The United Nations called Tuesday for "a clear, transparent and credible investigation" of mass graves uncovered at two major hospitals in war-torn Gaza that were raided by Israeli troops. Credible investigators must have access to the sites, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters and added that more journalists need to be able to work safely in Gaza to report on the facts.
Earlier Tuesday, UN human rights chief Volker Turk said he was "horrified" by the destruction of the Shifa Medical Center in Gaza City and Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis as well as the reported discovery of mass graves in and around the facilities after the Israelis left.
He called for independent and transparent investigations into the deaths, saying that "given the prevailing climate of impunity, this should include international investigators."
"Hospitals are entitled to very special protection under international humanitarian law," Turk said. "And the intentional killing of civilians, detainees and others who are ‘hors de combat’ (incapable of engaging in combat) is a war crime."
US calls reports of mass graves at the hospitals “incredibly troubling”
US State Department spokesman Vedant Patel on Tuesday called the reports of mass graves at the hospitals “incredibly troubling” and said US officials have asked the Israeli government for information.
The Israeli military said its forces exhumed bodies that Palestinians had buried earlier as part of its search for the remains of hostages captured by Hamas during its October 7 attack that triggered the war. The military said bodies were examined in a respectful manner and those not belonging to Israeli hostages were returned to their place.
What the Israeli military says
The Israeli military says it killed or detained hundreds of militants who had taken shelter inside the two hospital complexes, claims that could not be independently verified.
The Palestinian civil defence in the Gaza Strip said Monday that it had uncovered 283 bodies from a temporary burial ground inside the main hospital in Khan Younis that was built when Israeli forces were besieging the facility last month. At the time, people were not able to bury the dead in a cemetery and dug graves in the hospital yard, the group said.
(With inputs from agency)
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