UN inquiry accuses Israel of crimes against humanity in the West Bank

A UN inquiry has accused Israeli authorities and forces of crimes against humanity in the West Bank, naming extermination, torture, rape, other sexual violence and persecution. The Independent International Commission of Inquiry published its report on Monday, October 26, days before Israel’s general election, scheduled for Tuesday.

The commission said persecution rested on intersecting discriminatory grounds, including nationality, race and ethnicity. It also upheld its earlier allegation that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza, a charge Israeli authorities reject.

Israel’s immediate response came from its ambassador in Geneva, Daniel Meron, who denounced the findings as an effort to undermine the state’s legitimacy. The report places a sharp focus on conditions in the occupied West Bank, where the commission says the situation has deteriorated since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attacks on Israel and the subsequent war in Gaza.

The commission’s list of alleged crimes includes extermination, torture, rape and persecution. Its report attributes the alleged acts to Israeli authorities and forces and says persecution was based on intersecting discrimination tied to nationality, race and ethnicity.

The findings are allegations by a UN-mandated inquiry, not a judgment by a court. Israel rejected them, as it has the commission’s earlier conclusion about Gaza. Israeli authorities have described the Gaza genocide allegation as “false” and “anti-Semitic”.

In Geneva, the Israeli mission to the UN called the new report a disinformation campaign. Ambassador Daniel Meron said the commission sought to undermine Israel’s legitimacy and its right to exist and defend itself. The exchange sets out the stark divide between the commission’s conclusions and Israel’s response, while placing the report within the UN’s continuing scrutiny of the conflict in Gaza and the West Bank.

The commission recorded 254 Palestinian deaths from air strikes between October 7, 2023, and September 30, 2026. It compared that toll with six Palestinians killed by air strikes from 2008 to October 6, 2023. The figures underline the change in deaths by air strike across the two periods examined.

A separate UN concern emerged earlier this year. On September 4, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights accused Israel of forcibly displacing more than 33,000 Palestinians from three West Bank camps in early 2025. The commissioner raised the possibility that the displacement could amount to a crime against humanity and ethnic cleansing.

Together, the findings and allegations describe a worsening situation in the West Bank since the October 7 attacks and the war in Gaza. The commission’s report places the deaths, displacement and alleged abuses within that broader deterioration.

More than three million Palestinians live in the occupied West Bank alongside about 500,000 Israelis in settlements. Israel has occupied the territory since 1967. The settlements are deemed illegal under international law, and the area has seen heightened violence on both sides.

The commission also pointed to the expansion of settlement activity through a rapid increase in the establishment of outposts since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attacks. The report arrives as Israel approaches a general election scheduled for Tuesday, adding a domestic political backdrop to international scrutiny of the West Bank.

For Switzerland, the immediate connection is Geneva, where Israel’s mission to the UN issued its response and where the report’s findings entered a wider diplomatic debate. The commission, established in 2021, has now made allegations concerning both the West Bank and Gaza. Israeli authorities reject those allegations, while the inquiry stands by its conclusions.