This Conference Room Paper appears to be presented under the Commission’s mandate to “collect, consolidate and analyse evidence” in order to “maximize the possibility of its admissibility in legal proceedings,” such as before the International Criminal Court (“ICC”) or the International Court Justice (“ICJ”). The UN Guidance and Practice for fact-finding missions provides that evidence must be evaluated for its “reliability” and “truthfulness,” that investigations must be conducted with “integrity,” meaning “without any bias,” and that factual findings must be “adequately corroborated” by at least two other “independent and reliable” sources.

Yet, as detailed below, the Commission relies on a one-sided evidentiary record and repeatedly draws conclusions regarding intent, knowledge, and targeting decisions from witness testimony that is often impossible to independently verify. It further builds its findings on layers of inference and assumption that are presented as established fact, despite lacking sufficient evidentiary support. At the same time, it disregards key facts that contradict its conclusions, including evidence that Hamas operated from civilian areas and recruited and used children in hostilities. This selective treatment of the evidence raises serious questions regarding the impartiality and integrity of the investigation.

These shortcomings would be troubling in any fact-finding exercise. They are particularly concerning here because the Commission’s findings are intended to inform international legal proceedings, including before the ICC and the ICJ. Findings of this nature—particularly those purporting to establish intent and criminal responsibility—would ordinarily require rigorous testing and corroboration before being relied upon in judicial proceedings. Yet international courts have an established practice of relying on UN reports as evidence. This report therefore undermines not only the integrity of international fact-finding, but also the application of international law and confidence in the UN system as a whole.

A summary of UN Watch’s detailed legal rebuttal follows.

CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL LEGAL REBUTTAL

By Salo Aizenberg

The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem (“COI”), issued a 94-page report (the “Report”) alleging that Israel deliberately targeted Palestinian children, with a particular focus on the war in Gaza. These are among the gravest accusations possible under international law, carrying implications of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. Yet despite the extraordinary nature of these allegations, the Report fails to provide even a single verified example demonstrating that Israel Defense Forces (“IDF”) personnel identified an individual as a civilian child and deliberately selected that child for death for no purpose other than killing the child. Instead, the report repeatedly substitutes the tragic fact that children died during the war for proof of deliberate targeting.

The Report’s conclusions are built on layers of speculation and inference unsupported by direct evidence at every stage of the analysis. In each incident recounted, the COI cannot conclusively determine whether Israeli forces fired the shot, whether militants were present, whether combat was occurring nearby, whether any threat existed, or what battlefield circumstances surrounded the incident. Yet despite these uncertainties, it repeatedly reaches definitive conclusions regarding Israeli responsibility and intent. In each case, the COI constructs an entire narrative of intentional killing through stacked assumptions rather than verified facts, transforming uncorroborated allegations into definitive findings of criminal conduct.

At the same time, the COI systematically removes Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (“PIJ”) from the battlefield narrative, portraying the Gaza conflict as though the IDF, acting under orders from Israeli political and military leadership, was engaged solely in the deliberate killing of civilians, particularly children. Across 94 pages, the Report never acknowledges that the IDF was fighting a heavily armed force of tens of thousands of Hamas and PIJ operatives who constructed hundreds of kilometers of tunnels, embedded military infrastructure throughout civilian areas, and routinely operated from homes, schools, hospitals, mosques, and displacement zones.[1] The result is a fictionalized account of the conflict in which there is no armed opposition, no complex urban battlefield, and no armed actors in Gaza other than the IDF. Combined with the erasure of militant activity in the West Bank, this distortion enables the COI to advance the fabricated narrative that Israeli forces were trained, directed, and deployed to deliberately target children as a matter of policy.

Such deficiencies strip the Report of legal credibility and render it indistinguishable from advocacy framed as serious analysis. The Report’s extreme length is intended to create the impression of rigorous evidentiary and forensic review, yet it still cannot mask the fundamental absence of reliable proof for its central allegations. An accusation that Israeli soldiers deliberately identified and killed children cannot rest on speculative reconstructions of battlefield events while systematically excluding military context and contradictory evidence. This rebuttal examines the central defects of the Report and demonstrates why the evidence presented cannot sustain a finding that Israel deliberately targeted children. A summary of the Report’s principal deficiencies is as follows:

1. Failure to provide corroborating evidence of any incident of IDF soldiers targeting children: A review of the incidents cited by the COI shows no evidence supporting the report’s headline allegation. In none of the cases can the COI definitively establish that a civilian Palestinian child was identified by an IDF soldier and intentionally targeted for death. That conclusion is speculative throughout. The COI’s methodology effectively assumes that a child killed in Gaza was both killed by the IDF and intentionally targeted merely because the child died.

2. Erasure of Hamas as a belligerent: The Report erases Hamas and other armed groups as active belligerents despite their deployment of tens of thousands of operatives throughout Gaza and their extensive military infrastructure built over 17 years, including vast tunnel networks, weapons stockpiles, booby-trapped buildings, and command facilities embedded within civilian areas.[2] There is no acknowledgement or discussion of Hamas’s use of hospitals, schools, mosques, residential buildings, and humanitarian zones for military purposes, or its openly acknowledged strategy of operating from within the civilian population.[3] A reader would come away believing the IDF was deployed in Gaza against only women and children. By ignoring the existence of Hamas and other armed groups as an opposing fighting force in Gaza, the COI creates a framework in which the deaths of children are presumed to reflect deliberate targeting rather than the realities of combat in an urban battlefield.

3. Presumption of no military presence: Throughout its incident-by-incident assessments, the COI repeatedly makes comments such as: “The Commission could not find any indication of a threat towards members of the Israeli security forces” (g., para. 58). But the COI has no way of knowing whether Hamas or PIJ operatives were present, engaged in combat, or operating from the area at the time of an incident, especially given Hamas’s exclusive use of civilian clothes for combat and its operations from apartments and concealed tunnel shafts beneath civilian areas. This assumption is foundational to the entire report. By presuming the absence of active combat or a military presence from the outset, the COI treats the death of a child not as a possible consequence of urban warfare, crossfire, militant activity, or error, but as presumptive evidence of intentional targeting by the IDF.

4. Reliance on local sources: The COI relies on family testimony to determine how children were killed, yet provides no explanation for how family members could know the circumstances of a strike or whether a child was deliberately targeted. Witnesses could not realistically know the full Gaza battlefield environment surrounding an incident, including the positions and movements of IDF and militant forces across a dense, 360-degree urban combat zone. Nevertheless, the COI accepts claims of certainty from family members about the source of fire and responsibility for a death.

5. Doctors as battlefield and ordnance experts: The COI repeatedly relies on medical professionals as expert testimony on military events and ordnance identification, even though doctors and hospital staff are not trained in weapon systems, ballistics, battlefield reconstruction, or combat analysis. This reliance is itself fatal to the report’s methodology. For example, the report cites a doctor who claimed, “she saw around five children shot by quadcopters” (para. 64), yet provides no explanation for how the doctor could determine the source of fire, the circumstances of the shootings, or whether the bullets came from Israeli quadcopters at all. These hospital-based testimonies appear throughout the report as featured evidence.

6. Unsupported attribution of bullets and ordnance: The COI repeatedly cites images of recovered bullets or fragments as proof that IDF forces were responsible for a shooting, yet provides no documented chain of custody, independent forensic verification, or explanation of how the munitions were authenticated. The report simply assumes that photographs or testimony regarding bullets presented by local hospital staff originated from Israeli weapons systems. Militant groups in Gaza also use a wide range of ammunition and captured weaponry, making unsupported attribution methodologically unsound. Without forensic analysis establishing the origin of a projectile and maintaining a verified chain of custody from the scene to investigators, the COI cannot reliably determine who fired a shot, let alone infer intentional targeting.

7. No mention of Hamas’s infiltration of Gaza hospitals: The report simultaneously treats Israeli operations against hospitals as presumptively criminal while also relying heavily on testimony from doctors and medical staff within those same institutions as neutral and authoritative evidence. Yet extensive evidence emerged throughout the war showing that Hamas used hospitals for military purposes, including command centers, tunnel infrastructure, and hostage detention.[4] Numerous healthcare workers and hospital personnel were later identified by Hamas and PIJ themselves as operatives, often commanders. This context is critical both to assessing the legality of military operations involving hospitals and to evaluating the credibility and independence of testimony originating from within institutions infiltrated by Hamas and PIJ.

8. Invention of new Laws of Armed Conflict and application of them to Israel: The COI asserts that if Israel attacks a location knowing civilians, including children, are present and would be killed, the attack is therefore unlawful and constitutes evidence that civilians were intentionally targeted. This directly contradicts the established Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC), which permits attacks on military objectives even when civilian casualties are foreseen, provided the applicable rules governing distinction, proportionality, and precautions are satisfied. Under the COI’s invented framework, military objectives placed in civilian structure or otherwise embedded among civilians effectively become permanently immune from attack, and any resulting civilian deaths are treated as proof of extermination, willful killing, and deliberate targeting.

9. Failure to Address Child Soldiers: Although the COI briefly acknowledges reports concerning the use of children by Palestinian armed groups (para. 11), it does not investigate the issue or acknowledge that not all minors in Gaza or the West Bank are innocent civilians. This omission is highly significant. Hamas and other armed factions have long operated military training camps for minors, promoted armed participation among youth, and celebrated teenage fighters as martyrs.[5] Minors as young as twelve years old killed in Gaza and the West Bank were later publicly praised by Hamas and PIJ as combatants.[6] A report centered on children in armed conflict cannot credibly ignore the widespread exploitation and use of minors by Palestinian armed groups for combat and military activity.

[1] Hamas’ use of human shield in Gaza, NATO Strategic Communications Center of Excellence (June 6, 2019), https://stratcomcoe.org/publications/hybrid-threats-hamas-use-of-human-shields-in-gaza/87.

[2] How Hamas is Fighting in Gaza: Tunnels, Traps, and Ambushes, New York Times (July 13, 2024), https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/13/world/middleeast/hamas-gaza-israel-fighting.html; The Tunnels of Gaza: How the subterranean maze below the Gasa Strip works, New York Times (November 10, 2023), https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/11/10/world/europe/hamas-gaza-tunnels.html.

[3] Gaza Chief’s Brutal Calculation: Civilian Bloodshed Will Help Hamas, Wall Street Journal (June 10, 2024), https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/gaza-chiefs-brutal-calculation-civilian-bloodshed-will-help-hamas-626720e7.

[4] Hamas’s Human Shield Strategy in Gaza, Henry Jackson Society (April 2025),  https://henryjacksonsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/HJS-Hamass-Human-Shield-Strategy-in-Gaza-Report-WEB.pdf.

[5] Here’s what a Hamas training camp for teens looks like, The Washington Post (January 29, 2015), https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/heres-what-a-hamas-training-camp-for-teens-looks-like/2015/01/29/ef0b4092-a33f-11e4-9f89-561284a573f8_story.html.

[6] The Child Soldiers of Gaza, @Aizenberg55 X (February 17, 2026, 5:35 PM), https://x.com/Aizenberg55/status/2023783492446789844.

The post UN Watch Legal Rebuttal: Disproving the Pillay Commission’s Charge That Israel Deliberately Targets Palestinian Children appeared first on UN Watch.

By Dina Rovner, Legal Advisor at UN Watch

The Human Rights Council’s Pillay Commission on Israel, now headed by Srinivasan Muralidhar of India, just released a new report focusing on violations by “non-State actors,” specifically “settlers” and “Palestinian armed groups” in the West Bank and Gaza. Despite the Commission’s formal reconstitution following the resignation of Navi Pillay, Miloon Kothari, and Chris Sidoti—with Sidoti subsequently re-appointed and Florence Mumba joining the panel—its reporting continues to reflect a persistent bias against Israel. 

