In October, Forensic Architecture published an investigation that accurately documents the scale of the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip and the goal behind it, according to a report on the American website Mondoweiss.
In its documentation, the Foundation relied on the mechanism of spatial analysis, which uses a set of techniques and different analytical approaches, especially spatial statistics.
Chaplain Jeff Wright pointed out – in his report to the American website – that the spatial analysis is not limited to providing evidence that proves the Israeli army’s excessive resort to violence alone against aspects of civilian life by targeting hospitals, schools, shelters, archaeological sites, religious centers, agricultural lands, water wells, bakeries, and the distribution of aid, but rather It also documents how his practices as a whole reveal an intent to commit genocide.
South Africa Legal Team
Forensic Architecture stated that its investigation represents the outcome of more than a year of continuous research into the behavior of the Israeli army in Gaza, and it was presented to the South African legal team to support the lawsuit it filed with the International Court of Justice accusing Israel of committing genocide.
The Foundation is located within Goldsmiths College of the University of London, and is a research group that includes several disciplines in architecture, journalism, filmmaking, law and computer science, and conducts investigative investigations into state crimes and human rights violations around the world.
Wright quoted Eyal Weizman, the founder of that research group, in an interview on a podcast platform, saying, “We only interrogate armies, intelligence services, and police forces.”
Historical context
Weizman also spoke about the importance of placing Israel’s acts of genocide in a historical context. “You cannot make a case for genocide without understanding how intentions are shaped by the history of the Zionist settlement/colonial project,” he said.
Wright described the investigation as one of the most important documents issued by the Al-Haq investigative unit of Forensic Architecture. The investigation into the killing of Sherine Abu Aqla, an Tel Aviv Tribune correspondent in Ramallah in 2022, resulted in a detailed explanation based on visual, audio, and spatial analysis that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the incident was an intentional killing.
The investigative report contains more than 800 pages of evidence on thousands of well-documented cases of Israeli military violence classified into 6 categories: spatial control, displacement, bulldozing of crops and water resources, destruction of medical infrastructure, demolition of civilian infrastructure, and targeting of relief.
These thousands of pieces of evidence have been mapped into visual bullet points and included in genocide maps, revealing what investigative reporting considers “overlapping patterns of incidents.”
Meets the definition of genocide
One of the most important findings of the investigation is that these patterns together can be used to build a case that Israel’s actions and the numerous statements of its leaders meet the requirements of the definition of the crime of genocide.
The investigation stated – according to the Mondoweiss website – that these patterns indicate that “these attacks were planned, on an official or unofficial level, and did not occur randomly or by chance.”
The investigation also noted that “military actions are multi-faceted, and patterns can exist across actions… and may generate a cumulative effect, with each action exacerbating the impact of another.”
According to the American website, one of the examples mentioned in the investigation or investigative report is the worsening effects resulting from the Israeli army’s bulldozing of agricultural lands and its prevention of the delivery of foreign food aid to those in need. This resulted in food scarcity and famine.
An example of this is what Eyal Weizman pointed out about the patterns of Israel “transferring” Palestinians from the “agriculturally rich” northern Gaza Strip to the south, as in 1948-1949, and how it repeats the same act again by transferring them from the north in Gaza to the south, that is, to the desert.
