Two recent reports have drawn attention to what human rights organisations and UN investigators describe as one of the defining features of Israel’s assault on Palestinian life: the systematic targeting of Palestinian children.

The first report, published by the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry, examines violations against Palestinian children since the beginning of the genocide in Gaza. The second, by the leading Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem, documents the killing of children by Israeli forces and settlers in the occupied West Bank.

While focused on different contexts, the reports paint a strikingly similar picture. They reveal a pattern in which Palestinian children are routinely killed, injured, displaced, detained and deprived of the conditions necessary for life and development. In this context, the targeting of children emerges as a central feature of Israel’s wider campaign of genocide, ethnic cleansing and forced displacement.

The UN’s findings

The UN independent international commission of inquiry’s report, “The essence of childhood has been destroyed”: Israel’s deliberate targeting of Palestinian children in the Occupied Palestinian Territory since 7 October 2023 , is among the most comprehensive examinations to date of the impact of the ongoing genocide on Palestinian children.

The report notes that at least 20,179 children have been killed and 44,143 more injured as a result of Israeli military action in Gaza since October 2023. It highlights the continued killing of Palestinian children since the October ‘ceasefire’ came into effect, the sharp increase in violence against Palestinian children in the West Bank, and the use of torture, illtreatment and sexual violence against Palestinian children in detention.

The Commission concludes that Israeli security forces and authorities have committed, and are continuing to commit, genocide and other atrocity crimes by deliberately targeting Palestinian children. The report also examines how attacks on healthcare and reproductive facilities have affected newborns’ survival and miscarriages rates, as well as documenting Israel’s destruction of the infrastructure that sustains childhood, including maternity and neonatal services, paediatric healthcare, schools and nurseries. This destruction is interpreted as part of a broader policy of inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza and impose measures intended to prevent births – both clauses of the definition of genocide under the Genocide Convention of 1947.

The Commission’s findings are not limited to Gaza. The report also identifies a sharp escalation in violence against children in the occupied
West Bank. B’Tselem’s latest research provides a detailed account of how that violence is unfolding on the ground.

The killing of Palestinian children in the West Bank

B’Tselem’s report, Unshielded Childhood: Palestinian children and teenagers killed by Israel in the West Bank in 2025, documents how lethal
violence against children has become an entrenched feature of Israel’s military occupation of the West Bank.

Over the period from 7 October 2023 to 7 June 2026, B’Tselem records the killing of 235 Palestinian children by Israeli forces in the West Bank, with a further five killed by Israeli settlers. These deaths are sustained by a culture of near-total impunity. Despite hundreds of Palestinian deaths, the organisation is unaware of a single prosecution being brought in cases involving killings in the West Bank since October 2023.

The report combines statistical evidence with detailed testimony from parents, siblings and witnesses. It describes how military raids, settler violence and the constant threat of attack have become part of daily life for many Palestinian children, with devastating psychological
consequences for children and their families.

Military detention and abuse in Israeli custody

Both reports point to a system of control and punishment that extends into every aspect of Palestinian childhood. One of its clearest
manifestations is Israel’s long-standing use of military detention against children.

Palestinian children remain the only children in the world who are systematically prosecuted in military courts. International law is clear that
children should be detained only as a last resort and for the shortest possible period. Yet Israeli forces continue to conduct mass arrests of Palestinian children, with over 360 children currently held in Israeli military detention.

In research commissioned by Save the Children in 2025, children reported physical abuse, sexual violence, denial of medical care and restrictions on contact with family members while in Israeli custody. These practices form part of a wider form part of a wider system that subjects children to coercion, punishment and trauma from an early age.

An international responsibility

Taken together, the reports present a devastating body of evidence.

Whether through bombardment in Gaza, targeted killings in the West Bank, or the abuse of children in military detention, they reveal how
Palestinian children are routinely subjected to violence while being denied protection, accountability or justice.

The findings demand a response from the international community. States that claim to uphold international law cannot continue to ignore mounting evidence of grave violations against children while maintaining political, military and diplomatic support to Israel without consequence.

Yet the UK government’s recent clash with Save the Children raises serious questions about its commitment to defending Palestinian
children’s rights. Rather than supporting organisations documenting the impact of violence on children, our government has instead chosen to
challenge their efforts to hold power to account.

The protection of children is often invoked as a universal principle. These reports raise a simple but urgent question: does that principle apply
equally to Palestinian children?

* Maggs Mackechnie is on the Committee of Liberal Democrat Friends of Palestine. She is currently Chair of her local party, Canterbury and Coastal Lib Dems.