ISTANBUL
The Gaza Tribunal issued its final findings and “moral judgment” in Istanbul on Sunday, declaring that Israel is perpetrating genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza, and calling on the international community to take urgent measures to stop it.
The statement, delivered on Sunday, concluded four days of public hearings where international jurists, experts and witnesses presented evidence and testimonies on what they described as systematic crimes. It was read out by Christine Chinkin, who chaired the Jury of Conscience.
“The Jury, guided by conscience and informed by international law, does not speak with the authority of states, but when law is silenced by power, conscience must become the final tribunal,” the members said, stressing that the Tribunal “is a civil society response to the continuing lack of accountability for the commission by Israel of genocide in the Gaza Strip. We believe that genocide must be named and documented and that impunity feeds continuing violence throughout the globe.”
“Genocide in Gaza is the concern of all humanity. When states are silent civil society can and must speak out,” the members added.
They said that the Gaza Tribunal's work amounts to “a valuable archive … providing lasting evidence of the truth of the genocide against the Palestinian people,” and expressed solidarity “with the rallies, the marches, the encampments, the flotillas, the strikes and other actions that protest the genocide and states’ unwillingness to hold Israel to account.”
They said that the ruling “offers a counter-narrative to the security narrative Israel and its allies persistently broadcast,” rejecting language that frames Palestinian suffering merely as a humanitarian disaster.
The jury said it had heard extensive evidence of crimes, their causes, and the collusion and complicity of other actors, and the resilience of Palestinians, noting that its findings draw on international law, human rights treaties, the Rome Statute, and “the unyielding belief that every human life has equal worth.”
It emphasized that its statement is grounded in the moral imperatives of natural justice and reiterates and endorses the Sarajevo Declaration adopted in May 2025.
Range of crimes
The jury condemned what it called “an ongoing genocide” and a “coherent and consistent pattern of exterminatory violence” including the intentional mass destruction of residential properties and infrastructure — electricity, water, sanitation — leading to profound cultural loss and community disintegration, the destruction of water supplies, hospitals, schools, universities, cultural sites and agriculture.
It asserted that “the weaponization of hunger, denial of medical care, and forced displacement are not collateral damages of war—they are instruments of collective punishment … and of genocide.” “They are not justified by any claim of military objectives,” the jury added.
Besides genocide, the statement accused Israel of a series of named crimes including:
• Starvation and famine through the deliberate denial of food, water, and systematic destruction of the food system
• Expanded definition of domicide including destruction of memories, hopes and cultural continuity
• Expanded definition of ecocide including catastrophic environmental damage that destroys capacity to survive after bombing ceases
• Deliberate destruction and targeting of healthcare infrastructure and personnel described as “systematic for decades”
• Reprocide, defined as systematic targeting of Palestinian reproductive care to eliminate future lives and the ability to safely reproduce
• Scholasticide, described as the genocide of knowledge through killing, silencing and displacing a generation of students and teachers
• Attacks on journalists, described as targeting “genocide documentation”
• Torture, sexual violence, disappearances, and gender-based violence in multiple contexts
• Politicide — assassination and kidnapping of political and cultural leaders, representatives, activists, and destruction of civic institutions
Accusations of complicity
The report said Western governments — particularly the US — were complicit and in some cases colluding by providing “diplomatic cover, weapons, weapon parts, intelligence, military assistance and training … constituting a breach of their legal duty to prevent genocide and to cooperate to end a violation of a peremptory norm of international law — genocide and the Palestinian right to self-determination.”
“Silence and inaction in the face of genocide are not an option and are other forms of complicity,” it said.
The findings added that media, academic institutions, global supply chains, banks, transportation, high-tech companies and cloud computing services are sustaining the war effort — as well as biased Western media reporting that conforms to political and economic interests of ruling elites — forming what it described as “the political economy of genocide … the highest form of hyper-imperialism of the 21st century.”
The jury argued that global governance was failing to uphold its duties. “The United Nations, paralyzed by the veto and political selectivity, has abdicated its foundational responsibility ‘to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.’”
But it commended the UN Human Rights Council’s special procedures, including Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese and the Commission of Inquiry.
Root causes and demands
The initiative linked current events to “an over-century-long settler-colonial apartheid regime rooted in the supremacist ideology of Zionism … supported by a neo-colonial power structure led by the United States and its allies, and shielded by international complicity.”
It said the genocide is highly visible in real time and carried out with advanced technology against a captive population in a closed territory, and that despite interventions by the International Court of Justice and International Criminal Court, Israel has ignored international judicial processes with impunity and even ICC personnel and NGOs assisting it have been sanctioned by the US.
Among its recommendations were calls:
• To hold all perpetrators, supporters and enablers accountable “politically, militarily, economically and ideologically”
• To suspend Israel from international organizations, particularly the UN
• To activate the Uniting for Peace mechanism to mandate a protective force for the Palestinian territories
It reaffirmed the Palestinians’ right to self-determination and urged “steadfastness and non-displacement,” along with a coordinated global movement to dismantle Zionist structures and isolate the regime across all arenas.
“The struggle is with Zionism as a racist, supremacist, settler-colonial enterprise—not with Jews or Judaism,” the statement said.
It called for a “single rights-based political order grounded in equality, decolonization, restitution, and the unfettered right of return.”
Issuing the findings “in the name of justice, dignity, and peace,” the jury concluded with a final warning: “Silence is not neutral; silence is complicity; neutrality is surrender to evil.”
Gaza Tribunal
The public sessions held at the Istanbul University from Thursday to Sunday marked the culmination of a year-long effort by international jurists, scholars, and civil society representatives to document what they describe as Israel’s crimes against Palestinians.
On Thursday, proceedings built on earlier hearings in Sarajevo and other global forums, consolidating findings across three thematic chambers: International Law; International Relations and World Order; and History, Ethics, and Philosophy.
On Friday, the tribunal heard expert presentations and witness testimonies on starvation, ecocide, domicide, and the targeting of civilians and public infrastructure, including the destruction of health care and education systems.
Saturday’s sessions, meanwhile, centered on complicity, the international system, resistance, and global solidarity efforts.
The final day featured a roundtable discussion offering overall reflections and evaluations of the tribunal’s work.
Presided over by Richard Falk, former UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, the initiative aimed to produce a comprehensive “people’s record” of what participants assert amounts to genocide, apartheid, and systemic violations of international law in Gaza.
