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4d ago

Israeli Rafah ‘Humanitarian City’ Plan Faces War Crime Accusations, Derails Truce Negotiations

Its backing by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prompted unified legal warnings that it could constitute unlawful transfer

People make their way past the rubble of houses in Rafah, Gaza, in January 2025, a day after a now-defunct ceasefire deal in the war between Israel and Hamas came into effect.
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Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said if Palestinians are "deported into the new ‘humanitarian city’, then you can say that this is part of an ethnic cleansing.”

Overview

  • Defense Minister Israel Katz’s proposal would seal more than two million Palestinians inside a closed camp in Rafah, initially housing 600,000 displaced Gazans with no right to exit.
  • Former prime ministers Ehud Olmert and Yair Lapid joined army chief Eyal Zamir in labeling the scheme a concentration camp and warning it risks ethnic cleansing.
  • Sixteen Israeli international law scholars and agencies like UNRWA and Amnesty International have warned the plan could amount to war crimes of unlawful transfer.
  • Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues to support the project, and Israel’s refusal to withdraw from the designated area has become a key obstacle in Qatar-mediated ceasefire talks.
  • The proposal emerges against a backdrop of a devastating Gaza conflict that has killed over 58,000 Palestinians, displaced millions and driven the territory toward famine.