On 9 April 1948, Irgun and Lehi paramilitary forces attacked the Palestinian village of Deir Yassin near Jerusalem, killing over 107 civilians including women and children. Documented by the International Red Cross and Israeli New Historians. The massacre triggered mass flight during the Nakba.

On 29 October 1956, Israeli border police shot dead 49 Palestinian citizens of Israel — returning farm workers — at the entrance to Kafr Qasim village for violating a curfew they were unaware of. The Israeli government later acknowledged the massacre; perpetrators received light sentences and were subsequently pardoned.

Between 16–18 September 1982, Lebanese Phalangist militias entered Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut and massacred between 800 and 3,500 Palestinian and Lebanese Shia civilians while Israeli forces controlled the perimeter. Israel's own Kahan Commission found Defence Minister Ariel Sharon bore personal indirect responsibility.

During Operation Defensive Shield (April 2002), Israeli forces conducted large-scale military operations in Jenin refugee camp, killing 52 Palestinians and demolishing approximately 800 homes — leaving 4,000 people homeless. A UN fact-finding mission was denied access by Israel. Human rights organisations documented unlawful killings and destruction of civilian property.

During weekly demonstrations at the Gaza perimeter fence from March 2018 to December 2019, Israeli forces killed 214 Palestinians — including journalists, paramedics, and children — and injured over 36,100. A UN Independent Commission of Inquiry found reasonable grounds to conclude Israeli forces committed war crimes and crimes against humanity.

During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, over 750,000 Palestinians were expelled or fled — roughly half of the Palestinian Arab population. Some 530+ villages were depopulated or destroyed. 78% of historic Palestine became the State of Israel. UN General Assembly Resolution 194 affirmed the right of refugees to return — a right never implemented by Israel.

During the June 1967 Six-Day War, an additional 300,000+ Palestinians were displaced. Israel assumed military occupation of the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Sinai, and Golan Heights — occupations governed by international humanitarian law that Israel has systematically violated. UNSC Resolution 242 called for Israeli withdrawal; Israel has never fully complied.

Israel has demolished over 55,000 Palestinian structures in occupied territories since 1967, using military orders, administrative permit denials (Palestinians refused permits at a 98% rate in Area C), and punitive demolitions of family homes — the latter a form of collective punishment prohibited under Article 33 of Geneva Convention IV.

Systematic forced evictions in Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan, and Wadi Hilweh — based on 1950s Israeli absentee property laws that apply only to Palestinians, not Jewish Israeli citizens. Israeli Supreme Court rulings have enabled dispossession while creating a two-tiered legal system in East Jerusalem, which Israel unilaterally annexed in violation of international law.

Israel has transferred over 700,000 of its citizens into occupied Palestinian territory in violation of Article 49(6) of Geneva Convention IV. UNSC Resolution 2334 (2016) — adopted unanimously — declared all Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territory a flagrant violation of international law and called on all states not to recognise them.

Israel controls 60% of the West Bank (Area C) under the Oslo Accords, blocking Palestinian construction, economic development, and access to natural resources. Palestinians are denied building permits at a 98% rate in Area C while Israeli settlement construction continues unimpeded. This systematic discrimination creates conditions of forced displacement through bureaucratic means.

The separation barrier — 700 km long, 85% constructed inside the West Bank rather than along the Green Line — was declared illegal by the ICJ in its 2004 Advisory Opinion. The Court found it violates Palestinian rights to self-determination, freedom of movement, rights to work, health, education, and adequate standard of living. Israel refused to comply with the ruling.

Military orders, "state land" declarations, bypass roads, and nature reserve designations are used systematically to confiscate Palestinian land. Over 2.4 million dunams confiscated since 1967. These mechanisms are applied exclusively in ways that benefit Israeli settlers while blocking Palestinian development, constituting a pattern of discriminatory dispossession.

OCHA recorded 1,204 settler attacks causing Palestinian casualties or property damage in 2023 — a record high before October 7. Attacks include arson, vandalism, agricultural destruction, and physical assault. The trend escalated sharply following the formation of Israel's most right-wing government in December 2022, which included settler leaders as ministers.

On 26 February 2023, settlers carried out a coordinated rampage through the Palestinian town of Huwara, burning homes, vehicles, and Palestinian-owned businesses for hours while Israeli military forces stood by and did not intervene. Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich subsequently called for Huwara to be "wiped out." The event was internationally condemned as a pogrom.

According to Israeli human rights organisation Yesh Din, 92% of Israeli Police investigations into settler violence against Palestinians are closed without indictment. Settlers operate under Israeli civil law while Palestinians in the same territory are subject to harsher Israeli military law — a dual legal system that Israeli and international human rights organisations have described as constitutive of apartheid.

As of 2023, over 7,000 Palestinians are held in Israeli prisons (Addameer). This includes over 160 children, over 200 women, and over 1,300 individuals held under administrative detention — detained without charge, without trial, and without access to the evidence against them, under military orders that can be renewed indefinitely.

