A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
For the first time, two prominent Israeli groups say that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. Now, Israel has repeatedly denied these accusations. In just a few moments, we'll hear from a scholar of urban warfare who has been with the Israel Defense Forces inside Gaza and says no genocide is occurring. But first we'll hear from one of the Israeli organizations making that assessment. B'Tselem is an organization that tracks human rights violations by Israel in the occupied territories. Yuli Novak is the executive director there. She joins me now to share the findings of the report, titled "Our Genocide."
Yuli, thank you for joining us. Really quick, I want to say that the IDF has repeatedly rejected accusations of genocide and said that your report ignores Hamas', quote, "use of civilians as human shields," the abuse of civilian infrastructure for military purposes and its deliberate targeting of Israeli civilians. So given that, Yuli, what has led you to this opposite conclusion that what is happening is indeed genocide?
YULI NOVAK: Hi. So what led us there is to look at reality and what's going on around us. And what we see around us is a policy that Israel is taking into effect in Gaza that has horrific consequences. And alongside that, in official statements of Israeli leaders about the goals of its attack on Gaza. So that lead us to a definite conclusion that what Israel is doing is taking a coordinated and deliberate action to destroy Palestinian society in the Gaza Strip. We can go into that, but I'll just say that is the exact definition of genocide.
MARTÍNEZ: What is those policy statements that you mentioned that would fall under what international law defines as genocide, as intent to destroy in whole or in part a national, racial or religious group?
NOVAK: Yeah. So first of all, I heard your discussion before. And I know the legal discussion is what taking place around the world. And it is super important because justice needs to be done, and perpetrators need to be brought to justice. But having said that, because we are talking about genocide that is happening now, I think that it cannot be a theoretical discussion. What we need to see is, again, what is in front of our eyes, not the specific of lawyers who are arguing among themselves.
And what we see is, first, leaders of Israel from the first days of this attack on Gaza told us what they are about to do and what they're going to send the Israeli army to do. And that is to kill and to destroy the Gaza Strip, and to starve it. They said it. The prime minister of Israel said it. The minister of defense said it. The president of Israel said it. And then we heard it from the commanders, the high-ranking commanders, again and again and again. And then we heard it from the soldiers on the ground.
MARTÍNEZ: But were those statements directed more at Hamas or Palestinians in the Gaza Strip?
NOVAK: No, to target Palestinians. You know, everybody heard about the expression Amalek by now - right? - which Netanyahu used when he talked to the soldiers when he sent them to war. And our defense minister, Gallant, said we are fighting human animals. And our president said there are no civilians. It's not true. It's an entire nation there that is responsible for the crimes of October 7.
Now, as an Israeli, I don't want and I can't take, you know, to undermine or say something about October 7 because it was the scariest day of my life. And it was a real criminal and brutal attack. But what happened since then is that every action that Israel is doing in Gaza is justified by this notion of self-defense. And that is something that we can't accept.
MARTÍNEZ: Can I ask you, if these statements, though, date back to the beginning of the war, we're talking 22 months now, why speak out now?
NOVAK: So, you know, we have been working day and night from the first day this whole thing started. And we have published, as an organization of Israelis and Palestinians who live here, we have published, investigated, documented and published many reports all throughout the past two years. I think what happens now is that as an Israeli and Palestinian organization, we have dozens of Palestinians in our team, both from the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and inside Israel. We had to make sure that we make the sufficient contextual and legal preparation in order to get out with this and in order to do whatever we can in the most effective way to stop it, which is what we believe that each and every person need to do at the moment.
MARTÍNEZ: Now, the report also says that there's a risk that what's alleged to be genocide will not be contained at the Gaza strip, and that Israel may use similar principles or tactics in other places. Can you explain what that means?
NOVAK: Yes, so what we are witnessing, again, in the past 22 months, is a devastating attack on Gaza. But at the same time in the West Bank, we see the same regime, the same system, with the same logic and also a spillover of the practices that we see in Gaza. Now, the violence in the West Bank is on the rise. You know, just yesterday, we lost a very good comrade and friend and activist who lived in South Hebron Hills in the south part of the West Bank.
He was killed by a settler. You can see it on videos. It was in the middle of the day. And this is just one more victim. Close to 1,000 Palestinians killed in the West Bank throughout the past two years either by settlers or backed by the Israeli army, or by the army, most of them by the Israeli army. So when we take into account the fact that there is no local or international mechanism that work to protect Palestinians at the moment, what we are warning of is that the slightest trigger can make the genocide spill over to other areas under Israel control.
MARTÍNEZ: Quickly, what do you say to the argument that war is ugly? It's awful. It's the worst thing you could possibly do to any group of people, but it's not necessarily genocide.
NOVAK: I would say that people should look - all of us should look at history. And in history, most of the genocide that happened throughout history, they had a war in the background. And it was always, always a story of self-defense, a story of existential threat that we have to take care of. In different ways, in different tactics, but it is always the same. A war is not about targeting civilians.
MARTÍNEZ: Yuli Novak is the executive director at B'Tselem. Thank you, Yuli, for your time. In a few minutes, we're going to hear a different view on the war in Gaza from a West Point scholar on urban warfare who has embedded with the IDF several times in the last two years. And you can hear and read different perspectives and analysis of the conflict in the Middle East at npr.org/middleeast.
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