Body of Genocide Scholars Declare Israel Committing Genocide in Gaza—but Does It Even Matter?

This essay appeared in the Sept. 2, 2025 edition of UNFTR’s premium newsletter. Become a UNFTR member to receive our bonus newsletter each week and for other perks.

With its slaughter of tens of thousands of children, war crimes that have left thousands buried in rubble, indiscriminate use of torture and arbitrary detention of Palestinians, widespread attacks on aid workers, healthcare professionals and utility systems, sexual violence, and forced-starvation policy, among many other horrific injustices, Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, according to the world’s leading genocide studies organization.

The International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS), founded in 1994, became the latest in a chorus of groups, scholars, and human rights professionals to make this case against Israel—one that has been all but ignored by the so-called “rules-based order” engineered and led by the United States, which has funded and backed the mass annihilation for nearly two years.

IAGS’ conclusion came in the form of a three-page resolution that puts a premium on the legal framework of genocide, reading more like a criminal complaint than a passionate condemnation of Israel’s decimation of Palestinian life, culture, and society.

That said, the unvarnished truths about Israel’s campaign should be enough to inspire outrage.

The War on Gaza’s Children: 28 Deaths Daily

Take its war on Gaza’s children. Israel, according to UNICEF, has killed 28 children a day, or, as the group says, “the size of a classroom.” More than 18,000 children have been slaughtered and tens of thousands more injured during the last 22 months of relentless attacks—making it one of the most deadly conflicts for children in modern history.

“This destruction of a substantial part of a group constitutes genocide,” IAGS writes, quoting from a joint declaration issued by six countries in the Gambia v. Myanmar case, which says “children form a substantial part of the groups protected by the Genocide Convention, and that the targeting of children provides an indication of the intention to destroy a group as such, at least in part. Children are essential to the survival of any group as such, since the physical destruction of the group is assured where it is unable to regenerate itself.”

You don’t need a master’s degree in international law to understand that children represent the future of any society, and that slaughtering them is both shameful and creates myriad consequences—not to mention the physical and mental scars Gaza’s children, if they survive, will carry with them for the rest of their lives.

The resolution covers everything from the massive casualty and injury count and the forced displacement of Gaza’s estimated 2.3 million population to the razing of 90 percent of the housing infrastructure, genocidal statements made by Israeli government officials, and the deliberate destruction of food sources, among many other examples.

On the legal question of “intent to destroy,” the resolution notes that Israeli officials have referred to Palestinians as “human animals,” promised to produce “maximum damage” and declared an ultimate objective of “flattening Gaza.”

Every line from the IAGS carries its own weight, but there’s one that’s particularly striking—that Israel is “destroying entire families and multiple generations of Palestinians” amid its genocidal campaign.

The resolution comes as yet another consequential voice in international human rights law, Professor William Schabas, said in a recently published interview that other countries, including the United States, could be held liable for the genocide in Gaza.

‘Strongest Case of Genocide Ever’

Notably, Schabas, a professor of international law at Middlesex University, London, professor of human rights law and international criminal law at Leiden Law School, and the author of more than 20 books related to international human rights law—including “Genocide in International Law: The Crime of Crimes”—said the case brought by South Africa against Israel less than three months after the war started is “arguably the strongest case of genocide that has ever come before the Court.”

“The point, however, is that we have more than just circumstantial evidence here,” Schabas, who comes from a family of Holocaust survivors, said in the interview. “We have more than a mere pattern of conduct—we also have statements and other indications of policy. All of these elements must be considered together when making a final judgment. Ultimately, this assessment rests with judges or, in some contexts, juries, depending on the legal framework. They will need to determine whether the totality of this evidence amounts to genocide.”

There’s quite a bit of damning evidence.

Meanwhile, Schabas methodically debunked the perverted narrative that genocide claims are baseless because, as its supporters say, Israel could be much more cruel and kill so many more Palestinians if they so wanted.

“Israel’s response in Gaza is entirely disproportionate to what self-defense would require. Moreover, the International Court of Justice has declared the occupation of Gaza to be unlawful. You cannot claim self-defense while engaging in unlawful actions. It’s like a bank robber who fires on the police because they’re firing on him—he can’t go to court and invoke self-defense, because he is, by definition, acting unlawfully. In the same way, I don’t think Israel can credibly rely on self-defense here. In my view, this is simply a bogus argument.”

