Since the October 7 attacks by Hamas that killed 1,200 people in Israel, the Israeli occupying forces have killed more than 17,000 Palestinians, over 6,000 of them children, and wounded more than 46,000. Close to 1.9 million people — about 85 percent of Gaza’s population — have been forced to flee their homes and squeeze into roughly one-third of the Gaza Strip.
The vast majority of people in Gaza have been displaced and are on the verge of famine.
On October 13, in anticipation of its ground invasion into Gaza, Israel ordered 1.1 million Palestinians in northern Gaza to evacuate to the south within 24 hours. Although that was an impossible deadline to meet, half the population of Gaza was forcibly transferred in response to the evacuation order. Then, Israeli forces carpet-bombed the north, striking homes and hospitals. Much of the area was reduced to rubble.
“It is inconceivable that more than half of Gaza’s population could traverse an active war zone, without devastating humanitarian consequences, particularly while deprived of essential supplies and basic services,” said Paula Gaviria Betancur, special rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons, on October 13.
Israel ordered Gazans in the south to evacuate on December 3. But there is nowhere for them to go. The Israeli border crossings are closed and the Rafah Crossing from Egypt is heavily restricted. Many people are sleeping in the streets and on sidewalks. “Images from Gaza on [December 3] showed plumes of dark smoke rising above a rubble-covered landscape and bloodied children wailing in dust-covered hospital wards,” according to a New York Times report. “Mourners stood beside rows of bodies wrapped in white sheets.”
“Under international humanitarian law, the place where you evacuate people to must, by law have sufficient resources for their survival — medical facilities, food and water,” said United Nations Children’s Fund spokesman James Elder in an interview with the Times. “That is absolutely not the case. They are these patches of barren land, they are streets or corners or any space in a neighborhood, half-built buildings. The common thing they have is no water, no facilities, no shelter from cold and rain, and particularly no sanitation.”
UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Martin Griffiths, said the Israeli military campaign has created “apocalyptic” conditions and ended meaningful humanitarian operations. “This is an apocalyptic situation now, because these are the remnants of a nation being driven into a pocket in the south,” Griffiths noted.
The Rome Statute for the International Criminal Court (ICC) lists the forcible transfer of population as a crime against humanity “when committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack.” Israeli forces have mounted a widespread and systematic attack against the civilians in Gaza.
Forcible transfer under the Rome Statute “means forced displacement of the persons concerned by expulsion or other coercive acts from the area in which they are lawfully present, without grounds permitted under international law.” There is no legal or moral justification for........