Gaza updates

Defence affairs 

UN experts accuse Israel of ‘extermination’ in attacks on Gaza schools, religious sites

An independent United Nations commission has said that Israeli attacks on schools, religious and cultural sites in Gaza amount to war crimes and the crime against humanity of seeking to exterminate Palestinians, AFP reports.

“Israel has obliterated Gaza’s education system and destroyed over half of all religious and cultural sites in the Gaza Strip,” the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory said in a report.

It accused Israeli forces of “war crimes, including directing attacks against civilians and wilful killing, in their attacks on educational facilities that caused civilian casualties. In killing civilians sheltering in schools and religious sites, Israeli security forces committed the crime against humanity of extermination.”

It noted: “While the destruction of cultural property, including educational facilities, was not in itself a genocidal act, evidence of such conduct may nevertheless infer genocidal intent to destroy a protected group.”

The commission urged the Israeli government to stop attacking cultural, religious and educational institutions and called on Israel to “immediately end its unlawful occupation of Palestinian territory”, cease all settlement activity and comply fully with provisional measures ordered by the International Court of Justice.

Gaza’s Al-Amal hospital ‘virtually out of service’: WHO

The Al-Amal Hospital in Gaza, one of the few still operating in the Palestinian territory, is now “virtually out of service” due to intense military activity, AFP reports quoting the head of the World Health Organisation (WHO).

“Access to the hospital is obstructed, preventing new patients from reaching care, and leading to more preventable deaths,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus posted on X.

Tedros said two emergency medical teams, one local, the other international, “are still doing their best to serve the remaining patients with the limited medical supplies left on the premises”.

“With the closure of Al-Amal, Nasser Medical Complex is now the only remaining hospital with an intensive care unit in Khan Younis,” he said.

Greta Thunberg departs Israel, en route to Sweden

Swedish activist Greta Thunberg departed Israel on Tuesday after being detained aboard the Madleen, a Gaza-bound aid ship intercepted by the Israeli navy in international waters, the Israeli foreign ministry said.

Thunberg was on a flight to France, where she would continue her journey to Sweden, the ministry said, according to Reuters.

Three other people who had been aboard the charity vessel also agreed to immediate repatriation. Eight other crew members are contesting their deportation order, Israeli rights group Adalah, which advised them, said in a statement. They will be held in a detention centre ahead of a court hearing.