“Thirst as a weapon”: UN experts condemn Israel’s deliberate dehydration and starvation of the Palestinian people

29 July 2025

GENEVA  – UN experts* today expressed alarm at Israel’s deliberate withholding of access to safe drinking water from Palestinians in Gaza, calling it a serious violation of international law and a crime against humanity.

“Israel is using thirst as a weapon to kill Palestinians,” the experts said. “Cutting off water and food is a silent but lethal bomb that kills mostly children and babies. The sight of infants dying in their mothers’ arms is unbearable. How can world leaders sleep while this suffering continues?”

“This catastrophe was not only predictable; it was predicted. Israel’s blockade and destruction of civilian infrastructure has left most of Gaza’s two million residents displaced and without access to the minimum vital amount of drinking water,” the experts said. This has led to deaths and widespread illness caused by water pollution, and a lack of sanitation and hygiene.

Since October 2023, Israel’s military operations have repeatedly targeted water facilities, wells, pipelines, desalination units, and sewage systems. Eighty-nine per cent of Gaza's water and sanitation infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed by Israel’s forces, leaving over 90 per cent of households water insecure.

“Israel’s acts right now in Gaza are barbaric, and the related actions of Government officials constitute crimes under the Rome Statute: extermination is committed by cutting off the supply of medicine, food and water,” the experts said.

“These intentional, widespread and systematic attacks against Palestinians are a deliberate infliction of conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of a population – another act of genocide.”

In its Advisory Opinion of 9 July 2024... READ MORE  https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/07/thirst-weapon-un-experts-condemn-israels-deliberate-dehydration-and

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