Palestinian officials are accusing Israeli forces of carrying out “execution-style” killings in Gaza after the discovery of a mass grave containing at least 30 decomposing bodies. Some of the victims were blindfolded with their hands tied behind their backs with zip ties. The bodies were found on the grounds of a school in Beit Lahia. Al Jazeera spoke to one man who helped discover the bodies. Palestinian man: “Inside the schoolyard, we were shocked to find the dead bodies. Those are Palestinian civilians, blindfolded and handcuffed at the back. The dead bodies were kept inside black plastic bags.” The discovery of the mass grave comes as the death toll in Gaza has topped 27,000. At least another 66,000 have been injured. The group Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor is now estimating that more than 25,000 Palestinian children have lost one or both parents in Gaza over the past four months.

More video and eyewitness info on Al Jazeera so far

Also reported on Common Dreams and Middle East Eye.

I haven’t found any reports of any independent investigations yet, hopefully they are underway

  • @HappycamperNZEnglish
    -5•10 months ago

    By this point honestly I don’t know. The quality of information that gets to the public, the bias and propaganda from both sides, even the mass bot account in lemmy.world that downvote everything not anti Israeli tells me there is alot of information missing.

    Are we looking at individuals actions, groups of people, or a systematic process? The amount of suppressed information and incorrect reporting makes the latter appear to be all there is, but the reality is somewhere in the range.

    Could it be a genocide - yes. Are there massive questions that need to be asked - absolutely. Have both sides committed crimes against humanity - very likely. Is it enough for media to be screaming genocide, make a biased article to inflame the masses without checking the facts - no.

    • @WaxedWookieEnglish
      3•10 months ago

      What definition of genocide are you using? There’s no way to credibly dispute the fact that Israel’s actions comfortably meet both the UN and dictionary definitions.

      Do you have any thoughts on my question about the meaningful differentiation between Novemberpogrome-era Nazi Germany and modern Israel?

      • @HappycamperNZEnglish
        -2•10 months ago

        UN definition

        • proven attempt to physically destroy a national, ethnical, racist or religious group.

        The key difference being we are seeing incidents of killing of civilians - either in conflict (expected) or execution (not expectedin conflict). What we aren’t seeing is a focused attempt at destroying the entire group - 10 here, mostly men, building destroyed there - or clear instructions to destroy the group. Quality reporting is showing individual incidents, mass propaganda and biased articles are calling it genocide.

        No sorry, I cant comment on the difference as that wasn’t my area of study - mine was surface level Syria, Ukraine, Rwanda and War crime definitions, causes and responses. Id be limited to what the other poster said - one spoke German.

        • @WaxedWookieEnglish
          7•10 months ago

          Here’s the full UN definition:

          A mental element: the "intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such"; and
A physical element, which includes the following five acts, enumerated exhaustively:
    Killing members of the group
    Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group
    Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part
    Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group
    Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group

          A major portion of the Palestinian territory has been flattened, and supplies to rebuild have been blocked, people can’t return, and are kept in concentration camp conditions. Israel have killed more civilians than the total number of Hamas members in existence, and are showing no signs of “progress” - let alone slowing down. There’s also the small fact that they funded the rise of Hamas over the secular moderates - seemingly to create the pretext for the genocide they’re now committing. Tens of thousands of dead isn’t isolated incidents - particularly when they’re just stating their genocidal intent. Here’s some relevant quotes… I can provide admission that they were funding Hamas too if you’d like.

          Prime Minister Netanyahu

          They (Israel/IDF) are committed to completely eliminating this evil from the world,”

          and

          You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible. And we do remember.

          and

          I don’t call them human animals because that would be insulting to animals

          “Defence” minister Galant

          We are fighting human animals, and we are acting accordingly

          Kallner…

          Nakba to the enemy now! This day is our Pearl Harbour. We will still learn the lessons. Right now, one goal: Nakba! A Nakba that will overshadow the Nakba of 48. A Nakba in Gaza and a Nakba for anyone who dares to join!

          Atbaryan…

          erasing all of Gaza from the face of the Earth. Gaza needs to be wiped out.

          Halevi…

          goals for this victory. One, there is no more Muslim land in the land of Israel. After we make it the land of Israel, Gaza should be left as a monument, like Sodom.”

          If someone tells you they want to commit a genocide before killing tens of thousands of civilians in a few months while subjugating the entire population they’ve said they want to exterminate, I think it’s safe to believe them.