UN inquiry finds Israel committed age-based persecution of Palestinian children in West Bank
Sondos Asem reports in Middle East Eye on 27 October 2026:
Israeli authorities and forces have committed the crime against humanity of age-based persecution against Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank, the UN’s top investigative body on Palestine and Israel has concluded, while also accusing Israel of continuing its genocide in Gaza despite a ceasefire agreement.
In its fifth report to the UN General Assembly, published on Monday, the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, said Israeli forces had “deliberately killed and caused serious bodily and mental harm to Palestinian children on account of their status as Palestinian children”.
The report said the harm inflicted on children “is not incidental or collateral” to the wider violence, but “forms part of a pattern of intentional violence directed against Palestinian children”, amounting to the crime against humanity of persecution.
Between 7 October 2023 and 30 September 2026, Israeli forces killed 1,080 Palestinians in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, among them at least 237 boys and seven girls, and wounded 10,940, according to UN figures cited in the report.
In one case documented by the commission, a seven-month-old baby was killed and both parents were wounded when an Israeli soldier opened fire on their car in Hebron on 5 June 2026.
Video footage showed the father slowing down, stopping and raising his hands before the soldier fired two rounds into the car without warning, shooting the baby in the head. No medical assistance was provided.
The Israeli army said a member of the Yehuda Brigade had fired because the car accelerated towards soldiers. The commission said that at a range of 10 metres, the soldier would have had a clear view of those inside.
In Tammun, in Tubas Governorate, on 15 March 2026, Israeli forces fired on a car carrying a family of six, killing the mother, father and their two youngest sons. The two older sons were wounded and then assaulted by soldiers.
The commission said it was not aware of any effective investigations, disciplinary or judicial measures in any of the cases it examined, and that the absence of accountability “has entrenched a discriminatory system” in which crimes against Palestinian children are “repeatedly committed with impunity”.
The findings come following a damning report by the same commission in June accusing Israeli forces of deliberately targeting Palestinian children as a central element of their genocide in Gaza.
Crimes against humanity
The commission also concluded that Israeli military operations in the West Bank since 7 October 2023, together with settler violence, form a widespread and systematic attack on the civilian population, the constituent element of crimes against humanity.
“The attack requires a high level of coordination and organised planning, indicating the existence of a policy to attack the civilian population,” the report said.
“The Commission finds that the Israeli authorities utilised settler violence to target the Palestinian civilian population, and intended settlers’ conduct to form part of the ‘attack’ against the civilian population.”