‘We have never seen anything like this’: UN Commission of Inquiry head
VIDEO A UN commission has found Israeli authorities responsible for carrying out war crimes in Gaza.
The report says Israel is responsible for murder, torture, sexual violence, and forcibly transferring and starving Palestinians.
It says its actions are an intentional and direct attack, on the civilian population in the strip.
Navi Pillay, the chair of the UN's commission of inquiry presented the report's findings to the Human Rights Council in Geneva.
a un commission has found Israeli authorities responsible for carrying out war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza the report says Israeli authorities committed the crimes of starvation murder intentional attacks against civilians torture and outrages upon personal dignity in Gaza evacuation routes and designated safe areas were consistently targeted by Israeli forces that the commission determined amounted to the forcible transfer of people Israel imposed a total Siege constituting in Collective punishment and denied Palestinians essential Necessities such as water food electricity Fuel and humanitarian assistance for strategic and political purposes the report says Israeli forces also committed acts of sexual violence torture and inhuman treatment in the West Bank plastic calls on the Israeli government to immediately Implement a ceasefire lift the siege of Gaza ensure the delivery of humanitarian Aid and cease targeting civilians it also urges the Palestinian government and authorities in Gaza to cease all rocket attacks on Israel and unconditionally release all hostages the commission also found Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups responsible for war crimes including deliberate targeting of captives wavi P the chair of the un's commission of inquiry presented the report's findings to the Human Rights Geneva Israeli authorities are responsible for war crimes crimes against humanity and violations of humanitarian and human rights law extermination intentionally directing attacks against civilians and civilian objects murder or willful killing using starvation as a method of War forcable transfer gender persecution targeting Palestinian men and boys sexual and gender-based violence amounting to torture and cruel or inhuman treatment Michael Mansfield is an international lawyer and joins us live from Birmingham in the UK good to have you with us first of all what do you report well I think it's an extremely report because of course the it has to be remembered that in the background we have the ICC has through its Chief prosecutor issued warrants for the individuals uh alleging exactly what the found so it is the justification for what he was doing if it if it was needed it is needed because you had an automatic response from America which was as well as Israel to criticize and almost punish the international criminal court for daring to even investigate let alone issue warrants for their arrest so it seems to me that this is an important report on that scale next also alongside you have the international court of justice where South Africa was uh litigating the whole issue of um the crimes being committed and particularly in the context of genocide and the genocide convention well this report goes further than anything so far and the court has been very reticent and has only talked about plausible rights and so on but actually this establishes it seems to me a very strong not just Prime facial case but goes further than that I I'm not going to say conclusive but it's certainly a long way towards being conclusive so I think it's a very important report when you look at the international court of justice and finally of course the UN itself if it's going to bring out these reports it's got to do something about not just call for an a ceasefire maybe it's got to consider the possibility of intervention here which of course the charter originally allowed for in order to stabilize areas of the world where Warfare essentially was getting out of control but you you say that but do you think it will spark any actual action well immediate action no is the straight answer to to you it isn't but uh it is on another front I left the action to ask because I know the problems with the United Nations and the security Council and the divisions and all the rest of it that we're familiar with between America Russia and the UK sitting on the fence as usual however I think the importance of this report is to counter the really quite disgraceful attacks on the IC doing its job and Duty properly that has been brought about by the US supported by Israel and the United Kingdom what do they say oh well help I mean that's about the weakest response you could imagine so it seems to me this report can now be used by those are approaching litigation of any kind domestically or internationally to say we have an authoritative report here seems to me it's authoritative and you're not going to do much better than this and it seems to me that should be fueling all the initiatives including the other possibility on a domestic front of the the BDS campaign where people are boycotting and divesting and sanctioning a country which is involved Israel in particular and not the only one obviously but Israel mainly is focusing on well the word been used extermination but of course it it just plays more into Israel's narrative doesn't it that the UN is biased against it the report calls for an immediate Hal to military operations but we know that it's simply going to be dismissed by Israel yes my observation about Israel is that it doesn't matter what the organization is unless the organization is supporting its objectives and its priorities then it is automatically either regarded as and called anti-semitic or it is regarded as hostile uh to their objectives and so on so you know it I I think whether it's the UN or any other organization the fact is there isn't another organization with any credibility internationally and it seems that this is a very important step and if we're going to at least look towards the future of a kind of civilized situation then the United Nations has to be given support and the political uh as it were divisions that are right at the top as it were in the security Council they have to be reformed it's a very good case for reforming how the security Council works the rest of the United Nations does some incredible work particularly providing