Amnesty says Gaza groups committed war crimes
By AP
NGO cites indiscriminate fire and use of civilians for cover during fighting; Israel too was charged of crimes in previous report
A general view shows the collapsed minaret of a destroyed mosque in Gaza City, on July 30, 2014 after it was hit in an overnight Israeli strike. (photo credit: AFP/MAHMUD HAMS)
JERUSALEM — The human rights group Amnesty International said in a report Thursday that armed Palestinian organizations had committed war crimes during the 2014 Gaza-Israel conflict, by killing both Israeli and Palestinian civilians using indiscriminate projectiles.
he report comes after two other reports issued in late 2014 that accused Israel of war crimes for attacks on multistory civilian buildings and attacks on Palestinian residential homes during the war.
The 50-day Gaza war left more than 2,100 Palestinians dead, around half of which Israel says were fighters. Gaza officials claim most were civilians. On the Israeli side, 66 soldiers and six civilians were killed.
Palestinian operatives, including the armed wing of Hamas, launched unguided rockets and mortars which cannot be aimed at a specific target and are a breach of international law, the human rights group said.
Six civilians in Israel were killed in such attacks, and 13 Palestinian civilians were killed when a Palestinian projectile launched from the Gaza Strip apparently landed in a Gaza refugee camp.
Palestinians have claimed that the Israeli military was responsible for that attack, but Amnesty International said an independent munitions expert examining the evidence on the group’s behalf concluded that a Palestinian rocket was responsible.
The report also alleged other international humanitarian law violations during the conflict, including Palestinian terror groups’ storing munitions in civilian buildings and United Nations schools, and launching attacks near locations where hundreds of displaced civilians were taking shelter.
“The devastating impact of Israeli attacks on Palestinian civilians during the conflict is undeniable, but violations by one side in a conflict can never justify violations by their opponents,” said Philip Luther of Amnesty International.
Luther called on both Israeli and Palestinian authorities to cooperate with UN and International Criminal Court probes “to end decades of impunity that have perpetuated a cycle of violations in which civilians on both sides have paid a heavy price.”
Hamas officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
On Monday the European Union joined Palestinian and Arab delegations in asking Israel to allow a United Nations human rights investigator access to the Gaza Strip.
Israel has declined to allow the investigator, Makarim Wibisono, into Gaza, and Wibisono presented an initial report to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva based on interviews with people in Jordan and Egypt, as well as individuals communicating via video call from Gaza.
His report calls on Israel to investigate the killing of more than 1,500 Palestinian civilians, one-third of them children, during the Gaza war. Of the 2,100 Palestinians killed, Israel contends that half were militants.
JTA and Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.
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