In an apparent effort to project even-handedness, the report addresses violations by both Israeli and Palestinian non-State actors. Yet the distribution of attention tells a different story. More than half of the report focuses on Israeli violations against Palestinians, while only approximately 9% addresses Palestinian attacks against Israelis. Another 34% examines Hamas abuses against Palestinians in Gaza. Even in those latter sections, however, the Commission repeatedly contextualizes or shifts blame to Israel, attributing lawlessness, repression, and social collapse primarily to Israeli actions rather than Hamas governance, effectively minimizing Hamas’s responsibility for its own crimes. The report also applies markedly different accountability standards to Israel and Palestinian actors. 

At the heart of the report is a false moral equivalence between Israeli civilians residing in the West Bank and jihadi terrorist organizations. According to Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics, approximately 482,000 Israelis currently live in communities in Judea and Samaria (also known as the West Bank), home to areas of profound Jewish historical and religious significance, including the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, Rachel’s Tomb near Bethlehem, and Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus. While the overwhelming majority are peaceful civilians, a small minority of Jewish extremists—estimated by Israeli defense officials at roughly 300 individuals, many of whom are not residents of the area—have repeatedly engaged in violence against Palestinians, including property damage, assaults, and, in some cases, killings. 

The issue of extremist Israeli violence is real and should be investigated and prosecuted to the full extent of the law. Israeli authorities themselves have acknowledged this as a serious problem and have taken actions to curb the phenomenon, ranging from issuing restraining orders to arrest and prosecution, as detailed in Section 3 below. Condemnation of such violence has come from the highest levels of government. As recently as May 21, 2024, Israeli President Isaac Herzog lambasted acts of violence by Jewish extremists, saying that they “defile and violate every basic moral, legal, and Jewish norm.” He noted that “There are elements on the fringes of our society that have normalized violence, and, sadly, some go even further — celebrating it and taking pride in it.”   

However, the existence of a small number of violent Jewish extremists does not warrant the collective stigmatization of hundreds of thousands of Israeli civilians. Using the term “settler violence” to characterize all Israeli residents of the West Bank through the actions of a small extremist minority is misleading and irresponsible and risks stigmatizing innocent civilians due to their status as “settlers.” The report then draws a false moral equivalence by placing them in the same analytical category as designated terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad—groups openly committed to Israel’s destruction and the murder of Jews. By the same logic, one could describe Hamas terrorism as “Gazan violence.” Such terminology would be widely rejected because it conflates the actions of violent actors with those of the broader population. 

The report’s treatment of Israeli victims illustrates the consequences of this framing. In paragraph 68, the Commission notes that of 42 Israelis killed in terrorist attacks in the West Bank between 2023 and 2025, 36 were “settlers.” By contrast, when discussing Palestinian fatalities, the report does not distinguish between uninvolved civilians, members of armed groups, or Palestinians killed while carrying out terrorist attacks. Instead, it categorizes Palestinian victims only by sex and age. The Commission’s deliberate emphasis on the “settler” status of Israeli victims—while withholding comparable contextual information regarding Palestinian fatalities—creates the unmistakable impression that attacks against these Israelis are somehow more understandable or less morally troubling.   

Moreover, a close examination of the report reveals that many of its factual and legal conclusions rest on an incomplete and methodologically flawed evidentiary record. The report relies on unidentified witnesses, NGOs, open-source material, and prior UN reports—including the Commission’s own reports—which often suffer from the same methodological flaws. The lack of transparency regarding sources makes many factual assertions impossible to independently verify. Moreover, the report repeatedly omits or disregards material that undermines its narrative of Israeli violations, yet reaches sweeping legal conclusions on the basis of an incomplete and selective factual record. This is most evident in the Commission’s transformation of the criminal conduct of a small extremist minority into sweeping and unsupported allegations of Israeli state policy, culminating in the claim that settler violence functions “as a means of implementing” that policy (para. 73).    

The Commission relies almost exclusively on OCHA statistics for deaths and injuries involving both Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank (paras. 7–8, 68). However, a detailed April 2025 incident-level analysis of OCHA’s data conducted by the Israeli NGO Regavim—corroborated in part by academic and other independent analyses—identified serious methodological deficiencies. 

According to the study, approximately 12% of reported incidents (roughly 1,000 out of 8,333) relied on only a single source. More significantly, under the rubric of “settler violence,” OCHA counted Palestinians killed or injured in attacks they themselves initiated, while simultaneously undercounting Palestinian attacks and resulting Israeli casualties compared to official Israeli government data. OCHA also classified as “violent events” incidents that involved no violence at all, including Jewish visits to the Temple Mount, visits to archaeological sites, and even traffic accidents. Approximately 20% of recorded incidents occurred in Jerusalem rather than the West Bank, most involving Temple Mount visits or clashes between Israeli police and Muslim rioters. Another 19% involved alleged “trespassing” by Israeli tourists and hikers in the West Bank without violence, physical assault, or property damage. 

After excluding incidents that did not involve physical violence initiated by Israeli civilians against Palestinians or their property, the study concluded that OCHA overstated the scope of “settler violence” by approximately 90%, identifying an average of only 9.4 allegations of Jewish nationalist physical violence per month—roughly 110 annually. By comparison, official Shin Bet data recorded more than 2,000 Palestinian attacks against Israelis per year, an average of 167 per month. A June 2025 editorial in the Wall Street Journal endorsed many of Regavim’s findings, while a 2026 study by senior IDF officials reached similar conclusions. Hebrew University criminology researcher Dr. Michael Wolfowicz also identified methodological flaws in UN reporting, including double counting. For example, if a Palestinian terrorist was shot while carrying out an attack and died the following day, the incident could be recorded twice as “settler violence”—once for the shooting and again for the death. Palestinians killed in clashes with IDF soldiers were also at times included within the broader “settler violence” rubric. Indeed, in March 2026, OCHA reported that 26 Palestinians had been “killed by Israeli forces or settlers” since the beginning of the year. This included Khattab Mohammad Daragmeh, who was killed while attacking IDF soldiers and later mourned by Hamas as one of its shahids. Notably, while the Commission accuses Israel of “mischaracterizing settler-initiated assaults as Palestinian attacks” (para. 28), the OCHA methodology on which the report relies repeatedly classifies Palestinian-initiated attacks as “settler violence.” 

The Commission’s conclusions regarding alleged settler violence rest on deeply flawed and inflated data, substantially undermining the reliability of many of its factual and legal findings. Its central charge that settler violence functions “as a means of implementing” Israeli state policy (para. 73) is therefore unsupported. 

These methodological deficiencies are compounded by a series of additional factual, legal, and analytical flaws throughout the report, including the following:

1. Selective Evidence and Unverifiable Sources

The Commission states that it “consulted multiple sources of information, collected hundreds of open-source items, conducted remote interviews with victims and witnesses, and received information through an open call for submissions” (para. 3). Yet much of the report relies on anonymous interviews, unattributed allegations, and undisclosed materials, while the underlying evidence remains “on file with the Commission” and unavailable for independent scrutiny (paras. 3–4). As a result, many factual assertions cannot be independently verified. This concern is heightened by the Commission’s past reliance on highly politicized NGOs, which advance one-sided narratives demonizing Israel and minimizing or omitting Palestinian culpability. The result is a report built on unverifiable claims and selective sourcing that presents an incomplete factual record.  

2. Recycles Biased UN Reports

Aside from its reliance on biased OCHA data, the report cites remarkably few sources for its factual findings—mostly other UN reports, including previous reports of the Commission itself—and none at all for its legal conclusions. Rather than independently substantiating its claims, the Commission largely recycles prior UN reporting, much of it based on the same questionable and politicized sources. Repetition does not make contested allegations credible, nor does citing prior UN reports remedy underlying evidentiary deficiencies.  

3. Insufficient Support for Claims of State Policy

The Commission claims that “settler violence has been carried out in collaboration with Israeli military authorities,” relying only on biased UN reports (para. 10). It further alleges that Israeli authorities promote “structural conditions that enable [settler violence],” citing outdated Knesset reports from 1982 and 1994 (para. 11). Without citing evidence, it asserts that “Israeli Army units have operated alongside settlers in numerous incidents,” that authorities treat settler attacks as “riots” or “confrontations” between “two ostensibly equal sides,” and that when Palestinians respond by throwing stones, they mischaracterize “settler-initiated assaults as Palestinian attacks” (Para. 28). On this basis, the Commission concludes that there has been a “de facto collapse of the distinction between settlers and soldiers” (para. 28), and that settler violence functions “as a means of implementing” Israeli state policy (para. 73). 

The factual record does not support these sweeping claims. Attacks by Jews against Palestinians in the West Bank are perpetrated by a small minority of extremists who do not represent most settlers and in no way reflect Israeli “state policy” or its “implementation,” as the Commission claims (para. 73). The Commission itself acknowledges that some of those involved are not settlers at all, but at-risk youth from Israel (para. 24). Its reliance on the most extreme figures in this movement, including Elisha Yered and Meir Ettinger—both of whom have faced criminal proceedings in Israel—only confirms that this is not a mainstream phenomenon. Nor is it directed only at Palestinians: some of those responsible have also attacked IDF soldiers. 

More can and should be done to curb Jewish extremist violence against Palestinians in the West Bank. But the claim that such violence reflects Israeli state policy is contradicted by repeated condemnations from Prime Minister Netanyahu, including when violence was directed against Palestinians and against the IDF, as well as by President Isaac Herzog, IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir, and others—an inconvenient fact the Commission quickly dismisses (para. 73). Settlement leaders have also condemned such violence. 

Recent studies published in 2025 and 2026 reviewing Israeli police data further undermine the Commission’s narrative of systemic impunity. While complaints against Jewish offenders in the West Bank were significantly higher than elsewhere in Israel, many allegations were ultimately dismissed as false or unsupported. One February 2026 case illustrates the problem: Palestinian sources accused settlers of deliberately setting fire to a sheep pen in the southern West Bank, killing dozens of sheep. An Israeli police investigation found that the fire was electrical, not a “criminal or nationalistically motivated act.” 

Israeli authorities have also taken coercive measures against extremist settlers, including administrative detention. In 2025, leaked Shin Bet recordings reportedly exposed the head of the agency’s Jewish Division pressing the Judea and Samaria police chief to intensify arrests and interrogations of extremist settlers, stating: “We always want to arrest them for interrogation, as much as possible.” Far from demonstrating official indifference or acquiescence, these actions directly undermine the Commission’s claim that settler violence functions “as a means of implementing” Israeli state policy (para. 73). 

4. Dismisses Evidence of Israeli Action Against Settler Violence

The Commission repeatedly discounts or minimizes Israeli efforts to address extremist violence by Jewish Israelis in the West Bank. It criticizes Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Netanyahu, for describing perpetrators as “a small group of unruly youth” that “do not represent settlers as a whole” (para. 23), despite the Commission itself acknowledging that some perpetrators are not settlers at all, but at-risk youth from Israel (para. 24). Likewise, while acknowledging that Israeli authorities have issued removal orders against violent settlers and dismantled certain outposts described as “exporters of Jewish terror,” the Commission dismisses these measures as merely “symbolic” and “limited in scope” (para. 27). 

The Commission similarly discounts repeated public condemnations of settler violence by senior Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Netanyahu, President Herzog, and military leadership as “periodic government statements,” and asserts that Israeli authorities have taken “no meaningful or sustained measures” to curb such attacks (para. 73). Yet this conclusion disregards administrative detention, arrests, removal orders, police investigations, and other coercive measures undertaken against extremist offenders.

The Commission also appears willing to infer institutional failure from incomplete legal processes. In discussing a March 2026 case in which Israeli police arrested seven individuals, it emphasizes that it was “not aware of any investigative or judicial outcomes,” implying a deficiency in accountability even though the legal process had not yet run its course. The absence of immediate judicial outcomes is not evidence of impunity, particularly where arrests and investigations were already underway.