aid aid in a circumstance where Israel and others used you know so you know what the situation absolutely Michael Mansfield we really appreciate your time thanks so much for taking the time to join us UK Let's cross over now to Geneva where we can speak to our diplomatic editor James Bas he's at the UN Human Rights Council where that report was briefed a little earlier James the report a stark reminder isn't it of the brutalities of this war gave an extensive list of war crimes it really is a very detailed report and very very Grim reading if you read all of it uh summing up what has happened since the 7th of October the session of the Human Rights Council on the commission of inquiry hearing from the commission of inquiry has paused for the lunch break which means we're able to speak to the chair of the commission of inquiry NE P who's with me now uh you spoke when you spoke to the council about the enormity of the situation and I think people know you you're the former High Commissioner of Human Rights you had a very distinguished judicial career as well have you ever seen anything like this before we have never seen anything like this and this extent and that's why I said even the attack on United Nations unprecedented the number of victims unprecedented has never happened before uh in every other commission's report so the figures are unbelievable so I delivered the report and I pointedly asked the member states to read the two big conference papers that accompany the report the report is 10,700 words and with this enormous conflict how can we put details in there I notice from the reaction of both Palestine and Israel the ambassadors said we didn't address their issues sufficiently I will be telling them to read the detailed papers that accompany this enormous task but I truly value this kind of interactive dialogue I value that this Human Rights Council took it out of the political Arena really and planted it squarely in terms of international law speaker after speaker Ambassador after Ambassador today supported our recommendation of respect for international law for accountability when I've read through the report and there's a lot to read it seems to me and yours is an ongoing investigation but even though you've covered so much there are perhaps things that aren't in it I'm thinking for example tax on hospitals and medical facilities I mean is there more to come there's much more to come we had to cut cut off our presentation from 7th October to 31st December our next report will be delivered before the general assembly at the United Nations in New York and that'll cover what you've just described um and and the effect of Education of children for instance all these are important in this report we also we did investigate sexual violence um I think it's tragic that Israel is preventing us from seeing victims inside Israel you know the Ambassador described uh people she knew personally a mother who lost a child the effects of sexual violence then how can they explain that they preventing those victims from seeing un commissioner commission that will Faithfully investigate and get the voices of their victims out because you've not been allowed to go to Gaza you've not been allowed to go to Israel you are you are not allowed to operate according to the Israelis but of course the international court of justice has said you should be there I welcome that the one of the very strident recommendations from the international court of justice is that the commission the UN Commission in charge of Investigation be allowed to the allowed there and you know even I hoped as a law abiding person that Israel will comply with that specific order of the icj we've written to them and we have no response as we have had no response to our repeated uh requests in the past for Access and what I find particularly disturbing is they not only deny us access into Israel and Gaza but whole of Palestine we need to talk to the victims there as well um you know there's been some complaint that we have not investigated sexual violence fully on the part of Israeli soldiers and Palestinian women well we need to get there to speak to the victims ourselves and I'm going the commission will think about how we can take this further there's an order of Courts ordering Israel to let us in and they not in compliance you talk about the international court of justice there's the international criminal court as well and you're well aware that the prosecutor there wants arrest warrants he wants those to be granted given all of the evidence that you've seen and you can make legal findings as well although you're not a court do you think there'll be more cases coming in the international criminal court well I can't speak for the prosecutor but I can authoritatively that we have a memorandum of understanding with the prosecutor and we have now furnished them with like 7,000 pieces of information video material uh and and the open source material that we have verified our information comes from the entire United Nations all the different agencies so we have shared the information I'd like to think that that would have been very helpful for them to draft their and as a former prosecutor yourself do you think that information that is actionable all the information you've shared just a correction I'm not a former prosecutor always on the side Defense former judge of that Court yeah ICC um when we say we we ourselves draw conclusion that the occupation is the is unlawful now and that is now before the icj and when we say crimes such as we named are being committed in both U on October 7th by Hamas and also by Israeli military forces we are basing that on evidence and facts that we've gathered so therefore I think I'm on safe ground in thinking that if the judges get to see that kind of detailed evidence I don't see why they wouldn't come to a similar conclusion on the crimes that are being committed that violate international law thank you very much for talking to Al I know you've got to go and address a news conference in a moment so we won't keep you anymore but thank you for speaking to us uh here at uh the UN Geneva headquarters European headquarters of the UN where the UN um Human Rights Council has been s sitting listening uh to that Commission of inquiry and that very very damning detailed report that you've been hearing about James Baye many thanks indeed make sure to subscribe to our channel to get the latest news from Al
