AI Calls for ICC Probe into Israeli Attacks Killing 44 Palestinian Civilians

The attacks included a strike that killed children playing foosball at the Maghazi refugee camp on April 16 and two strikes on residential buildings in Rafah on April 19 and 20, the rights group said.

In all three cases, there was no evidence of military targets in or around the affected locations and no indication of prior warning, it said.

“Our findings offer crucial evidence of unlawful attacks by the Israeli military as the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court applies for arrest warrants for senior Israeli and Hamas officials, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. As the Israeli military continues to escalate its ground incursion in Rafah, these cases also illustrate the urgent need for an immediate ceasefire,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty International’s senior director for research, advocacy, policy and campaigns.

“The cases documented here illustrate a clear pattern of attacks over the past seven months in which the Israeli military has flouted international law, killing Palestinian civilians with total impunity and displaying a callous disregard for human lives.”

Meanwhile, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said it is “horrified” by the Israeli attack on Sunday on the camp for displaced Palestinians in Tal as-Sultan and that the “deadly event” shows once again that nowhere is safe in Gaza.

The medical charity said more than 15 dead bodies and dozens of wounded people were brought to a trauma stabilization point that it supports in Gaza.

It reiterated its call for an immediate and sustained ceasefire.

Balakrishnan Rajagopal, the UN special rapporteur on the right to housing, has called for action against Israel in the wake of its latest attack on displaced Palestinians in Rafah.

“Attacking women and children while they cower in their shelters in Rafah is a monstrous atrocity. We need concerted global action to stop Israel’s actions now,” he said in a post on X.

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territory, described Israel’s attack on the tent camp in Rafah as “more horror.”

“This cruelty, along with blatant defiance of international law and system, is unacceptable,” she said in a post on X. “The #GazaGenocide will not easily end without external pressure: Israel must face sanctions, justice, suspension of agreements, trade, partnership and investments, as well as participation in international forums.”

Triestino Mariniello, a lawyer with the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCGR), told Al Jazeera that Israel’s latest attack on an area designated as a safe zone in Rafah shows that Israel is still ignoring the ICJ.

“These horrible images that arrive from Rafah show that the Israeli authorities are completely disregarding the binding, provisional measures issued by the International Court of Justice, which just two days ago ordered Israel to stop any military action in Rafah,” he said.

Mariniello added that Israel’s “completely arbitrary” designation of safe zones could amount to a “crime against humanity of forcible transfer of a population, considering there is no safe place in Gaza.”

He said that it was now up to the UN Security Council to ensure Israel follows the ICJ’s rulings.

“The urgent action by the international community should be an immediate session by the Security Council. This should have happened already.”

A spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has condemned the Israeli attack on Tal as-Sultan as a “massacre that exceeds all boundaries,” according to the Wafa news agency.

Nabil Abu Rudeineh “stressed the urgent need for an intervention to stop the crimes committed against the Palestinian people immediately” and said the “heinous massacre” is a challenge to international orders, including “the lucid and candid ruling of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordering Israel to cease its military offensive against the city of Rafah and provide protection to the Palestinian people.”

Abu Rudeineh said he held the administration of US President Biden responsible for Israeli crimes and demanded that Washington “compel Israel to stop the madness and genocide it is committing in Gaza.”

The only hospital in Rafah has only eight beds and lacks an ICU unit, leaving it incapable of treating all severe injuries.

Rafah has been targeted again this morning, and there are already injuries being treated in the hospitals.

Israeli forces continue their attacks across the Gaza Strip, even as outrage grows over the bombing that killed 40 people in Rafah.

Al Jazeera Arabic reported that at least five Palestinians were killed and several others wounded after Israeli jets bombed the home of the al-Batran family in the Zarqa area, north of Gaza City.

The victims included a child and her pregnant mother.

Another Israeli attack on the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip killed at least one Palestinian, according to AJA reports.