5. False Distinction Between Hamas’s Political and Military Wings

The Commission attempts to distinguish between Hamas’s “military wing” and Hamas governing institutions, criticizing Israel for targeting “civilian Hamas officials, including police, and internal security forces” (para. 46) while treating them as separate from Hamas military operations. Yet the Commission itself found that crimes against Palestinians in Gaza were committed by “a plain-clothed paramilitary force created in March 2024 by the Ministry of Interior in Gaza” (para. 37)—a Hamas government ministry.

In reality, Hamas does not recognize a meaningful distinction between its political, governing, and military structures. Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin explicitly rejected such separation, stating: “We cannot separate the wing from the body. If we do so, the body will not be able to fly. Hamas is one body.” Reflecting this reality, the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, the European Union, and others designate Hamas in its entirety as a terrorist organization, rather than distinguishing between political and military branches.

6. Minimizes Violent Stone-Throwing

The Commission minimizes the seriousness of Palestinian stone-throwing, criticizing Israel for referring to Palestinian stone-throwers as “terrorists” over what it characterizes as “some stone throwing” (paras. 29, 75). It further portrays stone-throwing as an act of self-defense, referring to “Palestinians who throw stones to defend themselves, their property and land in the face of settler attacks” (para. 75). 

This characterization obscures the violent nature of such attacks. Stone-throwing attacks are often carried out by organized groups and frequently target Jewish vehicles on West Bank roads. Israeli authorities have repeatedly documented incidents in which rocks thrown at moving vehicles resulted in severe injuries and fatalities. 

7. Shifts Responsibility for Palestinian Terrorism Against Israelis onto Israel

While the Commission includes a section on Palestinian crimes against Israelis, apparently in an effort to appear even-handed, it is the shortest section in the report and addresses the issue only superficially. Moreover, approximately one-quarter of the text is devoted not to Palestinian abuses themselves, but to criticizing Israeli security measures designed to protect civilians and prevent attacks. Without citing sources, the Commission claims that such measures contribute to further Palestinian violence “as a measure of resistance and revenge” (para. 72). By characterizing attacks as acts of “resistance and revenge,” the Commission implicitly legitimizes violence against Israelis while shifting focus from Palestinian responsibility to criticism of Israeli security measures.  

8. Ignores Official Palestinian Support for Terrorism

While the report concludes that “settler violence functions not as a deviation from state policy but as a means of implementing it” (para. 73), it ignores evidence of official Palestinian Authority support for terrorism. Beyond longstanding concerns regarding incitement on official PA television and in PA educational materials, Palestinian terrorists and their families continue to receive state payments. 

Although Mahmoud Abbas announced in February 2025 that the payment system would be reformed, he made clear that financial support would continue through a different mechanism. At the time, Abbas declared: “Even if we have [only] one penny left, it is for the prisoners and Martyrs. I will not agree, and you will not agree, to reduce any obligation, any interest, or any penny given to them. They must receive everything, as it was in the past, and they are more precious than all of us!” The U.S. confirmed, based on open-source reporting, that, as of February 2026, the payments continued. 

Moreover, a February 2026 report by Palestinian Media Watch found that since 2021, the Palestinian Authority had concealed substantial payments to terrorists by categorizing them as civil servant salaries and pension payments. Following the report, PA Finance Minister Estephan Salameh stated that the Palestinian Authority had “not abandoned” any terrorist, “whether they are prisoners or families of Martyrs and wounded,” and reaffirmed the PA’s commitment to these payments despite “great, almost impossible difficulty,” describing the issue as a “clear, fundamental national issue.” 

9. Selective Analysis of Nasser Hospital

The Commission detailed multiple Hamas violations against Palestinians at Nasser Hospital, including interrogations, mistreatment, and violent punishment carried out on hospital premises, thereby demonstrating Hamas’s operational use of the facility (paras. 55–61). However, it omitted any discussion of Hamas’s use of Nasser Hospital for military operations against Israel. The IDF has stated, based on intelligence, that Nasser Hospital served as a Hamas headquarters and that hostages were held there. This is corroborated by returned hostage Sharon Aloni Cunio, who told CNN in January 2024 that tens of hostages were held captive at Nasser Hospital. Military experts such as John Spencer and Andrew Fox, both of whom have conducted field visits to Gaza and analyzed these issues, have similarly concluded that Hamas used Nasser Hospital for military purposes in its war against Israel. Under Article 19 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, hospitals lose protection when they “are used to commit, outside their humanitarian duties, acts harmful to the enemy.” Yet despite documenting only Hamas’s operational use of the facility against Gazans—while omitting evidence regarding Hamas’s military use against Israel—the Commission finds that these documented crimes do not amount to “acts harmful to the enemy” and makes the sweeping legal conclusion that such conduct “does not result in the loss of special protection of the hospital against attacks under international humanitarian law.” (paras. 61, 87). Given the selective factual record, the Commission cannot credibly reach such a sweeping legal conclusion. 

10. Shifts Responsibility for Hamas Abuses Against Gazans onto Israel

In discussing Hamas violations against Palestinians in Gaza, the Commission frames Israeli actions—not Hamas rule—as the primary driver of abuses. In its “Background” section, it reiterates its prior claim that Israel “committed genocide in Gaza” after October 7 (para. 46), before faulting Israel for creating a power vacuum by targeting “civilian Hamas officials, including police, and internal security forces,” while distinguishing them from Hamas’s “military wing,” and by destroying “essential infrastructure.” According to the Commission, the resulting “lawlessness, killings, lootings, theft and social chaos were the direct results of this vacuum and Israeli attacks” (para. 46). 

The Commission similarly links increased risks of “sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment” to the humanitarian conditions in Gaza, attributing them to Israel’s alleged “destruction of the international aid delivery system” (paras. 46–47). In its legal conclusions, the Commission again situates Hamas violations “in a context where the genocide inflicted by Israel has devastated Gaza’s infrastructure, eliminated civil policing and administrative structures, and helped to create a deep power and security vacuum in which no functioning, accountable law-enforcement or judicial system protects civilians” (para. 81).

This framing obscures the role of Hamas itself. By suggesting that abuses primarily stemmed from the collapse of governance structures, the Commission implicitly portrays Hamas-run policing and governance as institutions that previously protected civilians. Yet Hamas police and security forces have long been implicated in abuses against Palestinians in Gaza, including executions, shootings at aid sites, arbitrary detention, and torture. In its August 2022 concluding observations, the Committee Against Torture expressed concern regarding “allegations of widespread torture” by the security and intelligence services of both the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. Likewise, in its August 2023 concluding observations, the Human Rights Committee expressed concern regarding the use of the death penalty in Gaza, the prosecution of civilians in military courts, the lack of judicial guarantees, and the absence of judicial independence. Video footage recovered in Gaza and published in November 2024 appeared to show Hamas members torturing Gazans between 2020 and 2022, visually reinforcing longstanding reports of abuse by Hamas authorities. The Commission did not address this evidence. 

11. Minimizes Hamas Abuse of Israeli Hostages

The Commission gives only cursory treatment to Hamas torture and sexual abuse of Israeli hostages. Its finding that hostages were merely “mistreated in captivity” (para. 69) fails to convey the severity of the reported abuse. This is the Commission’s first report since the release of the final Israeli hostages in October 2025 and its fifth report since the January 2025 hostage releases. Yet, it has never meaningfully addressed the consistent testimony of returning hostages describing repeated physical and psychological torture, sexual abuse and assault, deliberate starvation, and severe deprivation of hygiene and medical care.  

Likewise, while the Commission addressed sexual crimes committed on October 7 in its June 2024 report, its findings were limited. It stated that it could not attribute the crimes to Hamas due to insufficient information regarding perpetrators and made no findings regarding the deliberate or systematic nature of the abuse. The Commission has not revisited the issue in any meaningful detail despite extensive open-source material, including testimony from witnesses, survivors, and former hostages. 

For example, the May 2026 report of Israel’s Civil Commission on October 7 Crimes by Hamas against Women and Children concluded that Hamas sexual crimes were “deliberate,” “widespread,” “systematic,” and “integral” to the October 7 attack. The study documented its findings based on “430 formal and informal interviews, testimonies, and meetings with survivors, witnesses, former hostages, experts, and family members,” “more than 10,000 photographs and video segments,” and visits to affected communities. The Commission does not mention this report, nor does it engage with earlier Israeli studies, including the June 2025 report of The Dinah Project and the February 2024 report of the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel. 

12. Double Standards on Israeli and Palestinian Children

The report discusses the impact of settler violence on both Palestinian and Israeli children (paras. 77–78; 90). Regarding Israeli children, it portrays them as both “perpetrators and victims,” exposed to “constant indoctrination and radicalisation” amounting to “child abuse and exploitation.” Yet while the report briefly notes harm suffered by Palestinian children directly exposed to Hamas violence (para. 84), it entirely omits the longstanding indoctrination and radicalization of Palestinian children by Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, including through school curricula, glorification of “martyrs,” antisemitic narratives, media messaging, and the recruitment and use of minors by Palestinian armed groups. Numerous studies of Palestinian Authority textbooks, including those used in UNRWA schools, have documented such content. Whatever indoctrination may occur among some Israeli children, the Commission ignores a far more extensive, institutionalized and officially-sponsored system of indoctrination affecting Palestinian children. If indoctrination, radicalization, and the exploitation of minors constitute a child-rights concern amounting to “child abuse and exploitation,” the Commission cannot selectively apply that standard only to Israeli children while disregarding longstanding abuses affecting Palestinian children.  

13. Omits Gender-Based Violence Against Palestinian Women

While the report discusses sexual and gender-based violence perpetrated by Hamas against Palestinian males, including forced stripping, sexual humiliation, and threats of castration (paras. 64–67; 86), it entirely omits allegations of sexual violence against Palestinian women by Hamas, particularly in Gaza. An April 2026 exposé by the Daily Mail reported disturbing accounts by Gazan women who alleged that Hamas operatives sexually assaulted and raped women in exchange for humanitarian aid. The report’s complete omission of these allegations, despite its detailed treatment of sexual and gender-based violence against Gazan males, reflects a selective approach to documenting abuses committed by Palestinian actors. 

14. Unequal Standards for Palestinian Accountability

While the Commission treats Israel harshly, issuing a series of one-sided demands, it adopts a markedly more lenient approach toward the Palestinian Authority. Rather than demanding an immediate end to violations and meaningful accountability, as it does with Israel, the Commission merely calls on the Palestinian Authority to investigate and prosecute crimes “to the extent possible,” to take “all possible” measures to prevent future attacks, and to ensure that the judicial system complies with international law (para. 91). Notably, the Commission’s recommendations to Hamas relate only to violations against Palestinians, not Israelis. 

Likewise, the Commission’s recommendations to Member States are directed primarily at Israeli settlements and settlers, calling for criminal prosecutions and sanctions against those “sustaining” the “settlement enterprise” (para. 93(e)). Although the Commission also calls for a cessation of assistance and support to “all non-State actors,” including “settlers and Palestinian armed groups” (para. 93(d)), this framing creates a false moral equivalency between violent Palestinian armed groups and Israeli civilians living in the West Bank, while failing to distinguish between violent extremists and the overwhelming majority of settlers who are not involved in violence.

The post Legal Analysis of the Pillay Commission’s June 2026 Report to the Human Rights Council appeared first on UN Watch.

For over four years, from 2021 until several months ago, Kothari was a member of the UN Human Rights Council’s infamous Pillay Commission — the perpetual inquiry targeting Israel.

Most famously, Kothari and the other two members of the commission issued a report accusing Israel of “genocide” — a baseless conclusion that continues to be cited worldwide.

During his tenure, in July 2022, Kothari gave an interview where he ranted about the “Jewish lobby” controlling social media. Thanks to UN Watch, he was condemned for antisemitism by 17 countries, and even by the UN itself.

In June 2023, Kothari gave a speech at the UNHRC complaining that the media was too pro-Israel. He cited “biased reporting of the BBC, the New York Times, Washington Post, and there are many others almost verging towards fake news.”

This summer, after the U.S. imposed sanctions on UN special rapporteur Francesca Albanese, the entire membership of the Pillay inquiry announced their resignations.

