Israel continued to commit genocide in Gaza after last October's US-brokered ceasefire, the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry said in a report published on Monday — a genocide carried on under a truce, in which Israeli forces kept firing heavy munitions into populated areas while the ceasefire line itself moved deeper into Gaza, expanding Israeli control from 53% to at least 60% of the territory. The report, by the Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel, examined violations against Palestinian children from the start of the war on October 7, 2023 up to September this year, Reuters reported. Israel dismissed the report as part of a "misinformation campaign".
What did the commission find in Gaza during the ceasefire?
That the killing did not stop when the truce was signed. The commission said Israeli authorities had kept committing "genocidal acts with the genocidal intent to destroy, in whole or in part, the Palestinians in Gaza", Reuters and the Associated Press reported. It found that Israeli forces continued using heavy munitions, drones, quadcopters, artillery and sniper fire in densely populated areas during the ceasefire in Gaza, Reuters reported. Israeli fire across the advancing front killed at least 196 Palestinians during the ceasefire period — including 18 women, 32 boys and 11 girls — the commission said, according to AP. A commission report in September last year had already found that Israel had committed genocide in Gaza and that top Israeli officials including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu incited these acts — accusations Israel called scandalous, Reuters reported. Palestinian authorities say more than 74,000 people have been killed in Israel's assault on Gaza, launched after Hamas-led fighters killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel on October 7, 2023, Reuters reported.
How is the ceasefire line becoming a border?
By moving. The "Yellow Line", which was presented as a temporary ceasefire demarcation, is encroaching increasingly into Gaza and becoming a de facto border, reflecting Israel's expanding territorial control of the territory, the commission said, according to Reuters. Since October 2025, when the ceasefire was signed, Israeli forces have gone from controlling 53% of Gaza to at least 60%, the commission said, according to AP. For the Palestinians still living in the shrinking remainder, the truce has meant a front line that advances rather than a war that ends.
What did the report document in the West Bank?
A sharp deterioration running in parallel with Gaza. In its report to the UN Security Council, the commission said the number of Palestinians killed in airstrikes in the West Bank increased from six between 2008 and October 6, 2023 to 254 between October 7, 2023 and September 30, 2026, Reuters reported. Military operations since January 2025 have led to the largest displacement of Palestinians in the West Bank since 1967, with 34,176 Palestinians remaining displaced as of August 2026, the report said. Commission Chair Srinivasan Muralidhar said the intentional killing of Palestinian civilians and destruction of homes in the West Bank formed part of a broader strategy to exterminate and displace Palestinians, Reuters reported. The commission also accused Israeli soldiers and prison guards of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the West Bank, including extermination, torture, rape and other forms of sexual violence and persecution against civilians, and said it had recently documented six cases of sexual violence by guards against male detainees from Gaza at the Sde Teiman military prison, AP reported. AP noted that it could not independently corroborate multiple graphic accounts described in the report of sexual assaults by prison guards and soldiers on Palestinian detainees since October 2023. The commission also faulted the Palestinian Authority, saying it had targeted Palestinians who voice dissenting views and that journalists and human rights defenders had been killed and injured, Reuters reported.
How did Israel respond, and what happens to the findings?
Israel rejected the report outright. The Israeli mission in Geneva said the latest report was part of a misinformation campaign to demonize the State of Israel, and called for the commission's dissolution, Reuters and AP reported. "The attempt to destroy the Jewish state ... continues today through efforts by actors such as the UN Commission of Inquiry to undermine Israel's legitimacy and deny its fundamental right to exist and defend itself," Ambassador Daniel Meron said in a statement, according to Reuters. Israel has long criticized the commission's output and denied accusations of genocide in Gaza and sexual assault by its forces, AP reported. The commission's findings, which seek to document allegations and evidence of crimes in detail, could be used by prosecutors at the International Criminal Court or in other jurisdictions, AP reported.
This report is drawn from Reuters' October 26, 2026 report on the commission's findings, opened and read in full on reuters.com, and the Associated Press' October 26, 2026 report, opened and read in full via the verbatim AP carrier reflector.com. The commission's findings are reported as the commission stated them; Israel's rejection is carried in both sources and is reported alongside. AP's limitation stands as AP stated it: it could not independently corroborate multiple accounts of sexual assault described in the report, and no graphic detail from those accounts is reproduced here.