Administrative detention — detention without charge, trial, or access to the evidence used to justify it — has been used by Israel for over 55 years of occupation under Military Order 1651. Orders are renewable every six months without limit; some Palestinians have been held for years without ever facing charges. UN human rights bodies, including the Human Rights Committee, have repeatedly called for its abolition.

The Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) documents systematic use of stress positions, sleep deprivation, sensory isolation, and hooding during interrogation. Israel's Supreme Court permits "moderate physical pressure" in security cases. The UN Committee Against Torture has repeatedly found Israel in violation of the Convention Against Torture and called for an end to these practices.

Israel is the only country in the world that systematically prosecutes children in military courts. Between 500 and 700 Palestinian children are detained each year. Defence for Children International – Palestine documents night arrests, denial of access to parents and lawyers during interrogation, and coercion into confessions — in violation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Israel demolishes family homes of Palestinians accused (not convicted) of attacks on Israelis as a deterrent — a practice explicitly prohibited as collective punishment under Article 33 of Geneva Convention IV. B'Tselem has documented over 500 punitive demolitions since Israel resumed the practice in 2014, rendering hundreds of family members homeless for acts they did not commit.

Since 1967, Israeli settlers and IDF forces have uprooted over 500,000 Palestinian olive trees — a primary source of Palestinian agricultural livelihood (OCHA). Harvest interference, movement restrictions during harvest season, and military-declared closed areas affect over 80,000 farming families. Olive tree destruction is often accompanied by settler takeover of the cleared land.

Israel controls 87% of West Bank water resources through the Joint Water Committee, which gives Israel effective veto over Palestinian water projects. Palestinians receive an average of 25 litres per person per day — well below the WHO minimum of 50 litres. Israeli settlers in the same territory consume 300+ litres per person per day. Water cisterns and pipelines serving Palestinian communities are periodically vandalised by settlers.

Since 2007, Israel has maintained a comprehensive air, sea, and land blockade on Gaza — controlling who and what enters and exits. The UN, World Bank, and UNCTAD classify this as collective punishment under Article 33 of Geneva Convention IV, imposed on 2.3 million civilians for the political choices of their leaders. The blockade has been described by former British Prime Minister David Cameron as turning Gaza into "a prison camp."

Gaza's GDP per capita in 2023 remains below its 1994 Oslo Accord baseline. Unemployment stands at over 45%; youth unemployment exceeds 60%; over 60% of the population lives in poverty; and 80% depend on humanitarian aid (UNCTAD 2023). UNCTAD estimates Gaza's economy would be 2–3 times larger without the blockade. The economic strangulation is a deliberate policy, not a byproduct of conflict.

Palestinians must obtain Israeli military permits to access their own land in Area C, enter Jerusalem (with the permit denial rate exceeding 90% for many categories), move between parts of the West Bank, and work inside Israel. Permits are used as political pressure instruments — revoked en masse following incidents — and create a permission-based system of movement unique to the Palestinian population, not applicable to Israeli settlers in the same territory.

Palestinian exports must pass through Israeli-controlled crossings, subject to arbitrary delays, restrictions, and seizure. Palestinian agricultural products lose significant market value due to delays. Until recent EU court rulings, Palestinian products from settlements were mislabelled as "Made in Israel" — while genuinely Palestinian goods faced additional scrutiny. UNCTAD estimates the Palestinian economy would be two to three times larger without trade and movement restrictions.

Between 2000 and 2005, Israeli security forces and settlers killed 3,179 Palestinians — compared with 1,010 Israelis killed in the same period (B'Tselem). Palestinian casualties included hundreds of children and bystanders killed at checkpoints. Major incidents include the re-occupation of Palestinian cities (2002) and prolonged siege of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.

Four major Israeli military operations in Gaza between 2008 and 2021: Operation Cast Lead (2008–09), Operation Pillar of Defence (2012), Operation Protective Edge (2014), and Operation Guardian of the Walls (2021). Cumulative Palestinian casualties exceed 4,800 killed and 30,000+ injured. UN independent investigations found evidence of war crimes in all four operations, including attacks on civilians, use of white phosphorus, and attacks on UNRWA facilities.

247 Palestinians were killed in the West Bank in 2022, and 218 more in the first nine months of 2023 — the highest rates since 2006 (B'Tselem). This included large-scale military incursions into Jenin, Nablus, and Tulkarm refugee camps, use of drones and military-grade weapons in civilian areas, and a pattern of killing that UN experts described as executions in some cases.

Veteran Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh was shot and killed by Israeli forces while covering an Israeli military raid in Jenin refugee camp on 11 May 2022. She was wearing a clearly marked press vest. UN, US, and multiple independent investigations concluded she was killed by Israeli fire. No soldier was charged. Her killing was part of a broader pattern: B'Tselem documents dozens of journalists injured or killed by Israeli forces while reporting in occupied territories.