Kothari’s Deal To Exchange Posts

However, in his resignation letter, Kothari cited an “understanding” reached with the UN. Apparently, in exchange for his departure from the inquiry, he was promised a new UN role.

Indeed, in January, a Turkish-chaired UNHRC panel selected Kothari as its top candidate to become the next UN expert on poverty, despite his clear lack of any relevant experience.

In nearly all cases, those chosen by the vetting panel are then appointed by the Council. However, UN Watch caught wind of the scheme and sounded the alarm. UN Watch urged democracies to intervene and end Kothari’s UN tenure once and for all.

Beyond his bias, argued UN Watch, Kothari exemplifies a pattern of UN cronyism, having rotated through multiple unrelated positions over more than a decade.

UN Watch also recalled the incident in 2002, while Kothari was serving as the UN’s special rapporteur on housing. He had requested a visa to visit Israel in a  strictly personal capacity — only to later submit an official report against Israel as a result of that supposedly “personal” visit. Kothari’s conduct violated the working methods of the UNHRC’s mechanisms, and raised serious legal and ethical issues.

Pressure Mounts — Kothari Rejected

In wake of UN Watch’s campaign against Kothari’s bid for reappointment, pressure mounted. On March 2nd, the new UNHRC president took the rare step of rejecting the panel’s recommendation of Kothari.

The denial of Kothari’s application was made official yesterday when the 47-member Council elected an alternative candidate by acclamation.

This outcome marks a rare but important victory for accountability at the United Nations. A backroom arrangement was exposed, pressure was applied, and the system was forced to correct itself.

It sends a clear signal: those who promote antisemitism and abuse UN mandates can be challenged — and stopped.

GOOD NEWS: Miloon Kothari—the former UN investigator who was condemned for antisemitism by 🇺🇸🇨🇦🇬🇧🇦🇺🇨🇿🇩🇪🇳🇱🇫🇷🇮🇹🇦🇹🇧🇪🇨🇭🇸🇪🇳🇴🇩🇰🇧🇷🇭🇺 —has just been blocked from his bid to become a UN Special Rapporteur for the next 6 years. UN Watch led a campaign exposing Kothari's bigotry and bias. https://t.co/c6jU2xi0Ql

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) March 31, 2026

The post Success: UN Official Who Ranted About “The Jewish Lobby” Loses Reappointment appeared first on UN Watch.

By Dina Rovner, Legal Advisor at UN Watch

The Pillay Commission, established in May 2021 under Resolution S-30/1, was designed to isolate Israel internationally, increase sanctions, and build criminal cases against Israeli officials. True to that mission, its latest report accuses Israel of “genocide,” institutional “discrimination” (a euphemism for apartheid), and other grave crimes. It urges states to impose sweeping boycotts and sanctions and even names specific Israeli officials as targets for prosecution in international courts.

The report centers on housing policy in Gaza, the West Bank, and within Israel’s sovereign territory. Its factual analysis and legal conclusions are entirely one-sided, omitting critical context and assigning sole blame to Israel for Palestinian suffering. It ignores Palestinian rejectionism, terrorism, and ongoing warfare — erasing the reality of decades of Palestinian violence and incitement.

While demanding that Israel “recognize and ensure the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination,” the Commission simultaneously denies the Jewish people that same right, demonizing Jewish settlement even within sovereign Israeli territory. Given the Commissioners’ well-documented record of anti-Israel activism and their repeated dismissal of antisemitism, such bias is predictable. But it underscores why this report has no legitimacy, no legal authority, and deserves to be categorically rejected.

As with its previous publications, the Pillay Commission’s latest report is deeply flawed. Key deficiencies are outlined below. The false genocide allegation, already thoroughly refuted, is not addressed here.

1. Bias Evident From Outset

The Commission’s bias is evident from the outset. In its opening paragraph, it declares that from the beginning it viewed October 7th as a “watershed moment” — not for revealing Palestinian rejectionism and commitment to jihadi terrorism, but for portraying Israel as seeking to “solidify and expand the occupation” (Para. 1). In doing so, the Commission perversely transformed the October 7th mass atrocity against Israel into a “watershed moment” to demonize the Jewish state. With this preconceived narrative, the Commission proceeds to manipulate facts to support its foregone conclusion that Israel has “deepened the occupation” since October 7th.

2. Ignores Hamas and Terrorism

The Commission entirely ignores Hamas. The word “Hamas” appears only once in the report (Para. 23), and even then, merely in reference to a quote attributed to Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir. The Commission itself makes no substantive reference to Hamas, nor does it hold the terrorist organization accountable for any violations, particularly its systematic exploitation of civilian infrastructure in Gaza for military purposes — the primary cause of the extensive damage to civilian property discussed in the report.

Likewise, the report completely ignores the issue of Palestinian terrorism targeting Jews and Israelis. The words “terrorism,” “terror,” and “terrorist” each appear only once, and only when quoted from Israeli officials.

3. Ignores Israeli Hostages

The Commission’s indifference to Israeli suffering is equally apparent in its treatment of the hostages. Apart from a token reference buried in a recommendation to the Palestinian government calling to “immediately release all hostages” (Para. 88), the report entirely ignores the plight of the Israelis — cruelly starved, chained, and tortured by Hamas for two years and deliberately deprived of their most basic human needs.

The Commission makes no mention of their rights to humane treatment, sanitary conditions, or visits by the International Committee of the Red Cross. Moreover, despite testimony from released hostages confirming they were held in civilian homes, hospitals, UN shelters, and designated humanitarian zones — acts that endangered Palestinian civilians and violated international law — the report refuses to address these violations. In omitting these facts, the Commission shields Hamas from accountability and distorts the causes of civilian suffering and destruction in Gaza.

4. Ignores Hamas Tunnels

The report mentions Hamas’s vast tunnel network only once (Para. 16) — not to hold Hamas accountable for diverting millions of dollars in international aid to build terror infrastructure instead of civilian infrastructure, nor for constructing an estimated 350-mile network of tunnels beneath Gaza that endangered all civilian structures above. Instead, the Commission refers to the tunnels solely to criticize Israel for citing them as a justification for establishing security corridors and buffer zones in Gaza. Once again, the Commission absolves Hamas of responsibility while condemning Israel for its legitimate security measures.

5. Erases the War

One of the Commission’s central claims is that after October 7th, Israel “systematically destroyed civilian objects across Gaza and repeatedly forcibly transferred the population” (Para. 13). This framing suggests that Israel invaded and devastated Gaza without provocation.

It erases the Hamas atrocities of October 7th — the massacre of Israeli families and the abduction of some 250 hostages — and ignores the broader war context, including Hamas’s deliberate strategy of embedding its fighters, weapons, and command centers within civilian infrastructure to maximize casualties, property damage, and international outrage.

The Commission later notes that property destruction increased significantly between October 2023 and February 2024 (Para. 20), which coincided with one of the most intense phases of combat between the Israeli army and Hamas. This context demonstrates that the destruction was an unfortunate consequence of urban warfare, not evidence of a genocidal Israeli policy as the Commission claims. By blaming Israel alone for the devastation in Gaza while omitting this essential context, the Commission amplifies Hamas propaganda and effectively serves as an advocate for the terrorist organization.

6. Circular Logic: Citing Itself as “Evidence”

The Commission attempts to lend legal legitimacy to its claims by citing the July 19, 2024 ICJ Advisory Opinion on the effects of Israeli policy on “the exercise by the Palestinian people of their right to self-determination” (Para 5). Yet in doing so, it is effectively citing itself.

The 2024 Advisory Opinion relied heavily on the Commission’s own September 2022 report to the UN General Assembly (A/77/328), which concluded — without considering a range of perspectives or authorities — that Israeli policy violated the Palestinian right to self-determination. That report relied almost exclusively on partisan, pro-Palestinian NGOs and recommended that the General Assembly request an ICJ Advisory Opinion on “Israel’s refusal to respect the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination,” effectively prejudging Israel.

The resulting General Assembly Resolution (A/RES/77/247) echoed this presumption, asking “what are the legal consequences arising from the ongoing violation by Israel of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination.” The ICJ’s Advisory Opinion then cited extensively to the Commission’s 2022 report. By invoking the ICJ’s conclusions, the Commission here relies on its own unsourced and partisan assertions as supposed legal authority — creating a circular reference rather than providing independent validation. For more on this see Timeline: How the Pillay Commission Instigated the ICJ Assault on Israel.

7. Erases Palestinian Agency

The report deliberately frames Israel’s housing policies through the Palestinian victim narrative, referring to the 1948 war as the Nakba (Arabic for “catastrophe”) (Section II, Background). In doing so, the Commission infantilizes Palestinians, strips them of agency, and absolves them of responsibility for their own fate.

The report presents a selective, ahistorical account claiming that 700,000 Palestinians were “forced to leave their homes,” while ignoring critical context: Arab states rejected the 1947 UN Partition Plan, launched a war of annihilation against the nascent Jewish state, encouraged Palestinians to flee, and ethnically cleansed areas that came under their control of Jews — including the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem and the entire West Bank, home to Judaism’s holiest sites. This selective framing shields Palestinians from accountability while demonizing Israel.

8. Rewrites History to Vilify Israel

Citing no sources, the report claims that the Arabs who remained in Israel after the 1948 war were “forced to concentrate principally in two large geographical areas, the Negev and Galilee,” implying that Israel forcibly relocated them to these regions (Para. 7). In reality, Arabs were already concentrated in these areas and remained there naturally following the war.

9. Falsely Claims Israel Occupies Gaza

While the Commission acknowledges that Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, it falsely asserts that Israel has continued to occupy the territory by virtue of its control over “the airspace, water and territorial borders of Gaza, as well as civilian infrastructure, including water and electricity, and key governmental functions” (Para. 17). In reality, although Israel has maintained a lawful naval blockade since 2007 — after Hamas violently seized control of the territory — it has had no physical presence in Gaza and no authority over its internal governance after the 2005 disengagement.

As a matter of international law, occupation requires effective control over the territory, which Israel clearly does not exercise. Indeed, Hamas’s ability to launch thousands of rockets into Israel, construct a vast underground terror network, and orchestrate the October 7th massacre from within Gaza demonstrates that Israel does not control the territory’s internal affairs.

10. Unsupported and Speculative Findings

The Commission’s conclusions rest on conjecture, not evidence. The Commission claims it “could not find reasonable military justification for the consistent and extensive expansion of the two corridors” (Para. 19). Yet it concedes “creating security zones” and “establishing military bases” can serve legitimate military purposes (Para. 72). The report cites no military experts, provides no independent analysis, and relies on unverified information. It also has no access to IDF operational data, internal military protocols, or on-the-ground observations. Despite this absence of expertise or evidence, the Commission expects readers to accept its unverified conclusions at face value.

11. Israel’s Own Oversight Mechanisms Address Discrimination—No Need for a Biased UN Commission

The Commission cites a 2024 State Comptroller report (Para. 52) highlighting Arab Israeli housing challenges. That report includes concrete recommendations — some directed at local municipalities — demonstrating that local elected authorities share responsibility for housing issues. The very existence of this report shows that these issues are actively addressed by the Israeli Knesset, demonstrating Israel’s democratic institutions already implement oversight and reform. There is therefore no justification for interference by a biased UN Commission.

12. Denies Jewish Right to Live in Their Homeland While Demonizing Growth of Jewish Communities

Although Israel is the historical homeland of the Jewish people, the Commission denies Jews the right to live anywhere within that homeland — whether in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), home to many Jewish holy sites, or within Israel’s sovereign borders. The Commission harshly criticizes the expansion of Jewish communities inside sovereign Israeli territory, labeling it “Judaization.” Depicting Jewish settlement in Israel as illegitimate constitutes a denial of the Jewish right to self-determination and is inherently antisemitic.

At the same time, the Commission misrepresents separate Jewish and Arab communities as “segregation,” ignoring that residential patterns reflect social, cultural, and safety preferences. Mixed cities exist, and there have been recent trends of Arab Israelis moving to Jewish-majority cities for safer environments. The Commission ignores this context entirely.

