UN Rights Chief Compares Israeli Practices in West Bank to Apartheid

Fri Jan 09 2026 03:56:13 GMT+0200 (Eastern European Standard Time)

The UN human rights office highlights systemic discrimination against Palestinians in the West Bank, matching it to apartheid policies, while Israel rejects the claims.

In a groundbreaking report, the UN human rights chief has labeled Israel's treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank as 'systemic discrimination' that resembles an apartheid system. The report points to drastic changes in the living conditions for Palestinians and accuses Israel of violating international conventions. The Israeli government has dismissed these claims as distorted while asserting its security needs.

The UN human rights office has issued a report detailing what it calls Israel's 'systemic discrimination' against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and said the situation has 'drastically deteriorated' over the past three years.

Israeli laws, policies, and practices were having an 'asphyxiating impact' on every aspect of daily life for Palestinians and violated an international convention against racial discrimination, it said.

'This is a particularly severe form of racial discrimination and segregation that resembles the kind of apartheid system we have seen before,' High Commissioner Volker Türk warned.

Israel dismissed the accusations as 'absurd and distorted.'

The Israeli mission in Geneva stated that the UN human rights office 'completely ignores fundamental facts that lie at the basis of the [Israeli-Palestinian] conflict.' They asserted the report has an 'inherently politically driven fixation... on vilifying Israel.'

The report claims there are 'reasonable grounds to believe that this separation, segregation, and subordination is intended to be permanent...' indicating that Israeli policies aim to maintain oppression of Palestinians in the West Bank.

Furthermore, the report highlights that every aspect of life for Palestinians is controlled by discriminatory laws, leading to large-scale land confiscation and unjust military court prosecutions.

In a strong statement, Türk emphasized that 'every negative trend documented in the report has not only continued but accelerated,' asserting that the dire situation for Palestinians worsens daily.