Publication: Summary of the UN Special Rapporteur’s report on Israel’s settler-colonial genocide

By: Henriette Willberg
For Law for Palestine

Overview erasure

On 30 October 2024, at the 79th Regular Session of the UN General Assembly, Dr. Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967, presented her report entitled “Genocide as colonial erasure,” on the devastating attacks unleashed by Israel against the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt) since 7 October 2023 and their catastrophic consequences. This marks her second report since October 2023, and it outlines the devastating impact of the ongoing genocide in Gaza, alongside the escalation of violence in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

In spite of the Special Rapporteur’s mandate and the International Court of Justice (ICJ)’s order that Israel allow international investigators to enter Gaza, Israel has continued to refuse Dr Albanese access to the oPt. The report, based on legal research and analysis, draws on interviews with victims and witnesses as well as remote, open-source information and contributions from experts and civil society (para 2).

The Special Rapporteur reaffirms her legal assessment that Israel’s conduct in Gaza constitutes Genocide. Israel’s unabated genocidal assault on Gaza has led to the forced displacement of at least 90 percent of Palestinians in Gaza and has resulted in vast destruction and unquantifiable losses (para 9, para 13), making Gaza “unfit for human life” (para 15). Following an intensification of violence from Israeli forces and settler militia in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, the Special Rapporteur concludes that the genocide in Gaza now risks expanding to all Palestinians under Israeli rule (para 83).

The report emphasises that Israel’s genocidal conduct must be understood in a broader context as part of “a century-long project of eliminatory settler-colonialism in Palestine” (para 89) and that “a deliberate campaign of connected incidents” across the entire Palestinian territory should be considered cumulatively (para 62). The Special Rapporteur critically analyses Israel’s disingenuous claims of self-defence and protection of hostages and makes the damning finding that the entire Israeli State apparatus is complicit in the genocidal project. The report concludes that the genocide is a means to an end, namely, “the complete eradication of Palestinians from the land so integral to their very identity” (para 84). She calls for urgent action in response to this grave situation.

The Special Rapporteur’s key recommendations to Member States include:

To enforce the absolute prohibition of genocide, commencing with a full arms embargo and sanctions
To formally recognise Israel as an apartheid state, to reactivate the UN Special Committee Against Apartheid and to put Israel on notice of possible suspension of its membership (as per Article 6 of the UN Charter)
To support investigations of international crimes, including on the basis of universal jurisdiction and to investigate and prosecute dual citizens involved in crimes in the occupied Palestinian territory

The analysis and findings of the Special Rapporteur’s report are summarised in greater detail below.

The unfolding genocide as a “means to an end”

In this section of the report, the Special Rapporteur examines patterns of conduct which “evidence an intent to employ genocidal acts as a means to ethnically cleanse all or parts of the occupied Palestinian territory” (para 12). Genocidal conduct in Gaza has proliferated and Israel’s deliberate strategy “to render Palestinian life unsustainable” has intensified across the occupied Palestinian territory.

Failure to cease and punish genocide in Gaza

The Special Rapporteur traces a systematic failure to cease and punish genocide in Gaza, documenting a disturbing proliferation of genocidal acts which have led to “unquantifiable” human, material and environmental losses (para 13). According to reports, nearly 42,000 Palestinians have been killed, of which at least 13,000 were children (para 14), and approximately 96,000 Palestinians have been injured. This magnitude of human loss has been accompanied by vast destruction creating nearly 40 million tons of debris and more than 340,000 tons of waste which have contaminated the ecosystem and contributed to the rapid spread of disease (para 15).

Dr Albanese documents how Israel has continued to attack designated “safe zones”, targeting displaced Palestinians in shelters and displacing them to uninhabitable wastelands (para 16). Evacuation orders have forced the majority of Gaza’s population into a humanitarian zone covering 12.6% of the Gaza strip (para 17), preparing the territory for annexation. Indeed, mass forced displacement has been followed by an expansion of Israeli roads and military bases which suggest “the aim of a permanent presence” (para 17).

Israel continues to target healthcare facilities, water and sewage systems, while obstructing humanitarian aid, as documented in this report. Using arguments of “medical shielding”, Israel has repeatedly attacked healthcare facilities and hospitals (para 18). In the face of a looming outbreak of poliovirus, detected by the WHO for the first time in over 25 years, Israel delayed vaccinations, attacked vaccination areas as well as a UN vaccination convoy (para 19). Systematic attacks on Gaza’s food sovereignty – through the destruction of agricultural land and reservoirs to the targeting of distribution centres – demonstrate an intent to destroy the population through starvation (para 20). 95% of Palestinians in Gaza are currently facing “high levels of acute food insecurity” and the destruction of 93% of agricultural, forestry and fishing economies foretells decades of deprivation to come (para 20).

Moreover, the Special Rapporteur documents a pattern of systematic abuse in a network of Israeli torture camps where Palestinians are subjected to unconscionable treatment, including starvation, severe beatings, electrocution, deprivation of medical care and sexual assault by both humans and animals (para 22).