The post Legal Analysis of the Pillay Commission’s September 2025 Report to the General Assembly appeared first on UN Watch.

CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL LEGAL REBUTTAL

By Salo Aizenberg

Accusations of genocide are among the most serious charges that can be made against a state. They evoke the darkest episodes of modern history, such as the Holocaust, Rwanda, and Srebrenica, and they carry immense legal consequences as well as profound moral weight. For this reason, the Genocide Convention of 1948 sets a deliberately high bar: genocide requires specific intent (dolus specialis) to destroy, in whole or in part, a protected group “as such.”[1] Genocidal intent is established only when there is no other reasonable inference. Evidence of widespread civilian casualties, extensive destruction, or inflammatory rhetoric does not suffice; what is required is proof that deaths and suffering were the result of a deliberate policy to exterminate a people. Establishing such intent is among the most difficult elements in international law, and the genocide allegation against Israel fails at this threshold even before considering the Report’s distortions of its conduct in Gaza.

The UN Human Rights Council Commission of Inquiry’s report is fatally deficient: its reasoning is deeply flawed, its evidentiary base unreliable, and its methodology unsound. It selectively misinterprets statements by Israeli leaders, accepts unverified Hamas casualty figures, disregards Hamas’s systematic use of human shields, relies on unverified media reports (such as by Al-Jazeera), and assumes that civilian deaths in Gaza are only the result of deliberate targeting by Israel. Its omissions are equally striking. The report erases Hamas as an active belligerent; across its 72 pages, it never acknowledges that the IDF is engaged with a 30,000-strong fighting force that constructed a battlefield fortified with 500 kilometers of tunnels. Such deficiencies strip the document of legal credibility and render it indistinguishable from propaganda dressed in legal language.

This rebuttal examines the central defects of the UN report (the “Report”) issued by the Commission of Inquiry (the “Commission”). It shows why the evidence presented cannot sustain a finding of genocide under international law. A summary of its main deficiencies are as follows:

1. Failure to prove dolus specialis: The specific intent to destroy a protected group is the central and extremely high bar in any genocide case. The Commission’s claim of genocidal intent fails on this threshold alone, relying on tortured parsing of statements, selective quotations, and conjecture rather than unambiguous evidence.

2. Erasure of Hamas as a belligerent: The report never acknowledges that the IDF is engaged in combat with an estimated 30,000-strong Hamas force in Gaza as well as thousands of fighters from other militant groups. A reader would come away believing the war has the IDF deployed against only women and children, with Hamas erased from the narrative. The Commission makes no attempt to analyze the war itself, because in its alternative version of reality, there is none.

3. Silence on Hamas’s military infrastructure: There is no mention of Hamas’s 17-year military buildup in Gaza, including its vast tunnel network, booby-trapped buildings, and massive arms buildup. By ignoring this reality, the report strips the conflict of its military context and recasts lawful military targets as evidence of genocide.

4. Erasure of Hamas’s use of civilian infrastructure: The Commission ignores Hamas’s openly acknowledged human shield strategy,[2] including its use of mosques, schools, residential buildings, and hospitals to conceal tunnels and weapons. Instead, damage to these sites is consistently portrayed as deliberate targeting of civilians by Israel.

5. No recognition of the hostage crisis: The report omits the fact that Hamas took Israeli hostages and continues to hold them, starve them,[3] and rape them.[4] This omission is consistent with the broader erasure of Hamas as an active actor in Gaza, removing essential context from the Commission’s narrative.

6. Reliance on Hamas-supplied fatality data: Despite Hamas’s long record of exaggerating civilian deaths and its status as a US and EU-designated terrorist organization, its figures are treated as fact while IDF data on combatants killed is ignored.

7. Civilian deaths distorted as evidence of genocide: The report presents civilian casualties as prima facie proof of genocidal intent rather than as tragic and unavoidable consequences of urban warfare, exacerbated by Hamas’s human shield strategy. The Report cites numerous incidents where civilians were killed as intentional and targeted acts by Israel without evidence.

8. Normal wartime consequences treated as crimes: Regular and expected wartime impacts on civilians, such as mental health impacts, difficulty accessing medical care and displacement, are depicted as evidence of genocide rather than inevitable outcomes of urban conflict.

9. Urban devastation portrayed as extermination: Large-scale damage is cited as proof of genocide, ignoring that urban combat inherently produces extensive destruction, particularly when military forces are embedded within civilian areas.

The Commission also ignores the obvious: the suffering of Gazans could be significantly reduced or even ended if Hamas released all hostages and relinquished control of Gaza. The idea that the population experiencing the claimed genocide has the power to stop it but refuses to is unprecedented in the history of actual genocides and exposes a deliberate blind spot in the Report. This omission mirrors the Commission’s broader erasure of Hamas as an active party in the conflict, a group with agency and responsibility, leaving readers with the false impression that all suffering in Gaza is solely Israel’s responsibility.

The Report is riddled with factual errors and assertions made with no credible evidence. A complete catalog of these mistakes and their corrections would be longer than the Report itself. This rebuttal highlights key factual errors and significant omissions that the Commission relies on to underpin its thesis of genocide.

[1] Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 78 U.N.T.S. 277 (adopted December 9, 1948, entered into force January 12, 1951), https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.1_Convention%20on%20the%20Prevention%20and%20Punishment%20of%20the%20Crime%20of%20Genocide.pdf.

[2] How Hamas is fighting in Gaza: tunnels, traps and ambushes, NYT (July 13, 2024), https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/13/world/middleeast/hamas-gaza-israel-fighting.html.

[3] World leaders condemn videos of emaciated Israeli hostages in Gaza as Red Cross calls for access, BBC (August 4, 2025), https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crr2dwn7q40o.

[4] Hostages released from Gaza detail sexual violence as Israeli report concludes Hamas used it as ‘weapon of war’ on October 7, CNN (July 8, 2025), https://www.cnn.com/2025/07/08/middleeast/hostages-gaza-sexual-violence-report-hamas-latam-intl; A Quest for Justice: October 7 and Beyond, The Dinah Project (June 2025), https://thedinahproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/The-Dinah-Project-full-report-A4-pages_web.pdf; Mission report Official visit of the Office of the SRSG-SVC to Israel and the occupied West Bank 29 January – 14 February 2024, UN (March 4, 2024),  https://www.un.org/sexualviolenceinconflict/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/report/mission-report-official-visit-of-the-office-of-the-srsg-svc-to-israel-and-the-occupied-west-bank-29-january-14-february-2024/20240304-Israel-oWB-CRSV-report.pdf.

The post UN Watch Legal Rebuttal: Disproving the Pillay Commission’s False “Genocide” Accusation Against Israel appeared first on UN Watch.

✅  Convened World Experts at UN to Fight Pillay Report: In June 2022, at a conference held in Geneva on the sidelines of the Human Rights Council, UN Watch convened renowned experts and activists—including Colonel Richard Kemp, Lieutenant Colonel Geoffrey Corn, Einat Wilf, Olga Meshoe, and Yoseph Haddad—to refute the lies in the Pillay Commission’s inaugural report.

✅  Video Documentary: In August 2022, UN Watch produced an animated video explaining the biased mandate and composition of the Commission of Inquiry, and why it needs to be terminated.

✅  Original Cartoons: UN Watch commissioned an artist to draw powerful cartoons on the Pillay Commission, illustrating how it serves as a Kangaroo court, its history of antisemitism, and lack of impartiality.

✅  Testimony at United Nations: UN Watch repeatedly took the floor at the UN to take on the Commission of Inquiry:
• March 2022: Hillel Neuer exposed Navi Pillay’s gross bias
• June 2022: Col. Kemp spoke for UN Watch, saying, “This report incites hatred of Jews around the world, and cruelly betrays the Palestinian people”
• June 2023: Neuer called out member Miloon Kothari’s remarks about “the Jewish Lobby” controlling social media. An hour later, Navi Pillay was caught on hot mic laughing with her colleagues on how they ran out the clock to avoid answering Neuer’s questions about their bigotry.

✅  Legal Submissions: When the UN named Israel-hater Navi Pillay to head the inquiry, UN Watch submitted a 30-page legal brief demanding she be disqualified on grounds of bias. This was reported by Agence France Presse, putting the UNHRC president on the defensive. UN Watch then put forward a draft resolution to terminate the Commission altogether.

✅  Exposing Kothari’s Antisemitism: UN Watch exposed Miloon Kothari’s antisemitic remarks that social media is controlled largely by “the Jewish lobby,” leading to an unprecedented 18 countries denouncing him for antisemitism, including the U.S., Canada, UK, Australia, Czech Republic, Germany, Netherlands, France, Italy, Austria, Belgium, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Brazil and Hungary.

✅  Launched Petition: UN Watch launched a petition to urge the United States to take action to remove the biased members, and to terminate the mandate of the Commission of Inquiry, garnering over 10,000 signatures.

Click here to view UN Watch’s dedicated webpage on the Pillay Commission.

3 years ago, UN commissioner Miloon Kothari ranted about the “Jewish lobby” controlling social media. 17 nations condemned him—but he kept his UN post.

Now, after the US sanctioned Francesca Albanese, Kothari resigned in fear.

The UN’s culture of impunity is starting to crack. pic.twitter.com/jnC5sWzSh7

— UN Watch (@UNWatch) July 25, 2025

BREAKING: Navi Pillay is resigning from the UN's permanent commission of inquiry on Israel, citing “age, medical issues and other commitments.” Her two colleagues are also resigning. Pillay was chosen for the post because of her visceral hate for Israel: https://t.co/jMTkNFEXrP

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) July 14, 2025

Meet the UN's impartial Pillay Inquiry:
✅ Navi Pillay — lobbies to “Sanction Apartheid Israel”
✅ Miloon Kothari — rants about “The Jewish Lobby”
✅ Chris Sidoti — says Jews “throw around accusations of antisemitism like rice at a wedding”

More: https://t.co/Lbkei65XMt https://t.co/sOmMeM9a87 pic.twitter.com/SBGXVAGP9F

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) March 13, 2025

⚡ Caught on Hot Mic: Navi Pillay and Chris Sidoti, members of the UN's anti-Israel inquisition, unaware their conversation before today's press conference was being recorded, laugh about how they ran out the clock to avoid answering our questions about their bigotry and bias. https://t.co/i2YDVwO5Fd pic.twitter.com/7QQ9uWScAb

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) June 20, 2023

ICC Prosecutor Nazhat Khan hosted the UN Commission of Inquiry on Israel, whom she appointed:
Miloon Kothari—rants about “The Jewish Lobby”
Navi Pillay—lobbies to “Sanction Apartheid Israel”
Chris Sidoti—says Jews “throw around accusations of antisemitism like rice at a wedding” https://t.co/6rscqu0q4c pic.twitter.com/mWXHmrOg8K

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) May 19, 2025

3/ Commissioner Chris Sidoti, who says Jews “throw around accusations of antisemitism like rice at a wedding,” also announced his resignation—effective Nov. 3, like Pillay. However, he told the chair: “I am willing to accept reappointment to the Commission should you so wish…” pic.twitter.com/H3wQSftiqw

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) July 14, 2025

The post UN Watch Led Campaign Against Pro-Hamas Pillay Commission — All Now Resigning appeared first on UN Watch.

“This week, the dominoes are falling,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch. “First, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio made the historic decision to sanction Francesca Albanese, the UN’s pro-Hamas rapporteur, in wake of a massive campaign led by UN Watch. Now the architects of the UN’s anti-Israel inquisition are fleeing the ship. The tide is turning.”

Thank you, 🇺🇸@SecRubio. You just made the historic decision to sanction Francesca Albanese, the UN's pro-Hamas rapporteur. Now the dominoes are falling. Frightened of also being sanctioned, architects of the UN’s anti-Israel inquisition are fleeing the ship. The tide is turning. https://t.co/QZlGt0EdV6

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) July 14, 2025

Navi Pillay, chair of the Commission of Inquiry (COI), announced her resignation citing “age, medical issues, and the weight of several other commitments.” However, Neuer said she seemed to be motivated by the sanctions.