Ongoing Ethnic Cleansing in Gaza City

As scholars, human rights experts and lawyers argue the legal case against Israel, the country’s far-right government has launched its widely condemned ethnic cleansing campaign in Gaza City, fueling a chaotic mass exodus amid waves of assaults.

Al Jazeera reported on Monday that Israel killed a pregnant woman and her unborn child near a refugee camp, underscoring the hellish plight of Palestinians in the city.

“They don’t know what to do and where to go. They are trying so hard to find a safer place, but the Israeli army keeps attacking every corner in the city,” Moath al-Kahlout, one of the outlet’s correspondents, said.

Last month, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) warned the Gaza City assault “will lead to mass killings of civilians and destruction of infrastructure vital to the survival of the population.”

Every day in Gaza brings new horrors. It’s been 22 months. Genocide conclusions are slowly rolling in. But none of it has stopped Israel’s unending brutalization of Palestinians.

As Schabas said of the support Israel enjoys from its genocide-enabling allies—international groups, such as the United Nations, are “constrained” with what they can do.

“A significant problem with the United Nations is that it is ultimately guided by the political views of its member states, particularly the most powerful ones—the permanent members of the Security Council. I am talking here mainly about the United States, but I would not overlook the United Kingdom and France either. Other wealthy and influential states, primarily in Europe or European settler states elsewhere, such as Canada and Australia, are also deeply devoted to Israel. They have been reluctant to take measures that would rein Israel in and, on the contrary, have often encouraged and emboldened it, frequently turning a blind eye when Israel has engaged in particularly troubling actions.”

We can appreciate the genocide determinations that are coming in. But nothing will change without political pressure. That’s why, at the end of the day, we can’t stop talking about Gaza.

Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI)’s emotional appeal in July just about sums it up:

“We will not stop. We will not be polite. We will not forget. Lift the siege. Feed the starving. Stop the killing now. Not another hour. Not another child. Not another bomb. Never again for anyone. For God’s sake, people. Reclaim our humanity.”

To get a sense of the breadth of IAGS’ genocide determination, here’s a breakdown of the resolution:

• Israel has engaged in systematic and widespread crimes against humanity, war crimes, and genocide, including indiscriminate and deliberate attacks against civilians and civilian infrastructure in Gaza.
• The actions of the Israeli government against Palestinians have included torture, arbitrary detention, sexual and reproductive violence, deliberate attacks on medical professionals, humanitarian aid workers, and journalists, as well as the deliberate deprivation of food, water, medicine, and electricity essential to survival.
• Israel has forcibly displaced nearly all of the 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza and demolished more than 90 percent of the housing infrastructure in the territory.
• Israel has destroyed schools, universities, libraries, museums, and archives, which are essential to Palestinian collective well-being and identity.
• Israel has killed or injured more than 50,000 children, noting that the destruction of a substantial part of a group, especially children, constitutes genocide.
• Israeli governmental leaders have made explicit genocidal statements.
• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu endorsed U.S. plans to forcibly expel all Palestinians from Gaza, described by the head of a UN Commission as ethnic cleansing.
• Israel’s destruction of agricultural infrastructure and denial of humanitarian aid creates intentional infliction of unlivable conditions, leading to starvation.
• The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on various charges, including starvation of civilians, intentional attacks against civilians, murder, and persecution.
• The ICJ found it plausible that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, and ordered Israel to prevent direct and public incitement of genocide.
• Leading international organizations and UN bodies, as well as scholarly experts in genocide studies, have concluded that Israeli governmental and military actions constitute genocide.
• The resolution notes that security measures are often a pretext for mass killing and genocide, as in Gaza.
• In totality, the resolution says that Israel’s policies and actions in Gaza meet the legal definition of genocide under Article II of the United Nations Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
• The resolution calls upon Israel to immediately cease all acts that constitute genocide and to comply with court orders related to the prevention and punishment of genocide.
  
  

Image Source

• Ashraf Amra, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO, via Wikimedia Commons. Changes were made.