UN Commision Finds Israel Guilty of Genocide Against Children in Gaza
A United Nations Commission of Inquiry has found sufficient evidence to suggest that, during Israel's more than two-year military campaign in Gaza, authorities deliberately targeted Palestinian children.
United Nations, New York City
Sphinx News: Ahmed Ali
As Israel continues its illegal siege and bombardment of Gaza, a United Nations Commission of Inquiry has found the Zionist government and relevant security authorities liable for the intentional and systematic killing of Palestinian children within the enclave.
The report was officially published on Tuesday by the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, which focused on examining Israel’s illegal military occupation and incessant violence in Gaza since October 7, 2023, specifically in its application against Palestinian children.
Officially published on June 18, 2026, and presented to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland, yesterday, the report outlines “violations and crimes against and affecting Palestinian children, including serious physical and psychological harm by the Israeli security forces since 7 October 2023, resulting in the death of at least 20,179 and injury of 44,143 children.”
Additionally, “The paper describes the deliberate targeting and killing of Palestinian children, including post-ceasefire, since the October 2025 Gaza peace plan.”
The report’s findings concluded that about “30 percent of people killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023, were children,” a staggering statistic that provides sufficient evidence for a pervading, inculcated, and normalized violation of human rights within Israel’s conduct in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
The report additionally highlighted the deliberate targeting of “neonatal and maternity care centres,” a development that directly infringes on Palestinians’ reproductive future and the survival of newborns. Such a fact, as noted in the report, leaves Palestinian women prone to miscarriages, their children with birth defects, and other reproductive vulnerabilities that may raise immediate health concerns for their own or their offspring’s lives.
Repeated acts of aggression against civilian infrastructure revealed an engendered military tactic employed by Israeli authorities, one which purposefully sought to undermine the demographic composition of the besieged Palestinian enclave.
Compounding the blatant violence was Israel’s aid blockade in Gaza, preventing necessary food and humanitarian supplies from entering the Strip. Such a barrier inhibited Palestinian adolescent and infant mortality rates, leaving fragile populations prone to infectious diseases, starvation-related deaths, and staggeringly low immunisation rates.
Srinivasan Muralidhar, chair of the commission and former jurist for the Supreme Court of India, said, “The evidence shows that Palestinian children have been deliberately targeted and killed by the Israeli security forces.” He added, “Even after the October 2025 ceasefire, children continue to be killed and seriously injured, with continued disregard by Israel for the ceasefire and for the protection owed to Palestinian children under international law.”
Muralidhar, reciting a series of instances where Israeli authorities have killed Palestinian children, told reporters in Geneva that “Israel targets children to weaken demographic vitality and deny the Palestinian people’s rights to self-determination.”
Particularly hammering censure of both the Israeli government and the IDF was Chris Sidoti, an international human rights lawyer and fellow participant in the Commission of Inquiry. Vehement in his appeals and protests, Sidoti told reporters on Tuesday, “What kind of people are your soldiers, who would allow a fourteen-year-old child to bleed for over 40 minutes? What kind of people are your leaders? When they give orders, they make statements that encourage this kind of conduct. Not merely permit it, but encourage it.”
The Commission was initially founded on May 27, 2021, and established to investigate purported violations of international law and human rights abuses and look into the “root causes” of conflict between Israel and Palestine.
In a September 2025 report, the commission concluded that there were reasonable grounds to determine that Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.
While its decision is not legally binding, yielding no major influence to abrogate discriminatory Israeli laws directly, hold governing authorities and security forces accountable in contemptuous court, or sanction the state’s arms and weapons program, the findings have been irrefutable to the reckoning and sheer devastation relevant authorities have caused in Gaza.
Speaking to reporters today in New York City on the Commission’s findings, Deputy Spokesperson for the UN Secretary-General, Farhan Haq, told reporters, “From our legal perspective, we await decisions that are taken by duly constituted courts, in other words, judicial bodies.” Haq is, of course, referring to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the United Nations’ principal judicial organ. The ICJ has yet to make a definitive determination, despite critics, multilateral institutions, NGOs, and human rights bodies ascertaining that the evidence for genocide is glaring.