Her colleagues, Miloon Kothari and Chris Sidoti, also submitted resignation letters, with Kothari referencing an “understanding” reached during a private meeting with the council president, suggesting that he was pushed out, likely for having been condemned by 18 states for antisemitism.

“The resignation of all three commissioners is long overdue,” said Neuer. “This was a commission born in prejudice — designed to target Israel, while ignoring Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Palestinian Authority. Its members were selected precisely for their hostility to the Jewish state.”

Neuer noted that the resignations follow mounting international criticism:

• In 2022, Miloon Kothari questioned Israel’s right to UN membership and evoked antisemitic tropes about Jewish control of the media—remarks condemned by 18 nations including the U.S., U.K., Germany, and France.

• Chris Sidoti trivialized the issue of antisemitism, claiming that Jews “throw around accusations like rice at a wedding.”

• Navi Pillay, chosen in July 2021 after she had lobbied government to “sanction apartheid Israel,” led a commission that generally turned a blind eye to Hamas terrorism and incitement, even after the October 7 massacre.

“This trio never should have been appointed,” said Neuer. “As documented by UN Watch, their legacy is one of distortion, demonization, and dishonor. Their departure is not reform, it’s damage control.”

UN Watch drew a direct line between the latest resignations and the political shockwaves from the U.S. decision to sanction Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur who has justified terrorism and been denounced for Holocaust inversion.

“Thanks to Secretary Rubio and the United States, the UN’s culture of impunity is starting to crack,” said Neuer. “Francesca Albanese was the tip of the spear in the UN’s war on Israel. Now that she’s been sanctioned, others are looking over their shoulders. The fear of accountability is finally setting in.”

UN Watch urged the UN Human Rights Council not to replace the three commissioners, but to terminate the COI altogether.

“Replacing one biased trio with another won’t solve the problem,” said Neuer. “This commission is irredeemably flawed—both in mandate and in execution. It must be dismantled. It’s not an inquiry, but an inquisition.”

UN Watch Campaigned to Sanction Albanese

UN Watch hailed the sanctioning of Albanese as a major victory for justice and the rule of law. The move comes after UN Watch led a sustained campaign demanding sanctions for Albanese, with letters to Secretary Rubio, UN chief Antonio Guterres and other officials, news interviews, social media, massive outdoor projections on billboards, and the support of more than 120,000 people who signed its petition calling on the United States to take action.

Meet the UN's impartial Pillay Inquiry:
✅ Navi Pillay — lobbies to “Sanction Apartheid Israel”
✅ Miloon Kothari — rants about “The Jewish Lobby”
✅ Chris Sidoti — says Jews “throw around accusations of antisemitism like rice at a wedding”

More: https://t.co/Lbkei65XMt https://t.co/sOmMeM9a87 pic.twitter.com/SBGXVAGP9F

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) March 13, 2025

The post UN Watch Hails Resignation of Entire UN’s Anti-Israel Inquiry: “This is All Due to U.S. Sanctions on Albanese, Dominoes Are Falling” appeared first on UN Watch.

By Dina Rovner, Legal Advisor at UN Watch

In this report, the Pillay makes one-sided condemnations of Israel for attacks on Palestinian “educational facilities and religious and cultural sites.” While the Commission finds Israel guilty of a host of war crimes and the crime against humanity of “extermination” in relation to attacks on schools and mosques that caused civilian harm, it largely exonerates Hamas for its role in inflating civilian harm with its human shield strategy.

A senior IDF commander recently described the extent of the use of IEDs and booby traps in Gaza, saying: “We see that they simply booby-trap anything they can, and they have no barrier or any moral limit in this aspect. We’ve seen booby-trapped kindergartens, also with tunnel shafts; we’ve seen schools; we’ve seen sites that are supposed to be used for humanitarian aid – in every such place, we encountered IEDs, we encountered tunnel shafts,” he stated. Hamas’s human shield strategy has been extensively, documented by the IDF and other military experts, and was admitted by October 7th mastermind Yahya Sinwar.

Like past Pillay Commission reports, this report contains major flaws that render its factual findings and legal conclusions completely unreliable, including the following:

1. Unbalanced

The report claims to look at “attacks on educational facilities and religious and cultural sites” in both “the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel.” However, the report almost exclusively condemns Israel for violations against Palestinians with only a few short paragraphs addressing Palestinian violations against Israelis, equivalent to less than half a page in 17 pages of text (< 3%). Moreover, even these short paragraphs ultimately blame Israel for harm caused by Palestinian terrorists. For example:

• Instead of condemning Hamas and PIJ for indiscriminate rocket fire on civilian areas, the report blames Israel for “acute lack of bomb shelters” in “Bedouin villages in the Negev.” (Para 40).

• Rather than condemning Hamas for causing mass displacement of children in Israel, the report focuses on criticizing the fact that Israeli schools serving displaced children lacked “the capacity to provide for psychological trauma.” (Para 41). Notably, the report ignores the severe trauma inflicted on all Israeli children due to the October 7^th Hamas attack and sustained rocket and missile fire by Hamaz, PIJ, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iran regularly sending Israeli children to bomb shelters.

2. Selective reporting

The report states that it focused on the period after October 7, 2023, but included some incidents from before that date to show “patterns of violations over time.” Notably, the Commission cites only pre-October 7, 2023 incidents that it deems show patterns of violations by Israel, for example “provocations” on the Temple Mount or alleged Israeli displacement of Palestinians to protect archaeological sites (Para 65, 71). However, it omits pre-October 7^th incidents that show patterns of violations by Hamas and other Palestinian terror groups, such as embedding military infrastructure in schools and mosques and attacking Jewish holy sites in Judea and Samaria.

3. Ignores Hamas violations against Israelis and Palestinians

For example, the report:

• Largely ignores widespread embedding of military activities in civilian infrastructure, which has been documented by the IDF and others. Although the report refers to one instance of Hamas operating from a school and includes a recommendation to “the de facto authorities in Gaza” to “cease using civilian objects for military purposes,” by ignoring the extent of this Hamas war crime and blaming all the damage in Gaza on Israel, the Commission effectively absolves Hamas of responsibility.

• Omits discussion of Hamas abuse of Palestinian children by indoctrinating them to jihad at school and recruiting them as child soldiers.

• Disregards Palestinian attacks on Jewish religious and cultural sites in Judea and Samaria, such as Joseph’s Tomb and Joshua’s Tomb.

4. Fails to Condemn terrorist incitement in Palestinian education

The word “incitement” appears only three times in the report, each time to criticize Israel for what the Commission views as overbroad application of its anti-terror laws. The Commission completely ignores the well-documented incitement of children to jihadi terrorism in Palestinian schools, including UNRWA schools, which is a violation of Palestinian children’s right to education that should have been addressed.

5. Defends support for Hamas October 7 Attacks

The report accuses Israel of “targeting educational personnel and students” for expressing “concern or opinions” about the Hamas October 7^th attacks. (Para 85). This includes an order by Israel’s Ministry of Education to “suspend any student or employee who expressed support for actions taken by armed groups on 7 October 2023, labelling such support as incitement to terrorism” (para 36). Thus, the Commission appears to defend educators’ expressions of support for October 7^th.

6. Deems Hamas more credible than IDF

The Commission relies uncritically on Hamas casualty data for the number of children killed, even though this data has been proven to be unreliable and cannot be independently verified. The Commission also fails to acknowledge that these numbers include children who were either directly killed by Hamas or killed due to their involvement in the hostilities as child soldiers for Hamas. The Hamas data itself shows that 65% of the teens aged 13-17 who were killed were male, strongly suggesting they were child combatants. At the same time, the Commission is dismissive towards IDF claims that its attacks on schools and cultural sites were targeting Hamas, noting the claims were “contested” and stating that it was “unable to independently verify” these IDF claims (Para 22, 50, 56), effectively absolving Hamas of responsibility for its war crimes.

7. Relies on cases already addressed by Israeli authorities

Several examples brought by the Commission to implicate Israel in violations involve incidents where Israel’s democratic institutions took some kind of remedial action. Therefore, these cases cannot support findings of specific violations or patterns of violations. For example:

• Disciplinary proceedings – IDF commander “received a disciplinary note for ordering the demolition without the proper approval.” (Para 16).

• Opening investigations – “The Israeli Security Agency and the police reportedly announced an investigation into” alleged vandalism of mosque by Israel settlers. (Para 57).

• Civilian legal proceedings – Israeli teacher dismissed for social media post criticizing Israeli bombing campaign in Gaza was reinstated after “a Tel Aviv court ruled that his dismissal was unlawful.” (Para 38).

• Arrests – “Five settlers, including two minors, were reportedly arrested and indicted for the attack on the school” near Jericho. (Para 35).

8. Promotes false narrative on Israeli archaeology

The report presents a highly politicized and false narrative arguing that Israeli archaeological excavations in Judea and Samaria exclusively preserve Jewish heritage while erasing all other cultures. However, according to Israeli sources, the opposite is the case. It is the Palestinians who destroy Jewishly significant archaeological sites. The Commission’s report completely omits this perspective, including all reports about damage to such sites, for example: a May 2020 report that the Palestinian Authority paved a road over the ancient Jewish Hasmonean fortress of Tel Aroma; a May 2023 report that the Palestinian Authority paved a new road through an archaeological site in Sebastia, the capital of the biblical Kingdom of Israel; and a March 2024 report that Palestinians vandalized the Second Temple period site of Umma-Rihan. Likewise, Palestinian excavations at the Temple Mount have sought to erase Jewish historical ties to the site by destroying artifacts. Notably, Israeli archeologists have said they would like to conduct joint research with Palestinian colleagues but that the Palestinians fear they will be labeled traitors if they participate.

9. Protects Muslim worship, denies Jewish prayer rights

The Commission criticizes Israeli security measures limiting Palestinian access to the site on the Temple Mount as (Para 72, 95) as “severe restrictions on freedom of religion.” At the same time, it deems Jewish prayer at the site—the holiest site in Judaism—to be a “provocation” (Para 72). In fact, only Israel guarantees freedom of religion and access to holy sites for all religions. When the area was controlled by Jordan from 1948 to 1967, Jewish religious sites were destroyed and Jews were denied access to their holy sites.

10. Blames Israel for violence, ignores Palestinian incitement

The Commission wholly adopts the Palestinian narrative that Israeli actions on the Temple Mount triggered “wider escalation of hostilities,” while completely ignoring the role of Palestinian incitement in inflaming the tensions. For example, the Commission asserts that Ariel Sharon’s October 2000 visit to the Temple Mount triggered the second intifada (Para 71). To the contrary, the evidence—including, statements by a PA official at the time and a Fatah official years later and an admission by Yasser Arafat’s widow—points to Arafat having planned and instigated the second intifada in response to the failure of the Camp David negotiations. Likewise, the April-May 2021 violence on the Temple Mount was directly incited by Palestinian leaders on all sides vying to prove their legitimacy as the next Palestinian leader in the context of the PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s cancellation of elections.

11. Factual findings not supported

The Commission’s broad conclusions are not supported by the facts and are often made subject to qualification using terms like “may have.” In many instances, the Commission did not conclusively determine who was behind the attack or consider the possibility that Hamas actions exacerbated the damage. For example:

• In Paragraph 14, the Commission states that it “could not identify any military objective for the demolitions of educational facilities.” However, in the previous paragraph, the Commission itself explained that Israel destroyed all buildings, including educational facilities, to create military buffer zones on the eastern border and separating the north and south of the Gaza Strip. (Para 13). Likewise, despite the overwhelming evidence of a pattern of Hamas use of Gaza schools for military purposes, the Commission dismissed all such claims as unverified (Para 16, 22) with one exception (Para 23). Even UNRWA has admitted widespread Hamas use of its educational facilities.

