UN inquiry finds genocide in Gaza continuing after ceasefire

A United Nations commission of inquiry has concluded that Israeli authorities and forces continued to commit war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide in the occupied Palestinian territory even after the Gaza ceasefire agreement of October 2025, The Hindu reported.

The finding comes from the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel, in a report submitted to the UN General Assembly on 14 October. It examines killings and serious bodily and mental harm inflicted by Israeli and Palestinian security forces since October 2023, placing them against the backdrop of General Assembly Resolution 181 of 1947, which ended the British Mandate and adopted the partition plan.

The numbers are stark. From 7 October 2023 to 9 October 2025, the report says, more than 72,600 Palestinians were killed in Gaza and more than 1,000 in the West Bank. From 10 October 2025 to 30 September 2026 — that is, after the ceasefire took hold — a further 1,431 Palestinians were killed in Gaza and 137 in the West Bank.

The commission found that patterns of unguided munitions continued after the ceasefire, contradicting a May report by the Board of Peace to the Security Council, which said the truce had largely held and brought "enormous relief to the civilian population". Israeli officials allege the attacks are responses to ceasefire breaches. The report also noted that on 28 May, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had instructed Israeli forces to seize 70% of Gaza.

In legal terms, the commission concluded that Israeli authorities and security forces committed the crimes against humanity of extermination, torture, rape and persecution, and the war crimes of wilful killing and wilfully causing serious injury. It said the killing and harming of children, and sexual and gender-based violence, were among elements establishing specific genocidal intent. Israeli forces were responsible for approximately 95% of killings of Palestinians in the West Bank since October 2023, it found, and personnel were prohibited from using lethal force against Jewish Israelis there.

The report described the perception of Palestinians and a possible Palestinian state as "a threat to Israel and the desire to reduce Palestinian population", saying this fostered a permissive military culture, The Hindu reported.

The commission also criticised the Palestinian Authority, citing its targeting of human rights defenders and widespread sexual and gender-based violence to silence women activists. The report now sits with the General Assembly; the next point to watch is whether member states act on its findings when the session takes them up.