Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups committed hundreds of crimes against humanity including the premeditated murder of civilians, sexual violence and kidnappings during their October 7 attack on Israel, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has said.
The US-based group released a report on Wednesday that accused the groups of repeatedly targeting and murdering civilians when they attacked Israeli towns and killed more than 1,100 people, the majority of them civilians.
“Palestinian fighters repeatedly attacked civilians and summarily executed individuals in their custody. The killings of civilians appear planned because of the many similarities in how killings took place across the attack sites,” the report said.
The crimes include “deliberate and indiscriminate attacks against civilians and civilian objects; wilful killing of persons in custody; cruel and other inhumane treatment; sexual and gender-based violence; hostage taking; mutilation and despoiling [robbing] of bodies; use of human shields; and pillage and looting”, said the report.
“It’s impossible for us to put a number on the specific instances,” Belkis Wille, HRW’s associate director, told a news conference, adding that “there were obviously hundreds on that day”.
Advertisement
Nirit Hunwald, a survivor from Kibbutz Be’eri where the gunmen killed 97 civilians, described dragging the corpse of a first responder who had been shot. “There was a blood trail. I cannot erase it from my mind, all the blood,” she told HRW.
The group said the assailants who breached the barriers separating Gaza from Israel on the morning of October 7 had also committed sexual violence. At least five Palestinian factions took part in the attack, and were joined by civilians from Gaza, it said.
“Human Rights Watch found evidence of acts of sexual and gender-based violence by fighters including forced nudity, and the posting without consent of sexualized images on social media,” the report said.
HRW, which has an acrimonious relationship with Israel because of previous reports accusing it of human rights violations, said it was not given access to “information on sexual and gender-based violence in the possession of the Israeli government” and could not independently verify numerous reports of rapes during the attack.
But it cited two UN investigations that concluded that sexual violence and rapes had occurred in at least three locations.
Advertisement
The attack — the deadliest against Jews since the Holocaust — scarred Israel and shook its belief in its ability to deter assaults.
The war that resulted has killed almost 40,000 Palestinians, according to the health ministry in Gaza, which Hamas has controlled since 2007. Israel says it has killed about 14,000 Hamas members.
The war, which has destroyed or damaged much of the territory, has led to accusations of war crimes against Israel. The International Court of Justice has ordered an end to the military operation after South Africa brought a case accusing Israel of genocide, something Israel has denied.
The International Criminal Court is expected to issue arrest warrants for Binyamin Netanyahu, the prime minister, Yoav Gallant, the defence minister, and the Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Yahya Sinwar.
Both sides are under pressure to agree to a ceasefire under which Hamas would release some of the hostages it is holding in Gaza. The group kidnapped more than 200 people on October 7 and released dozens in November in return for Palestinian prisoners.
Advertisement
Hamas says it has submitted its response to a US-drafted and UN-backed ceasefire proposal, and is awaiting Israel’s response. Israeli officials have expressed optimism about a deal, but several rounds of negotiations have unravelled at the last minute in recent months.
Israeli airstrikes in Gaza continued on Wednesday. Dozens were killed over the weekend in a strike aimed at the Hamas military commander Mohammed Deif.
The fate of Deif, who orchestrated the October 7 attack, remains unclear, but Israel confirmed that another senior Hamas militant, Rafa Salame, was killed in the attack on a compound Hamas had set up in a humanitarian zone.
Hamas demanded that HRW withdraw the report and “apologise”.
“We reject the lies and blatant bias towards the occupation and the lack of professionalism and credibility in the Human Rights Watch report,” said a statement released by the Palestinian militants, designated as a terrorist group by the United States, UK, European Union and others.
