A United Nations sponsored report has found that Jewish settlers are terrorising Palestinians with impunity, attacking children on their way to school and destroying farmers' trees and crops.
John Dugard, a South African lawyer, called the withdrawal of Israeli troops and settlers from the Gaza Strip last summer a positive step.
But the Jewish state effectively controls Gaza through targeted killings and sonic booms from warplanes flying over the region, Dugard said in a report prepared ahead of next week's annual meeting of the 53-member UN Human Rights Commission.
Itzhak Levanon, Israel's UN ambassador in Geneva, rejected Dugard's allegations as "misinformed and inaccurate."
Dugard's report "is guided by a clear political agenda, and bears little relation either to the facts or existing principles of international law," Levanon claimed in a statement.
Dugard said settler violence has been particularly egregious in the West Bank city of Hebron. His 22-page report made no reference to Palestinian terrorism, but said Hebron settlers "terrorise the few Palestinians that have not left the old city and assault and traumatise children on the way to school."
"It seems that settlers are able to terrorise Palestinians and destroy their trees and crops with impunity," Dugard said, adding that he himself was a victim of settler abuse while visiting the city in June 2005.
Next week's meeting comes as UN member states debate replacing the Human Rights Commission with a new body. The commission has been widely criticised for allowing some of the worst rights-offending countries to use their membership to shield each other from condemnation.
Dugard said Israel's actions in Gaza violated the Geneva Conventions on warfare, which forbid "all measures of intimidation or of terrorism" against civilians in time of war.
In the first three months after the Gaza withdrawal, targeted assassinations by Israeli defense forces in the territory killed 18 civilians and injured 81, in addition to killing 15 militants.
Hamas has observed a year-long moratorium on suicide and shooting attacks. But Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz warned yesterday that Hamas leaders, including the incoming Palestinian prime minister, will not be immune from targeted Israeli assassination if the group were to resume attacks.
AP