Israel has committed war crimes and extermination crime With its constant attacks on schools, universities, mosques and other educational, religious and cultural buildings in Gaza, as the UN has denounced on Tuesday, through an independent and international commission report for investigation in the occupied Palestinian territories, an agency chaired by the exjudue of the Navi Pillay International Criminal Court.
UN researchers have documented Attacks to 90% of Gaza’s schools and universities and the destruction of half of their religious and cultural places. “There are more and more indications that Israel is carrying out a concerted campaign to end life in Gaza,” Pillay explained when presenting the report to also highlight that these attacks seek to generate “damage to the generations present and coming.”
The UN Commission concludes that Israel has committed crime against humanity of extermination to Killer hundreds of people who took refuge in schools and religious placesincluding the mosques of IHya al-Sunna and Saad al-Ghafari, in the capital of Gazatí. On the other hand, Israel perpetrated war crimes by attacking religious buildings and historical monuments, and also by causing civil victims with their offensives against educational and cultural facilities, which has also left 658,000 Gazati children without school for 20 months.
Between October 7, 2023 and the end of February 2025, a period covered by the report, they were reported Attacks to 403 of the 564 Schools of Gaza, of which 85 were completely destroyed. Many of the schools were administered by the UN Agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), which in Israeli attacks on educational facilities and others that served as a refuge in Gaza died until February at least 742 people, said the report, which also denounced the Murder of at least 800 workers in schools and universities.
The research also analyzes deliberate fires and demolitions of schools, university campuses and other educational infrastructure by Israeli forces, as well as their military use in violation of international law, both by Hamas and by the Israeli army. The transformation of a campus of the Al-Azhar University as a synagogue for Israeli troops and also for ammunition warehouse and military vehicles is cited as an example.
Israel’s attacks on education in Palestine are not limited to Gaza, according to a report in which it is denounced that the increase in security controls and attacks on facilities, some of them perpetrated by settlers, have affected more than more than 806,000 Palestinian students in the West Bank. In that territory the report denounces attacks to 141 schools, the murder of 96 students and four educational workers, as well as the arrest of half a thousand students and teachers.
“Israel has barely done anything to prevent settlers intentionally attacking educational facilities and students to terrorize them and force them to leave“, denounces the report. It also mentions pressures to teachers and Israeli and Palestinian students for showing support or concern for the situation of the civilian population in Gaza, including dismissals, expulsions or even arrests,” especially against educators and women students. “
Regarding religious and cultural places, the 19 -page report denounces attacks in Gaza, access limitations in the West Bank and looting by Israeli soldiers to museums and archaeological research places in the strip. The UN Organization for Education, Science and Culture (UNESCO) has verified damage to 75 cultural and religious places in Gaza, including places of important historical value such as a Roman cemetery, the Gran Omari mosque or the Pasha Palace Museum.
On the other hand, military operations, arrests and harassment of faithful and religious figures have increased in the esplanade of the mosques of Jerusalem, one of the most sacred places for the Islamic religion, which has meant a serious limitation to freedom of worship and has sometimes exacerbated tensions. “The attacks and destruction of historical heritage places, the limited access to them in the West Bank and the attempts to erase its history Heterogeneous erodes the historical ties of the Palestinians with the Earth and weakens their collective identity, “Pillay warned, who was also the head of Human Rights of the UN and president of the International Criminal Court for Rwanda.
The commission headed, created by the UN Human Rights Council in May 2021, will present this report at its 59th session, which begins next week.
