Palestinian women living at makeshift tents struggle to survive under harsh conditions in Khan Yunis and Bureij Camp, Gaza Strip, March 7, 2025. /VCG

Israel carried out "genocidal acts" against Palestinians by systematically destroying women's healthcare facilities during the conflict in Gaza, and used sexual violence as a war strategy, United Nations experts said in a new report on Thursday.

Israel's permanent mission to the UN in Geneva described allegations in the report as unfounded, bias, and lacking credibility.

"Israeli authorities have destroyed in part the reproductive capacity of the Palestinians in Gaza as a group, including by imposing measures intended to prevent births, one of the categories of genocidal acts in the Rome Statute and the Genocide Convention," said the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel.

Those actions, in addition to a surge in maternity deaths due to restricted access to medical supplies, amounted to the crime against humanity of extermination, the commission said.

The report accused Israel's security forces of using forced public stripping and sexual assault as part of their standard operating procedures to punish Palestinians following the Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel in October 2023.

Israel rejected the accusations.

"The IDF (Israeli Defense Force) has concrete directives ... and policies which unequivocally prohibit such misconduct", the permanent mission to the UN in Geneva responded in a statement, adding that its review processes are in line with international standards.