PARIS, Monday, May 27, 2027 (WAFA) - The International Criminal Court should investigate as war crimes three Israeli air strikes that killed 44 Palestinian civilians, including 32 children, in the occupied Gaza Strip last month, Amnesty International said today.
The strikes – one on al-Maghazi on 16 April, and two on Rafah on 19 and 20 April 2024 – also injured at least 20 civilians, and are further evidence of a broader pattern of war crimes committed by the Israeli military in the occupied Gaza Strip in the last seven months.
“These devastating strikes have decimated families and cruelly cut short the lives of 32 children,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty International’s Senior Director for Research, Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns.
For this latest investigation, Amnesty International interviewed 17 survivors and witnesses, surveyed the locations of the strikes, visited a hospital where the wounded were receiving treatment, photographed remnants of the munitions used in the attacks for expert identification, reviewed video and photographic material obtained from local sources and available on social media, and examined satellite imagery of the locations.
In all three cases, Amnesty International did not find any evidence that there had been any military targets in or around the locations targeted by the Israeli military, raising serious concerns that these attacks amount to direct attacks on civilians and civilian objects, which are war crimes. Israel has not provided any information about the attacks in Rafah, and has only provided general allegations, which it later contradicted, regarding the attack on al-Maghazi.
Even if Israeli forces had intended to target legitimate military objectives in the vicinity of these three strikes, the evidence indicates these attacks did not distinguish between military objectives and civilian objects, and as such would therefore be indiscriminate. Indiscriminate attacks that kill or injure civilians, or destroy or damage civilian objects, are war crimes.
The evidence collected by Amnesty International also indicates the Israeli military failed to provide warning – at minimum to anyone living in the locations that were hit – before launching the attacks.
K.T
