to the Human Rights Council of the Pillay Commission of Inquiry.
By Dina Rovner, Legal Advisor at UN Watch
In this report, the Pillay makes one-sided condemnations of Israel for attacks on Palestinian “educational facilities and religious and cultural sites.” While the Commission finds Israel guilty of a host of war crimes and the crime against humanity of “extermination” in relation to attacks on schools and mosques that caused civilian harm, it largely exonerates Hamas for its role in inflating civilian harm with its human shield strategy.
A senior IDF commander recently described the extent of the use of IEDs and booby traps in Gaza, saying: “We see that they simply booby-trap anything they can, and they have no barrier or any moral limit in this aspect. We’ve seen booby-trapped kindergartens, also with tunnel shafts; we’ve seen schools; we’ve seen sites that are supposed to be used for humanitarian aid - in every such place, we encountered IEDs, we encountered tunnel shafts,” he stated. Hamas’s human shield strategy has been extensively, documented by the IDF and other military experts, and was admitted by October 7th mastermind Yahya Sinwar.
Like past Pillay Commission reports, this report contains major flaws that render its factual findings and legal conclusions completely unreliable, including the following:
1. Unbalanced
The report claims to look at “attacks on educational facilities and religious and cultural sites” in both “the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel.” However, the report almost exclusively condemns Israel for violations against Palestinians with only a few short paragraphs addressing Palestinian violations against Israelis, equivalent to less than half a page in 17 pages of text (< 3%). Moreover, even these short paragraphs ultimately blame Israel for harm caused by Palestinian terrorists. For example:
- Instead of condemning Hamas and PIJ for indiscriminate rocket fire on civilian areas, the report blames Israel for “acute lack of bomb shelters” in “Bedouin villages in the Negev.” (Para 40).
- Rather than condemning Hamas for causing mass displacement of children in Israel, the report focuses on criticizing the fact that Israeli schools serving displaced children lacked “the capacity to provide for psychological trauma.” (Para 41). Notably, the report ignores the severe trauma inflicted on all Israeli children due to the October 7th Hamas attack and sustained rocket and missile fire by Hamaz, PIJ, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iran regularly sending Israeli children to bomb shelters.
2. Selective reporting
The report states that it focused on the period after October 7, 2023, but included some incidents from before that date to show “patterns of violations over time.” Notably, the Commission cites only pre-October 7, 2023 incidents that it deems show patterns of violations by Israel, for example “provocations” on the Temple Mount or alleged Israeli displacement of Palestinians to protect archaeological sites (Para 65, 71). However, it omits pre-October 7th incidents that show patterns of violations by Hamas and other Palestinian terror groups, such as embedding military infrastructure in schools and mosques and attacking Jewish holy sites in Judea and Samaria.
3. Ignores Hamas violations against Israelis and Palestinians
For example, the report:
- Largely ignores widespread embedding of military activities in civilian infrastructure, which has been documented by the IDF and others. Although the report refers to one instance of Hamas operating from a school and includes a recommendation to “the de facto authorities in Gaza” to “cease using civilian objects for military purposes,” by ignoring the extent of this Hamas war crime and blaming all the damage in Gaza on Israel, the Commission effectively absolves Hamas of responsibility.
- Omits discussion of Hamas abuse of Palestinian children by indoctrinating them to jihad at school and recruiting them as child soldiers.
- Disregards Palestinian attacks on Jewish religious and cultural sites in Judea and Samaria, such as Joseph’s Tomb and Joshua’s Tomb.
4. Fails to Condemn terrorist incitement in Palestinian education
The word “incitement” appears only three times in the report, each time to criticize Israel for what the Commission views as overbroad application of its anti-terror laws. The Commission completely ignores the well-documented incitement of children to jihadi terrorism in Palestinian schools, including UNRWA schools, which is a violation of Palestinian children’s right to education that should have been addressed.
5. Defends support for Hamas October 7th
The report accuses Israel of “targeting educational personnel and students” for expressing “concern or opinions” about the Hamas October 7th attacks. (Para 85). This includes an order by Israel’s Ministry of Education to “suspend any student or employee who expressed support for actions taken by armed groups on 7 October 2023, labelling such support as incitement to terrorism” (para 36). Thus, the Commission appears to defend educators’ expressions of support for October 7th.
6. Deems Hamas more credible than IDF
The Commission relies uncritically on Hamas casualty data for the number of children killed, even though this data has been proven to be unreliable and cannot be independently verified. The Commission also fails to acknowledge that these numbers include children who were either directly killed by Hamas or killed due to their involvement in the hostilities as child soldiers for Hamas. The Hamas data itself shows that 65% of the teens aged 13-17 who were killed were male, strongly suggesting they were child combatants. At the same time, the Commission is dismissive towards IDF claims that its attacks on schools and cultural sites were targeting Hamas, noting the claims were “contested” and stating that it was “unable to independently verify” these IDF claims (Para 22, 50, 56), effectively absolving Hamas of responsibility for its war crimes.
7. Relies on cases already addressed by Israeli authorities
Several examples brought by the Commission to implicate Israel in violations involve incidents where Israel’s democratic institutions took some kind of remedial action. Therefore, these cases cannot support findings of specific violations or patterns of violations. For example:
- Disciplinary proceedings - IDF commander “received a disciplinary note for ordering the demolition without the proper approval.” (Para 16).
