Human Rights Watch accused the Israeli occupation of committing genocide crimes during the war it waged on the Gaza Strip, including deliberately depriving the residents of the Strip of access to water, demanding the imposition of sanctions on Israel.
The human rights organization said Thursday in a report that focused on water, “The Israeli authorities deliberately imposed on the Palestinian population in Gaza living conditions designed to destroy part of the population, by deliberately depriving the Palestinian civilians there of adequate access to water.”
The organization confirmed that these restrictions have led to thousands of deaths, and it is likely that more residents of the Gaza Strip will continue to die, stressing that what Israel is doing is “deliberate deprivation of safe drinking water and sanitation necessary for the minimum level of human survival.”
“What we found is that the Israeli government is deliberately killing Palestinians in Gaza by depriving them of the water they need to survive,” Lama Fakih, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, said in a press conference.
The report of the New York-based organization stated: “Since October 2023, the Israeli authorities have deliberately obstructed Palestinians’ access to the sufficient amount of water needed to survive in the Gaza Strip.”
Human Rights Watch referred to a statement by then-Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, in which he announced in October 2023 the imposition of a complete siege on Gaza and said, “There will be no electricity, no food, no water, and no fuel. Everything is closed.”
The Human Rights Watch report – which took a full year to prepare – was based on interviews with dozens of Gaza Strip residents, employees of water and sanitation facilities, paramedics, and relief workers, in addition to satellite images, data, and analysis of photos and video clips.
It should be noted that Human Rights Watch is the second major human rights organization in a month to use the word “genocide” to describe Israel’s war on Gaza, after Amnesty International issued a report concluding that Israel is committing genocide in the Strip.