UN News Today 13 March 2025 |

Human Rights Council probe alleges sexual violence against Palestinians by Israeli forces used as ‘method of war’

Senior human rights investigators reporting to the UN Human Rights Council alleged on Thursday that increasing sexual and gender-based violence by Israeli security forces against Palestinians – including children – amounted to war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Representing the Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, human rights lawyer Chris Sidoti (Sigh-doti) also maintained that Israeli forces systematically destroyed sexual and reproductive healthcare facilities across Gaza, including its largest fertility clinic, Al Basma centre:

“There is a question about whether those who were firing the tank shell – because our conclusion is that it was destroyed by a tank shell – knew at that time that it was a fertility clinic. But certainly their commanders knew and the commanders would have known that there were tanks operating within that vicinity and firing on buildings and fired on a healthcare facility that was clearly marked.”

Tank shelling destroyed about 4,000 embryos at the clinic that reportedly assisted 2,000-3,000 patients a month.

Previous reports by the Commission have covered in detail the terror attacks on Israeli villages and towns on 7 and 8 October by Hamas-led Palestinian armed fighters that killed around 1,250 people and left more than 250 taken as hostages back to Gaza.

The Israeli mission in Geneva issued a statement rejecting the Commission’s findings.

Europe, Central Asia report highest number of measles cases in over 25 years

Health news now and Europe and Central Asia have seen the highest number of measles cases in more than 25 years.

Issuing the alert, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the UN World Health Organization (WHO) said that nearly 130,000 cases were reported last year.

That’s double the number reported in 2023 and the highest number since 1997.

Romania reported the highest number of cases across Europe and Central Asia in 2024, with more than 30,000 cases, followed by Kazakhstan, Russia, Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan.

The UN agencies said that more than four in 10 cases were among children under the age of five while six in 10 required hospitalization from the disease, which can be prevented with a vaccine.

Conflict, hunger, poverty impede children’s early development: Türk

Governments everywhere are “letting children down instead of lifting them up” as conflict, hunger, poverty and climate change stymie child development, UN rights chief Volker Türk told Member States in Geneva on Thursday.

During a discussion on early childhood development, the High Commissioner for Human Rights noted that 80 per cent of the human brain is formed in the first three years of life.

Children everywhere lack the tools to stay safe online, he said, while conflict, hunger, poverty, inequality and climate change make them vulnerable.

To survive and thrive, children need “healthcare, nutrition, clean air and water, protection from harm and a sense of nurturing and security”, Mr. Türk insisted:

“Investments in early childhood are one of the smartest ways to achieve sustainable economic development.  Studies indicate that the economic return can be up to 13 times the amount invested. Programmes including South Africa’s Child Support Grant and the Bolsa Familia programme in Brazil can help to ensure that children born into the toughest circumstances can still have the most essential needs covered.”

The UN rights chief warned that children’s access to food, basic sanitation and drinking water remains seriously uneven across the world; two in five lack access even to basic sanitation.

Climate change is also likely to make children and future generations more vulnerable, Mr. Türk told the Council. He noted that in the next 30 years, eight times as many children could be exposed to extreme heat waves and twice as many to extreme wildfires.

Daniel Johnson, UN News

Music composed and produced by Joachim Harris. All rights reserved