• In another case, the Commission said that “satellite imagery analysis showing cars parked at the site” confirmed that “there was no significant threat to Israeli security forces in the area and therefore no military necessity to demolish the university buildings” (Para 18). Considering that the Commission admitted to receiving no reply from Israel to its request for information (Para 3) and that it did not have access to classified IDF intelligence supporting its targeting decisions, that conclusion is completely unfounded. At best, the Commission could have said that it was unable to assess the military necessity due to insufficient evidence. We note that the Commission also stated that it received no response to its request for information from the State of Palestine.

• In a section titled “Attacks on religious and cultural sites,” the Commission claimed it “documented allegations of possible looting” by IDF personnel (Para 45). Despite the Commission’s later admission that it hadn’t been able to verify the allegations and that Israel denied them, the Commission still included this unverified claim as proof that Israel “caused damage to cultural and religious sites in Gaza.”

12. Legal conclusions not supported

The Commission’s legal conclusions about necessity, distinction, precautions, proportionality, intent, reasonableness, war crimes, and crimes against humanity are drawn from an incomplete factual record and therefore have no credibility. As noted, the Commission itself admits it received no information from the Israeli government. Likewise, the Commission acknowledges that it did not credit IDF material in the public record. The Commission also did not take into consideration findings about Israeli compliance with International Humanitarian Law by military experts who visited the war zone and interviewed relevant officials including JINSA, the High Level Military Group, John Spencer, Andrew Fox, and others. Therefore, its legal conclusions that Israel committed war crimes and crimes against humanity should not be credited.

The post Legal Analysis of Pillay Commission’s June 2025 Report to the Human Rights Council appeared first on UN Watch.

By Dina Rovner, Legal Advisor at UN Watch

As set forth in Resolution S-30/1, the Pillay Commission’s one-sided mandate includes: 

• Collecting and preserving evidence “in accordance with international law standards” to “maximize the possibility of its admissibility in legal proceedings.” 
• Identify perpetrators with a view to ensuring that they  “are held accountable.” 
• Recommend “accountability measures” to “end impunity” and “ensure legal accountability,” including through “individual criminal and command responsibility.”

Building upon its previous reports which charge Israel with the worst violations based on a completely one-sided record and in line with the above mandate, this report seeks to further develop the case against Israel for the most serious crimes—war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. The report also aims to delegitimize the Israeli justice system as “inherently discriminatory” towards Palestinians for the purpose of dismissing the argument that the principle of complementarity forecloses prosecutions against Israeli officials by the International Criminal Court (Para 161). The Commission specifically states that it has “collected and stored” social media posts from IDF soldiers seemingly with the goal to hold them accountable for their actions in international courts (para 148). 

The report asks the Secretary-General to add “Israel in the annexes of the next annual report on conflict related sexual violence” (Para 230). At the same time, it does not cover any violations by the Palestinian Authority or Hamas and has no recommendations for or related to them.

The report suffers from critical deficiencies which render its conclusions unreliable, including the following: 

1. Biased, one-sided sources

As the Commission readily admits, it did not receive any information from the Israeli government (Para 4). The factual allegations are based almost exclusively on unnamed witnesses, unidentified Palestinian civil society organizations, and digital evidence such as social media posts, photographs, and videos which are not cited or supplied. Some of these witnesses are unnamed “women human rights defenders” in Gaza (para 110), some of which were previously arrested “under charges of ‘incitement to terrorism’” (para 115). In the absence of information from the IDF regarding its military protocols, security considerations, military justification for certain strikes, and its own investigations into specific incidents, the Commission’s factual presentation is necessarily incomplete, biased, and one-sided. Additionally, the report notes that while the standard of proof usually requires corroboration of “two other independent and reliable sources, verification for sexual violence may rely on a single primary source if deemed credible” (para 6). In other words, the Commission did not require any corroboration to draw a conclusion. In at least one example, the Commission relied on biased UN reports and reports from politicized Palestinian civil society organizations to corroborate information (Para 102). Moreover, at the same time that the Commission relies on biased Palestinian sources, it discounts or ignores accounts from Israeli sources. For example, the Commission determines that videos of captured Hamas fighters confessing to rape during an interrogation are pure “propaganda” (Para 123). 

2. Ignores Israeli victims

This report focuses only on Palestinian victims while ignoring the Israeli victims of October 7th and Hamas’s ongoing violations against Israeli hostages still in Gaza. Although the Commission did address some of the Hamas October 7th crimes in its June 2024 report, it ultimately concluded that it was “unable to independently verify” allegations of “rape and gang rape.” The Commission did not sufficiently credit or consider relevant material in the public record, including testimony by Israeli witnesses and survivors or reports by Israeli civil society organizations. Moreover, the Commission ignores the plight of the hostages still in captivity who continue to be subjected to various forms of torture, including sexual violence, as confirmed by hostages released in January and February 2025.

3. Whitewashes Hamas

The Commission whitewashes and legitimizes Hamas by making a false distinction between Hamas and its military wing. According to the report, the October 7th atrocities were perpetrated by “the military wing of Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups” (Para 4, 78, 220). However, countries like the U.S., UK, Australia, Canada, and the EU have designated the entirety of Hamas as a terrorist organization. This is because they recognize that there is no real distinction between Hamas and its military wing which work together to achieve the Hamas Charter goal of replacing Israel with an Islamic Palestinian state. Nevertheless, the Commission considers Hamas a legitimate entity and not a terrorist organization.

4. Ignores Hamas violations against Palestinians

The report completely ignores Hamas violations inside Gaza against Palestinians, including Hamas’s documented human shield strategy by which it operates from civilian structures, including hospitals and shelters, and its fighters dressing as civilians. This Hamas strategy transforms civilian infrastructure into valid military targets, justifying Israeli strikes against these targets, and contributes to the death of civilians. Instead of holding Hamas accountable, the Commission blames only Israel and gives Hamas a free pass for its violations.

5. Genocide accusation ignores facts, lacks finding of intent

The definition of genocide in the Genocide Convention includes “imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group.” Thus, the accusation that Israel perpetrated “reproductive violence” through direct attacks on reproductive facilities and blocking access to reproductive health care is presented as “genocidal” (Para 175, 178, 218, 219). In this regard, the Commission ignores countervailing facts indicating that Israel had no intention of blocking access to reproductive care. For example, the report omits mention of the numerous field hospitals and mobile clinics that have been established at different points throughout the war, many of which offer reproductive and maternal health care. Furthermore, a crucial element of the crime of genocide is “intent” to “destroy” the Palestinians as a group “in whole or in part” which is completely missing here. Nevertheless, the Commission’s biased and incomplete factual record led it to reach the unsupported conclusion that certain attacks were carried out with such intent (Para 175-176).

6. Dismisses IDF Investigations

While the IDF has at times published the results of its investigations, it has no obligation to do so or to share that data with the Commission. Nevertheless, at least one of the cases referenced by the Commission has led to an indictment against five IDF reservists. Yet, without any knowledge of the evidence in the hands of Israeli authorities, the Commission completely dismisses this criminal proceeding as inadequate because the indictment did not include a rape charge (Para 155). In another case, the Commission notes that it is “unaware of any report being released as a result of any investigation or of any serious action being taken to hold the perpetrators accountable” (Para 152). However, the fact that the Commission is “unaware” of investigation results does not render investigations inadequate. As of August 2024, the IDF stated that it had launched 74 criminal investigations. This is in addition to hundreds of preliminary investigations for which the IDF had yet to determine whether or not to open a criminal investigation. According to military expert Andrew Fox, “No other peer army…has something similar” to the IDF’s Fact-Finding Assessment Mechanism which “investigates incidents to find out what happened during the conduct of hostilities.” Fox adds that these investigations necessarily take time because of the difficulty in “gathering evidence” from “war zones.” 

7. Relies on public statements by Israelis not in a position of authority

In its June 2024 report, the Commission made sweeping accusations against Israel (including claims that Israel called for annihilation of Gaza) based on statements that were misrepresented and taken out of context. Here, the Commission accuses Israel of inciting against Palestinian women, citing only two statements, neither of which are by an Israeli government official. One is by Giora Eiland, former head of the National Security Council until 2006, and another is by Eliyahu Yosian, a commentator for the Misgav Institute for National Security (Para 37-38). Later in the report, the Commission cites to statements by “public media figures that excused or encouraged the use of sexual violence against Palestinians in detention” (Para 159). The report specifically referenced a statement by Israel Hayom journalist Yisrael Schlesinger which it admitted was “later retracted.” Significantly, these individuals are not in the government and have no authority over government or IDF policy. 

8. Atrocity Inversion

Not only does the report ignore Israeli victims, but it perversely turns the Israeli victims into the aggressors, using the October 7th sexual crimes as a tool to demonize Israel. For example, the report implies Israel has been exploiting the “sexual violence” committed against it for “political expediency,” thereby “fueling long-standing animosity and dehumanization” of the Palestinians (Para 10). The report also suggests that Israeli attacks on Palestinians reflect “attempts to rebuild Israeli national masculinity through aggression in retaliation” for the October 7th attacks (Para 78) and accuses Israeli soldiers of “intentionally” treating Palestinian men and boys in a “sexualized” manner “as an act of revenge” for October 7th (Para 202). 

9. Relies on fake casualty data from the Hamas Health Ministry

Citing directly to the Hamas Health Ministry and other sources that rely on Hamas Health Ministry figures, the report refers to the “extremely high civilian casualty ratio” (Para 21) and falsely asserts that “there is no doubt that civilians comprise the vast majority of the persons killed since the Israeli attacks began” (Para 22). The report ignores analysis by experts which found many problems and inconsistencies with the data, such as failure to distinguish between civilians and combatants, including natural deaths in the casualty count, including deaths from failed-rocket launches and other Hamas-related deaths, and men being recorded as women, among other things. Notably, in May 2024, the UN itself reduced the number of identified women and children deaths by half. In March 2025, the Hamas list dropped 3400 identified deaths, including 1080 children. Therefore, the Hamas numbers are completely unreliable. The Commission also fails to take into account Hamas’s use of child soldiers resulting in some minors under age 18 being legitimately targeted as combatants, or in the possibility that some women could be combatants. Israel maintains that close to half of the deaths are Hamas militants and military experts such as John Spencer have described the civilian to combatant ratio here as “historically low for high intensity urban warfare.” 

10. Conclusions not supported

Throughout the report, the Commission makes broad conclusory statements that rest on questionable assumptions and incomplete facts in order to indict Israel while exonerating Hamas. For example, the Commission states that:

• • “The ISF considers all adult male Palestinians in Gaza to be members of armed groups so legitimate targets” (para 22) because the Israeli estimate for number of combatants killed matches the estimated number of adult males killed. This fails to take into account Hamas’s use of child soldiers which means that the number of combatants killed includes both adult males and minors who are combatants or the possibility of some women being combatants. It is also based on the Hamas Health Ministry number of adult males killed which is unreliable due to proven inconsistencies in the data.
  • Regarding the case of two women that had been shot in the courtyard of a church in the vicinity of IDF activity, the Commission noted that according to witnesses “Israeli soldiers were deployed in the street behind the church complex and shouted in Arabic that it was forbidden to move outside.” The Commission nonetheless concluded that “the women were shot by an ISF sniper, who must have been able to identify the moving persons as women” (para 31). Given the warnings to the women not to go outside, Hamas’s practice of operating in civilian areas and dressing as civilians, and the Commission’s lack of access to IDF data from the field, the Commission has no basis to conclude whether the shooter “must have been able to identify” the victims as women.
  • “Given the increasing numbers of female fatalities in conflicts in Gaza over the past 20 years and the fact that women are more likely to experience conflict as civilians rather than combatants, the ISF could reasonably foresee high numbers of women and girls being killed and injured in its military operations in Gaza since 7 October 2023 yet took no steps to avoid and reduce these casualties.” (Para 165). This conclusion fails to take into consideration both Hamas actions that contribute to deaths of women, such as operating from civilian areas, and Israeli steps to avoid such deaths, such as evacuations.
  • “The intentional destruction of reproductive health care, infrastructure and facilities that provide essential services for the population of Gaza to survive and reproduce exhibits the intent to destroy the Palestinians in Gaza, in whole or in part. The Commission concludes that this is the only inference that could reasonably be drawn from the acts in question.” (Para 176). The Commission completely disregards the fact that Hamas operates from civilian areas, including medical facilities, as well as the fact that Israel facilitated establishment of field hospitals and other temporary clinics to supply reproductive health care services.
  • “In the cases documented by the Commission where soldiers ordered Palestinians to strip, the Commission finds that, because of the way this was ordered, the duration and the physical, sexual and verbal abuse that followed, these acts were intended to humiliate and subjugate the victims and were not carried out for security reasons.” (Para 189). The Commission discounts  legitimate security concerns that arise in a combat situation involving Hamas terrorists who disguise themselves as civilians and use the civilian population as human shields.

