In its early May offensive on the occupied Gaza Strip, Israel unlawfully destroyed Palestinian homes, often without military necessity, in what amounts to a form of collective punishment against the civilian population, Amnesty International said today. Israel also conducted apparently disproportionate air strikes which killed and injured Palestinian civilians, including children.
Amnesty International investigated nine Israeli airstrikes that resulted in the killing of civilians and in the damage and destruction of residential buildings in the Gaza Strip. Three separate attacks on the first night of bombing on 9 May, in which precision-guided bombs targeted three senior Al-Quds Brigades commanders, killed 10 Palestinian civilians, and injured at least 20 others.
They were launched into densely populated urban areas at 2am when families were sleeping at home, which suggests that those who planned and authorized the attacks anticipated – and likely disregarded – the disproportionate harm to civilians. Intentionally launching disproportionate attacks, a pattern Amnesty International has documented in previous Israeli operations, is a war crime.
Palestinian armed groups based in the Gaza Strip, led by Al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, fired indiscriminate rockets which killed two civilians in Israel and three Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip, which should also be investigated as war crimes.
Editor: I don’t like to promote Amnesty International because they are antisemitic protagonists but we need to know what they are saying.
Readers may be interested in knowing how the BBC has interpreted this latest ‘hatchet’ job by Amnesty International.