- Opening investigations - “The Israeli Security Agency and the police reportedly announced an investigation into” alleged vandalism of mosque by Israel settlers. (Para 57).
- Civilian legal proceedings - Israeli teacher dismissed for social media post criticizing Israeli bombing campaign in Gaza was reinstated after “a Tel Aviv court ruled that his dismissal was unlawful.” (Para 38).
- Arrests - “Five settlers, including two minors, were reportedly arrested and indicted for the attack on the school” near Jericho. (Para 35).
8. Promotes false narrative on Israeli archaeology
The report presents a highly politicized and false narrative arguing that Israeli archaeological excavations in Judea and Samaria exclusively preserve Jewish heritage while erasing all other cultures. However, according to Israeli sources, the opposite is the case. It is the Palestinians who destroy Jewishly significant archaeological sites. The Commission’s report completely omits this perspective, including all reports about damage to such sites, for example: a May 2020 report that the Palestinian Authority paved a road over the ancient Jewish Hasmonean fortress of Tel Aroma; a May 2023 report that the Palestinian Authority paved a new road through an archaeological site in Sebastia, the capital of the biblical Kingdom of Israel; and a March 2024 report that Palestinians vandalized the Second Temple period site of Umma-Rihan. Likewise, Palestinian excavations at the Temple Mount have sought to erase Jewish historical ties to the site by destroying artifacts. Notably, Israeli archeologists have said they would like to conduct joint research with Palestinian colleagues but that the Palestinians fear they will be labeled traitors if they participate.
9. Protects Muslim worship, denies Jewish prayer rights
The Commission criticizes Israeli security measures limiting Palestinian access to the site on the Temple Mount as (Para 72, 95) as “severe restrictions on freedom of religion.” At the same time, it deems Jewish prayer at the site-the holiest site in Judaism-to be a “provocation” (Para 72). In fact, only Israel guarantees freedom of religion and access to holy sites for all religions. When the area was controlled by Jordan from 1948 to 1967, Jewish religious sites were destroyed and Jews were denied access to their holy sites.
10. Blames Israel for violence, ignores Palestinian incitement
The Commission wholly adopts the Palestinian narrative that Israeli actions on the Temple Mount triggered “wider escalation of hostilities,” while completely ignoring the role of Palestinian incitement in inflaming the tensions. For example, the Commission asserts that Ariel Sharon’s October 2000 visit to the Temple Mount triggered the second intifada (Para 71). To the contrary, the evidence-including, statements by a PA official at the time and a Fatah official years later and an admission by Yasser Arafat’s widow-points to Arafat having planned and instigated the second intifada in response to the failure of the Camp David negotiations. Likewise, the April-May 2021 violence on the Temple Mount was directly incited by Palestinian leaders on all sides vying to prove their legitimacy as the next Palestinian leader in the context of the PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s cancellation of elections.
11. Factual findings not supported
The Commission’s broad conclusions are not supported by the facts and are often made subject to qualification using terms like “may have.” In many instances, the Commission did not conclusively determine who was behind the attack or consider the possibility that Hamas actions exacerbated the damage. For example:
- In Paragraph 14, the Commission states that it “could not identify any military objective for the demolitions of educational facilities.” However, in the previous paragraph, the Commission itself explained that Israel destroyed all buildings, including educational facilities, to create military buffer zones on the eastern border and separating the north and south of the Gaza Strip. (Para 13). Likewise, despite the overwhelming evidence of a pattern of Hamas use of Gaza schools for military purposes, the Commission dismissed all such claims as unverified (Para 16, 22) with one exception (Para 23).
- In another case, the Commission said that “satellite imagery analysis showing cars parked at the site” confirmed that “there was no significant threat to Israeli security forces in the area and therefore no military necessity to demolish the university buildings” (Para 18). Considering that the Commission admitted to receiving no reply from Israel to its request for information (Para 3) and that it did not have access to classified IDF intelligence supporting its targeting decisions, that conclusion is completely unfounded. At best, the Commission could have said that it was unable to assess the military necessity due to insufficient evidence.
- In a section titled “Attacks on religious and cultural sites,” the Commission claimed it “documented allegations of possible looting” by IDF personnel (Para 45). Despite the Commission’s later admission that it hadn’t been able to verify the allegations and that Israel denied them, the Commission still included this unverified claim as proof that Israel “caused damage to cultural and religious sites in Gaza.”
12. Legal conclusions not supported
The Commission’s legal conclusions about necessity, distinction, precautions, proportionality, intent, reasonableness, war crimes, and crimes against humanity are drawn from an incomplete factual record and therefore have no credibility. As noted, the Commission itself admits it received no information from the Israeli government. Likewise, the Commission acknowledges that it did not credit IDF material in the public record. The Commission also did not take into consideration findings about Israeli compliance with International Humanitarian Law by military experts who visited the war zone and interviewed relevant officials including JINSA, the High Level Military Group, John Spencer, Andrew Fox, and others. Therefore, its legal conclusions that Israel committed war crimes and crimes against humanity should not be credited.