The post Legal Analysis of Pillay Commission’s March 2025 Report to Human Rights Council appeared first on UN Watch.

In the Timeline below, we show that this “new” position paper is not at all new. The Commission’s latest analysis and recommendations originated in its September 2022 report to the General Assembly which served as the catalyst and the basis for the ICJ’s Advisory Opinion. The Timeline further shows how the current ICJ assault on Israel lacks any factual and legal foundation because it is based on the Commission’s biased and methodologically flawed report that only considered one-sided sources. Therefore, all proceedings and recommendations flowing from the ICJ Advisory Opinion, including the September 2024 General Assembly resolution demanding Israel end its occupation and this Position Paper are inherently flawed and do not provide a valid legal basis for the measures demanded of Israel, third States, or the UN.

September 14, 2022

The Pillay Commission issued a report to the General Assembly (A/77/328) concluding that the Israeli occupation was unlawful and recommending that the General Assembly request an Advisory Opinion from the ICJ on the “legal consequences” of the occupation and the resulting “obligations of third States and the United Nations.” (Para 92).

Sources: Unspecified “interviews with primary and secondary sources,” discussions with unidentified “stakeholders,” uncited “submissions,” and “research.” The only sources cited for factual matters are UN reports and documents and NGO’s known for their anti-Israel agenda, such as Norwegian Refugee Council, Amnesty International, Adalah, Yesh Din, and B’Tselem.

For a critique of the report see UN Watch Rebuttal of Pillay Commission’s September 2022 Report to the UNGA

November 11, 2022

Fourth Committee adopts resolution titled Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem requesting Advisory Opinion from the ICJ on the issues recommended by the Commission.

December 30, 2022

The UNGA Plenary adopts the Fourth Committee’s resolution Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem (A/RES/77/247) which took note of the Commission’s September 2022 report (A/77/328) and requested an urgent Advisory Opinion from the ICJ on: (1) the “legal consequences” of Israel’s “ongoing violation of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination from its prolonged occupation…”; (2a) how does this impact the “legal status of the occupation; and (2b) what are the “legal consequences” for all States and the UN.

The resolution was adopted by a vote of 87 to 26 with 53 Abstentions.

Favor: Includes China, Cuba, Iran, Pakistan, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Vietnam, Zimbabwe.

Against: Includes Australia, Austria, Canada, Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, United Kingdom, United States.

December 31, 2022

The Pillay Commission welcomes the General Assembly resolution requesting an advisory opinion of the ICJ. “The Commission considers that a definitive clarification of the legal consequences of Israel’s refusal to end the occupation, and what the obligation of third parties to ensure respect for international law are, will be crucial to member States and the UN in considering what further measures should be adopted to ensure full compliance with international law.”

January 17, 2023

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres transmits the General Assembly’s request for an Advisory Opinion to the ICJ.

September 2023

Pillay Commission publishes position paper detailing its position on the questions presented to the ICJ in Resolution 77/247, concluding that Israel is in continuing violation of “the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination” and that its occupation is “unlawful under international law.”

July 19, 2024

The ICJ issues its Advisory Opinion finding inter alia:

Israel

• “Israel’s policies and practices referred to in question (a) are in breach of international law. The maintenance of these policies and practices is an unlawful act of a continuing character entailing Israel’s international responsibility.” (Para 265).
• “In reply to the first part of question (b) … the continued presence pf Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory is illegal.” (Para 266).
• As to the second part of question (b), the ICJ found that the legal consequences for Israel include that “Israel has an obligation to bring an end to its presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory as rapidly as possible.” (Para 267); “Israel must immediately cease all new settlement activity. Israel also has an obligation to repeal all legislation and measures creating or maintaining the unlawful situation, including those which discriminate against the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, as well as all measures aimed at modifying the demographic composition of any parts of the territory.” (Para 268); “Israel is also under an obligation to provide full reparation for the damage caused by its internationally wrongful acts to all natural or legal persons concerned.” (Para 269).

Third States

• The ICJ enumerated obligations of third States, including to: “abstain from entering into economic or trade dealings with Israel concerning the Occupied Palestinian Territory or parts thereof which may entrench its unlawful presence in the territory; to abstain, in the establishment and maintenance of diplomatic missions in Israel, from any recognition of its illegal presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory; and to take steps to prevent trade or investment relations that assist in the maintenance of the illegal situation created by Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” (Para 278). They also must not “render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by Israel’s illegal presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” (Para 279).

UN

• The Court deferred to the General Assembly and the Security Council to determine the “precise modalities to bring to an end Israel’s unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory” and “what further action is required to put an end to the illegal presence of Israel.” (Para 281).

Sources: UN reports and documents. In Para 76, the Court indicated that it took evidence from UN reports, giving weight to “the care taken in preparing a report, the comprehensiveness of its sources and the independence of those responsible for preparing it.” Thus, the Court cited to the Pillay Commission’s reports 15 times and quoted the Commission more than 20 times. However, as noted above, the Pillay Commission either does not identify its sources or relies on one-sided sources with anti-Israel agenda. Therefore, the probative value of its reports is limited. Nevertheless, the ICJ expressly relied on these reports as “evidence” to support its legal conclusions. Other UN reports relied upon by the Court for “evidence” suffer from the same deficiencies.

July 22, 2024

The Pillay Commission welcomes ICJ advisory opinion, saying “the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory is now illegal under international law.”

September 18, 2024

UNGA adopts resolution A/ES-10/24 titled Advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice on the legal consequences arising from Israel’s policies and practices in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and from the illegality of Israel’s continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory making demands in line with the ICJ’s Advisory Opinion:

Israel

• Demanding that Israel end its “unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory” within 12 months, including ceasing all new settlement activity and evacuating all military forces and settlers from the area; making reparations; and “not impeding” the Palestinians from exercising their right to self-determination.

Third States

• Calling upon third States to “not recognize as legal the situation”; “not render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation”; “not recognize any changes in the physical character or demographic composition, institutional structure or status” of the territory. This includes trade and economic boycotts, refraining from establishing diplomatic missions in Jerusalem, arms embargoes, and sanctions against individuals.

UN

• Calling upon the UN and international bodies not to recognize the situation as legal or to cooperate with it in any way.
• Calling to establish “an international mechanism for reparation for all damages, loss or injury from the intentional wrongful acts of Israel…”
• Emphasizing the need for accountability, including investigations and prosecutions at the national and international level.
• Requesting the Secretary-General to present a report with proposals for establishing a mechanism to follow up on Israeli violations of the prohibition against apartheid in Article 3 of the CERD.

The resolution was adopted by a vote of 124 to 14 with 43 abstentions.

In Favor: Includes China, Cuba, Iran, Pakistan, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Vietnam, Zimbabwe.

Against: Includes Argentina, Czech Republic, Hungary, Paraguay, United States.

September 18, 2024

The Pillay Commission publishes its report to the General Assembly (A/79/232) which takes into account the ICJ’s Advisory Opinion finding that Israel’s “continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory is unlawful” (Para 5), consistent with the Commission’s September 2022 report requesting that opinion. The September 2024 report found that Israel’s attacks on medical facilities in Gaza after October 7^th were not attacks on legitimate Hamas military targets but “are in stark contravention of the International Court of Justice advisory opinion of July 2024.” (Para 88). The report also called on Israel to immediately end its “unlawful occupation” in line with the ICJ’s Advisory Opinion (Para 113) and called on Member States to comply with the advisory opinion by “not rendering aid or assistance to Israel in maintaining the occupation” and by “distinguishing in their dealings between Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” (Para 115).

October 18, 2024

The Pillay Commission publishes its latest Position Paper with its “legal analysis and recommendations” on implementing the ICJ Advisory Opinion. The legal authorities cited by the Commission consist mostly of non-binding and non-authoritative material—primarily the Advisory Opinion itself, other ICJ Advisory Opinions and orders mostly related to Israel, UN documents including the Commission’s own reports, UNGA resolutions, and a few secondary sources. Not surprisingly, the Commission’s position paper tracks its own prior conclusions from its September 2022 report and September 2023 position paper, as well as the ICJ’s July 2024 findings relying on the Commission’s earlier report and the September 2024 UNGA resolution making demands of Israel, third states, and the UN based on that ICJ Advisory Opinion.

Israel

• The Commission finds that Israel’s occupation is unlawful and must be ended as rapidly as possible, Israel must cease all settlement activities and evacuate all settlers, and it must make reparations.

Third States

• The Commission finds that third States must not recognize sovereignty claims by Israel over “occupied lands,” must not “render aid or assistance in maintaining the unlawful occupation,” meaning “financial, military and political aid or support.” States that do not “cease their aid and assistance to Israel” may be complicit with Israel’s “internationally wrongful acts.” Furthermore, States should distinguish in their dealings “between Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” which means not placing diplomatic missions in Jerusalem or issuing travel documents to settlers. States should also distinguish in “their military aid, foreign aid and support, and business enterprises.” Thus, the Commission advocates for arms embargos, economic boycotts, and cultural boycotts. Finally, it calls for full cooperation with the ICC investigation and for national authorities to conduct their own investigations and prosecutions under their own criminal laws.

UN

• The Commission finds that the UN must “distinguish in its dealings between Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” It advises the Security Council and General Assembly to “establish an ad-hoc Committee to comprehensively review the non-compliance and propose mechanisms to ensure implementation” by Israel like what was done in the Namibia situation. Finally, it recommends that the General Assembly “establishes an independent mechanism to investigate and document all claims in relation to the complex issue of reparations.”

About the Pillay Commission

On 27 May 2021, at the request of the Palestinian delegation and Pakistan on behalf of the Islamic group of states (the Organization of Islamic Cooperation), the Human Rights Council held a special session on “the Grave Human Rights Situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem.”

By a vote of 24 to 9, with 14 abstentions, the Council adopted the resolution “Ensuring respect for international human rights law and international humanitarian law in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and in Israel.”

In favor: Argentina, Armenia, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, China, Côte d’Ivoire, Cuba, Eritrea, Gabon, Indonesia, Libya, Mauritania, Mexico, Namibia, Pakistan, Philippines, Russia, Senegal, Somalia, Sudan, Uzbekistan and Venezuela.

Against: Austria, Bulgaria, Cameroon, Czech Republic, Germany, Malawi, Marshall Islands, United Kingdom, and Uruguay.

Through this resolution, HRC/30/1, the Human Rights Council decided to “urgently establish an ongoing, independent, international commission of inquiry to investigate, in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and in Israel, all alleged violations and abuses of international human rights law leading up and since 13 April 2021.”

The resolution further requested the commission of inquiry to “investigate all underlying root causes of recurrent tensions, instability and protraction of conflict, including systematic discrimination and repression based on national, ethnic, racial or religious identity.”

The commission of inquiry was mandated to report to the Human Rights Council and to the General Assembly on an annual basis as from June 2022 and September 2022, respectively.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE PILLAY COMMISSION

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