address the systemic issues at the heart of its wrongful removal of protected speech about Palestine. Amending its flawed policies, strengthening context-based review, and providing more access to data to facilitate independent research are essential to protecting free expression on its platforms.

Via Human Rights Watch

Photographs and videos filmed by victims and witnesses to the incident and reviewed by Human Rights Watch showed pagers exploding in various locales, such as grocery stores. Other videos that appear to be linked to the incident show adults and children in emergency rooms with severe penetrating traumatic injuries to their heads, torsos. and limbs, and other injuries consistent with the detonation of high explosives. 

Hezbollah, in a statement, said that the pagers belonged “to employees of various Hezbollah units and institutions” and blamed the Israeli government. US and former Israeli officials speaking to the media said that Israel was responsible for the attack. The Israeli military has not commented.

Lama Fakih, Middle East and North Africa Director at Human Rights Watch, said:

“Customary international humanitarian law prohibits the use of booby traps – objects that civilians are likely to be attracted to or are associated with normal civilian daily use – precisely to avoid putting civilians at grave risk and produce the devastating scenes that continue to unfold across Lebanon today. The use of an explosive device whose exact location could not be reliably known would be unlawfully indiscriminate, using a means of attack that could not be directed at a specific military target and as a result would strike military targets and civilians without distinction. A prompt and impartial investigation into the attacks should be urgently conducted.”

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Bonus Video added by Informed Comment:

“How were pagers turned into bombs against Hezbollah members? | Al Jazeera Newsfeed”