Hamas led armed Palestinian groups in committing hundreds of highly coordinated war crimes, including attacks on civilians and gender-based violence, during the October 7 onslaught on Israel that set off the war in Gaza, Human Rights Watch said in a comprehensive report.
One of the most in-depth international studies on the unprecedented incursion into southern Israel outlines a host of potential war crimes cases during the attack, in which some 1,200 people were killed and 251 were taken hostage.
“It’s impossible for us to put a number on the specific instances [of war crimes],” HRW associate director Belkis Wille said at a news conference announcing the group’s latest report, adding that “there were obviously hundreds on that day.”
The crimes include “deliberate and indiscriminate attacks against civilians and civilian objects; willful 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,” according to the report.
Although Palestinian terror group Hamas is recognized as the orchestrator of the attack, the report listed other armed groups that committed war crimes on October 7, including Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
Wille pointed to the “incredibly organized and coordinated nature” of the assault on cities, kibbutz communities, a music festival and military bases near the border with Gaza.
“Across many attack sites, fighters fired directly at civilians, often at close range, as they tried to flee, and at people who happened to be driving vehicles in the area,” said the report. “They hurled grenades and shot into safe rooms and other shelters and fired rocket-propelled grenades at homes. They set some houses on fire, burning and suffocating people to death, and forcing out others who they then captured or killed.”
HRW said it “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 quoted a team of the UN special representative on sexual violence in conflict who say they interviewed people “who reported witnessing rape and other sexual violence” including “rape and gang rape, in at least three locations.”
