Militants and police executed and maimed dozens of Palestinians in Gaza, UN report says

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — Hamas militants and police units in Gaza beat, maimed and publicly executed dozens of Palestinians during its war with Israel in acts amounting to war crimes, according to a United Nations report released Tuesday.

The U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights' report documented hundreds of cases of extrajudicial punishment in the war-ravaged territory, which it said were often publicized during and afterward to instill fear in the populace.

“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,” it said.

The commission found that Hamas-affiliated militants and police forces were involved in nearly one-fourth of the 249 documented cases — including 108 deaths — from August 2024 to January 2026. The commission specifically investigated cases involving Hamas-affiliated forces but also counted ones attributed to other armed groups.

Representatives for Hamas did not respond to questions about the report’s allegations.

Hamas has run Gaza for nearly two decades since seizing control of the territory from the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority. Since an October ceasefire halted more than two years of full-scale war with Israel, Hamas has steadily reconsolidated its control over the areas of Gaza that it still governs.

According to Tuesday's report, rather than being imposed through courts or judges, the punishments were carried out by Hamas' military wing and police units.

Srinivasan Muralidhar, the U.N. commission’s chair, said the abuses documented in Gaza were occurring in an “environment engineered by Israel,” where “Hamas-affiliated forces have exploited the vacuum created by relentless Israeli attacks and widespread destruction.

Those targeted included anti-Hamas activists and members of Israel-backed clans and armed groups that emerged in areas where Hamas’ grip weakened during the war, which has killed nearly 73,000 Palestinians, according to the territory's Health Ministry.

The U.N. report cites executions recorded on video, including one of three blindfolded men who were shot by masked men outside Shifa Hospital in September 2025 before a crowd. It describes another public execution a month later, when eight men were dragged into a public square in Gaza City and shot. Both groups were accused of being spies, traitors and collaborators, according to the report.

The instances, the commission said, "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."

Others targeted with beatings and forms of public shaming — including children — were accused of theft, drug trafficking or illegally selling tobacco.

Witnesses also told the commission that the punishments were carried out in hospital compounds, including the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis. However, it concluded that activities documented — which don’t target Israel — don’t forfeit hospitals’ protection under international law. Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of using schools, hospitals and mosques to stage operations.

The report is the latest from the world body, which last year accused Israel of committing genocide, using starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza and of ethnic cleansing in the West Bank — allegations that Israel strenuously denies. Israel has repeatedly accused the U.N. rights office of anti-Israel bias.

The U.N. report also criticized a growing wave of violence by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank, saying it “functions 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 respond to questions about the allegations.

Since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, 1,098 Palestinians — including at least 240 children — have been killed by Israeli troops or settlers in the occupied West Bank, according to U.N. figures. Amid the violence, Bedouin communities in rural areas have been driven from their land as new Israeli outposts have sprung up and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s pro-settler government has moved to legalize others.