In an unprecedented condemnation, the United Nations human rights chief has formally characterized Israel’s administration of the occupied West Bank as an “apartheid system” that systematically discriminates against Palestinians. The landmark 42-page report from the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, released Wednesday, documents what it describes as intensifying violations of international law through a comprehensive system of racial discrimination and segregation.
UN Rights Chief Volker Turk stated that Israel has created “a systematic asphyxiation of the rights of Palestinians” through decades-long discriminatory practices that have dramatically accelerated since late 2022. The report details how Israeli authorities maintain two distinct legal systems—one for Israeli settlers and another for Palestinians—creating what Turk called “a particularly severe form of racial discrimination and segregation that resembles the kind of apartheid system we have seen before.”
The investigation documents numerous violations including unlawful killings, arbitrary detentions, torture, settlement expansion, land confiscation, movement restrictions, home demolitions, and forcible transfers. Between 2005 and September 2025, Israeli military forces killed 2,321 Palestinians in the West Bank, including 496 children, while during the same period, 205 Israelis were killed.
Since the outbreak of the Gaza conflict in October 2023, the situation has deteriorated significantly with Israeli troops and settlers killing over 1,000 Palestinians in the West Bank alone. The report notes an alarming increase in extrajudicial killings with “almost complete impunity”—of more than 1,500 Palestinian killings recorded between 2017 and 2023, Israeli authorities opened just 112 investigations, resulting in only one conviction.
The document provides harrowing accounts of gratuitous violence, including the shooting of an eight-year-old boy in the back of the head as he ran away and a 15-year-old shot twice in the chest while attempting to light a small device that posed no threat to armored vehicles. Soldiers provided no medical assistance as the children died.
Economic and social impacts are equally severe. Movement restrictions have caused the loss of 306,000 jobs, with unemployment reaching 31.7% for men and 33.7% for women by early 2025. Education has been devastated—85% reduction in traffic across the West Bank affected at least 782,000 students, with girls disproportionately impacted due to safety concerns at checkpoints.
The report also documents systematic torture and sexual violence in detention, including anal rape with objects, forced nudity, and genital beatings. Israeli authorities dismissed the report as “absurd and distorted,” claiming it reflects the UN’s “inherently politically driven fixation on vilifying Israel.”
The UN rights office called on Israel to immediately end all discriminatory laws and practices, dismantle all settlements, evacuate settlers, and respect Palestinian self-determination rights, concluding that the separation and subordination of Palestinians appears “intended to be permanent… to maintain oppression and domination.”