A United Nations investigation released Tuesday reveals that Hamas fighters and security forces carried out brutal acts against their own people in Gaza, including public executions and torture that constitute war crimes.
The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights documented hundreds of instances of extrajudicial punishment throughout the war-torn region, many of which were made public to terrorize the population.
“These cases involved executions, kneecapping, bone-breaking with metal pipes or cement bricks and beatings and were framed by the perpetrators as punishments for alleged collaboration with Israel, looting humanitarian aid, theft, drug-related offenses or affiliations with internal rivals,” the report stated.
Investigators determined that Hamas-linked fighters and law enforcement participated in nearly 25% of the 249 documented incidents — which resulted in 108 fatalities — occurring between August 2024 and January 2026. While the investigation focused on Hamas-connected forces, it also recorded cases involving other militant organizations.
Hamas officials did not provide responses when asked about the report’s findings.
For almost twenty years, Hamas has maintained control over Gaza after taking the territory from the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority. Following an October ceasefire that ended more than two years of intense fighting with Israel, Hamas has been working to restore its authority in the parts of Gaza it continues to control.
The Tuesday report indicates that instead of using proper legal proceedings with courts and judges, the punishments were administered by Hamas’ armed forces and law enforcement divisions.
Srinivasan Muralidhar, who chairs the UN commission, stated that the documented abuses in Gaza occurred in an “environment engineered by Israel,” where “Hamas-affiliated forces have exploited the vacuum created by relentless Israeli attacks and widespread destruction.
Victims included opposition activists and members of Israeli-supported clans and armed factions that gained influence in areas where Hamas’ authority diminished during the conflict, which has resulted in nearly 73,000 Palestinian deaths according to the territory’s Health Ministry.
The UN investigation references filmed executions, including footage of three men with covered eyes who were killed by masked gunmen outside Shifa Hospital in September 2025 while onlookers watched. The document describes another public killing one month afterward, when eight individuals were pulled into a Gaza City plaza and shot. Both incidents involved people labeled as spies, traitors and collaborators, the report noted.
These events, the commission determined, “amount to the war crime of murder and to a violation of international humanitarian law and international human rights law, including the right to life, the right to liberty and security and the right to a fair trial.”
Additional targets of physical violence and public humiliation — including minors — faced accusations of stealing, narcotics trafficking or unauthorized tobacco sales.
Testimony from witnesses informed the commission that punishments occurred within medical facilities, including the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis. Nevertheless, it determined that the documented activities — which don’t target Israel — don’t eliminate hospitals’ protection under international law. Israel has consistently claimed that Hamas operates from schools, hospitals and religious buildings.
This report represents the most recent from the international organization, which previously accused Israel of genocide, weaponizing starvation in Gaza and ethnic cleansing in the West Bank — charges that Israel firmly rejects. Israel has consistently claimed the UN rights office demonstrates anti-Israel prejudice.
The UN document also condemned increasing violence by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank, describing it as functioning “as a means of implementing Israeli state policy, with both the state and violent settler groups working toward the same strategic objectives: entrenchment of Israeli settlements, annexation of Palestinian territory and displacement of Palestinians from their land.”
Israel’s Foreign Ministry did not provide responses regarding these accusations.
Since the Israel-Hamas conflict began, 1,098 Palestinians — including no fewer than 240 children — have died at the hands of Israeli forces or settlers in the occupied West Bank, based on UN statistics. During this violence, Bedouin communities in remote regions have been forced from their homes as new Israeli settlements have emerged and the government has worked to authorize additional ones.
