Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

The United Nations human rights chief called Israel’s intensifying assault on Gaza “tantamount to ethnic cleansing.”

The Israeli military on Monday designated Gaza’s second-largest city a combat zone and ordered all residents to evacuate ahead of an “unprecedented attack,” the latest escalation of Israel’s U.S.-backed genocidal assault on the enclave’s besieged and starving population.

The forced displacement order came as Israeli tanks and troops pushed further into the Gaza Strip as part of a renewed ground assault on the territory, which has been decimated by relentless bombings that began in the aftermath of the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack.

The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor said Monday that the rate of Israeli killings in Gaza has intensified significantly in recent days, crushing any lingering hope of an imminent cease-fire and heightening alarm over the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian emergency on the ground.

The group estimated that more than 300,000 Palestinians were forcibly displaced between May 12 and 18, with that number set to grow with the evacuation of Khan Younis.

“This surge in lethal attacks is part of a broader escalation by the Israeli military, marked by a scorched-earth policy and the systematic destruction of Gaza’s remaining residential areas and infrastructure,” said Euro-Med. “The ongoing campaign—now in its 19th month—has been characterised by mass killings, enforced starvation, and the deliberate dismantling of life-sustaining systems, with the explicit aim of eradicating the Palestinian population in Gaza and eliminating any possibility of return or reconstruction.”

Avichay Adraee, a spokesperson for the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), wrote in a social media post early Monday that “from this moment, Khan Younis governorate will be considered a dangerous combat zone.”

“The IDF will launch an unprecedented attack to destroy the capabilities of terrorist organizations in this area,” Adraee continued. “For your safety, evacuate immediately.”

Video footage posted to social media showed Israeli airstrikes pounding the area and residents scrambling to evacuate their families, many of whom have already been displaced multiple times since late 2023.

“They are literally forcing all of Gazans into a concentration camp in what used to be Rafah in southern Gaza, after destroying it. They are now planning on annihilating Khan Younis,” Elia Ayoub, a researcher based in the United Kingdom, wrote Monday. “There’s never been a genocide so thoroughly documented as it was live-streamed straight to our phones.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is facing an International Criminal Court arrest warrant for war crimes in Gaza, said Monday that the IDF is moving to seize “full control” of the “entire strip” while allowing in “minimal” humanitarian aid—remarks that deepened concerns about Israeli plans to starve out Gaza’s population and annex the territory.

“If this means annexation, it violates international law,” Swedish Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard said in response to Netanyahu’s comments. “Sweden maintains that the territory of Gaza must not be changed or reduced.”

“There needs to be a cease-fire and end to the fighting, and the hostages must be released,” she added. “No more statements or plans from the Israeli government that exacerbate the situation for civilians in Gaza.”

Over the past 24 hours, Israeli airstrikes have killed more than 130 people, bringing the official death toll since October 2023 to 53,486, according to Gaza’s Ministry of Health.

In a statement late last week, United Nations human rights chief Volker Türk warned that Israel’s “latest barrage of bombs” and “methodical destruction of entire neighborhoods”—as well as the cut-off of humanitarian assistance—signals “a push for a permanent demographic shift in Gaza that is in defiance of international law and is tantamount to ethnic cleansing.”

“We must stop the clock on this madness,” said Türk.

Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).