Risk of genocide in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem

Further, the Special Rapporteur examines critical developments across the occupied Palestinian territory and finds a risk of genocide in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. She reports that the devastation inflicted on Gaza is spreading to the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, where violent attacks by settler militias have surged alongside harsh detention practices and attacks on medical workers and infrastructure (paras 24-37). Violent settlers, with support of Israeli forces, have killed more than 692 Palestinians and injured 5,199 (para 25). Israeli forces have conducted a mass arrest campaign, leading to the detention of tens of thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank including academic, journalists and human rights defenders (para 27). Like in Gaza, detention practices have been brutal and detainees have been subjected to torture, rape and denial of medical care (para 27).

Israeli forces have conducted sieges, raids and aerial bombardments in camps in the northern West Bank, displacing thousands of families and destroying critical infrastructure (para 29). As part of operation ‘Summer Camps’, launched on 27 August 2024, Israeli forces targeted Jenin, Nablus, Qalqilya, Tubas and Tulkarem, placing the populations under curfew, restricting food and water, targeting public health infrastructure and destroying streets and property (para 30). Targeted attacks on the health sector in the West Bank have been widespread, mirroring the destruction inflicted in Gaza (para 31).

This violence has been accompanied by a furtherance of Israel’s de jure annexation. On 29 May 2024, governance of the West Bank was transferred to civilian authorities, who promptly approved further land appropriation (para 32). Alongside this, Israel has demolished, confiscated or ordered the demolition of over 1,416 Palestinian structures, displacing Palestinian communities and opening up territory in Area C for further colonisation (para 32).

Following her assessment of these escalations, the Special Rapporteur concludes, worryingly, that there is a risk the genocide in Gaza will expand to all Palestinians under Israeli rule.

“The deliberate strategy of Israel to render Palestinian life unsustainable has markedly intensified everywhere in the occupied Palestinian territory, with devastating consequences for Palestinian survival”
(para 34).

Understanding the legal complexity and scope of genocidal intent

The Special Rapporteur finds that relevant jurisprudence allows for a “comprehensive interpretative approach” to capture genocidal intent in State conduct (para 38). She begins her examination on the legal complexity of genocidal intent by highlighting three important factors to bear in mind.

First, Dr Albanese highlights that “the compartmentalisation of the conduct into its disparate acts can obscure the requisite genocidal intent” (para 36(a)). As a result of the “magnitude and complexity” of the crime of genocide, genocidal conduct needs to be understood and analysed within its broader context (para 39). This means considering “the destruction caused by the nature and scale of atrocities”, the “fog of war”, “claims to retribution or alternative motives” and “the opportunity to commit genocide” (para 39).

Genocide is often found in combination with other crimes, however it is the pattern of conduct from these crimes considered together that is essential for genocidal intent (para 41).

Second, the report outlines how other acts, aside from the five constituting genocidal conduct, can be indicative of genocidal intent (para 36(b)). In the jurisprudence, the assessment of genocidal intent has been broadly focused on acts which target the foundation of a group, looking at intent to destroy holistically and in totality (para 44). Moreover, it has been recognised that a group is comprised not only of individuals “but also of history and traditions”, as well as the “relationship with the land” (para 45) – a particularly relevant relationship in settler-colonial contexts, where land is “intrinsic to both a people’s right to self-determination and the settler-colonial project” (para 46). Land is an integral part of the identity of an Indigenous population and is therefore “indicative of how the settler-colonial project destroys – in order to replace – the Indigenous Population” (para 46).

The Special Rapporteur argues that, in a settler-colonial context, conduct resulting in the disconnection of an Indigenous people from their land – forced displacement, for example – should be considered significant indicators of specific intent targeting the group’s existence (para 48). Israel’s apartheid regime in the occupied Palestinian territory was recognised by the ICJ in its Advisory Opinion of 19 July 2024, which found that Israel’s continued presence in the oPt was unlawful and that Israel was in violation of Article 3 of CERD, including racial segregation and apartheid (see, for example, Advisory Opinion of 19 July 2024, paras 155 173, 179). The colonial nature of Israel’s occupation was further highlighted in several separate opinions of the ICJ Judges (Separate Opinion of Judge Yusuf para 12, Declaration of Judge Xue para 4, Separate Opinion of Judge Gómez Robledo para 26)

Third, the Special Rapporteur observes that jurisprudence arising primarily from the criminal prosecution of individuals can limit early recognition of State responsibility for genocide (para 36(c)). In Croatia v. Serbia, the ICJ determined that “reasonableness” should be considered when inferring genocidal intent from patterns of conduct, (para 50), namely that genocidal intent is the “only reasonable inference”. Whilst State intent “can be derived from the aggregate of individual perpetrators’ genocidal intents”, an absence of individual criminal convictions should not exonerate a State (para 51). The Special Rapporteur supports the argument made by a group of States currently intervening in The Gambia v. Myanmar that the “reasonableness criterion” requires a “balanced approach” (para 52). This entails filtering out other possible intents not supported by the evidence (para 53(a)), considering State conduct and intent holistically (para 53(b)), and recognising the totality of genocidal conduct such that is not obscured by the “claimed strategies, policies and actions” of the wrongdoing state (para 53(c)).

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