A court in Chile is reviewing a criminal complaint by the Brussels-based Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF) against Rom Kovtun an Israeli sniper who served in Gaza during the regime’s two-year genocidal war on the Palestinian territory, in a case under the principle of universal jurisdiction.
The HRF, named after a five-year-old Palestinian girl killed in Gaza in January 2024, said it filed the complaint before the 8th Guarantee Court in Santiago, seeking the investigation and prosecution of Kovtun.
According to the filing, Kovtun took part in the siege and destruction of Gaza’s largest hospital, al Shifa, between March and April 2024 in Gaza City.
HRF argued that Chilean courts have jurisdiction because the country has incorporated the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) into domestic law, allowing the prosecution of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes regardless of where they were committed.
Dyab Abou Jahjah, director of the Hind Rajab Foundation said: ‘The targeting and destruction of a functioning hospital during a military siege strikes at the core of international humanitarian law.
‘When there is evidence suggesting a sniper’s involvement in such an operation, domestic courts have a duty to act. Universal jurisdiction exists to ensure that grave crimes do not escape scrutiny simply because they were committed abroad,’ he added.
Kovtun’s social media posts revealed he was on holiday in the country, opening the door to ‘universal jurisdiction’, according to legal experts.
The HRF says it has built several cases relying in part on publicly available online material posted by Israeli soldiers themselves.
The foundation has filed a series of legal complaints targeting Israeli forces. While none have yet resulted in a conviction, some countries have taken preliminary steps. Peru, for example, last year opened an investigation into an Israeli soldier over crimes committed in Gaza.
Israeli forces carried out executions of civilians during the assault on the hospital, including children. Medical staff, including doctors and nurses, were detained and allegedly mistreated during the invasion.
After Israeli forces withdrew, hundreds of Palestinian bodies were found in and around the hospital complex, some reportedly showing signs of restraint and abuse.
President Emmanuel Macron has insisted that French citizens fighting for Israel cannot be labelled ‘genociders’, as French judges pursue legal action against nationals also holding Israeli passports who are accused of aiding Israel’s aggression on Gaza.
Macron said that the French who also hold Israeli passports are ‘children of France’ who must never be accused of genocide.
Macron stated: ‘We cannot accept, we must never accept that any of our children, that any French person, be accused of being genocidal.
‘That is impossible, and it represents a reversal of values to which we must not yield.’
On 3rd February, French authorities issued warrants requiring two French women who also hold Israeli passports to appear before an investigating magistrate for ‘complicity in genocide’ over allegations they attempted to block humanitarian aid from entering the besieged Gaza Strip during Israel’s ongoing genocidal aggression.
The warrants, however, do not order their arrest.
The women, born in France and now living in the occupied Palestinian territories, are Nili Kupfer-Naouri, head of the group ‘Israel Is Forever’, and Rachel Touitou, an activist linked to Tsav 9, which is a far right group formed by the families of Israeli settlers who were taken captive in Gaza.
Complaints were filed by the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, Al-Haq and Al-Mezan over direct obstructing of life-saving aid between 2023 and 2025.
- Israeli fire has killed at least two Palestinians in separate incidents across the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, as Israel continues to block thousands of Palestinians from seeking urgent medical attention through the partially-reopened Rafah crossing in its ongoing, more than two-year genocidal war on the enclave.
One child was killed in the northern Strip when an Israeli drone targeted children on their way to check their destroyed homes in the area.
Israeli soldiers opened fire on and killed Muhand Jamal al-Najjar, 20, near the Bani Suheila roundabout east of the city of Khan Younis.
Israeli fire also wounded three Palestinians in al-Mughraqa in the central Strip and the al-Mawasi area of Rafah to the south.
Since the ‘ceasefire’, which Israel has violated on a near-daily basis, took effect in mid-October, more than 600 Palestinians have been killed and more than 1,600 wounded, according to the latest figures released by the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
The latest deaths come as the Israeli military maintains its blockade on Palestinians looking to exit Gaza via the Rafah crossing to Egypt for medical care.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has tallied a total of 260 patients leaving Gaza since the first day of reopening two and a half weeks ago, the office told Al Jazeera on Wednesday – a small fraction of the roughly 18,500 people who desperately require evacuation.
The figure even falls short of an earlier promise from an Egyptian border official that at least 50 Palestinians would cross in each direction starting from the first day. Instead, just five patients were permitted to leave.
Human rights and medical groups, including the World Health Organisation (WHO), have repeatedly called for Palestinians to be able to access critical care outside Gaza.
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus wrote on social media earlier this month that the body wanted to see an ‘immediate reopening of the medical referral route to the West Bank, including East Jerusalem’, and for more countries to accept patients for specialised care not available in the Strip.
The rate of return to Gaza through the Rafah checkpoint has also been slow: 269 people had passed into Gaza as of February 11, OCHA said in its latest report.
One recent batch – made up of 41 people who were transported to Nasser Medical Complex – said Israeli soldiers subjected them to humiliating physical searches and intense interrogations, an Al Jazeera team reported.
Returnees have previously recounted being blindfolded during hours of political interrogations and psychological pressure before being allowed to reenter Gaza.
- More than 80 UN member states and several organisations on Tuesday condemned ‘unilateral’ Israeli decisions aimed at expanding Israel’s ‘unlawful presence’ in the occupied West Bank.
Delivering a statement at a news conference at UN headquarters in New York, Palestine’s UN envoy Riyad Mansour said: ‘I have the honour to deliver the following statement on behalf of 80 States and a number of organisations on the latest Israeli decisions regarding the occupied West Bank.
‘We strongly condemn unilateral Israeli decisions and measures aimed at expanding Israel’s unlawful presence in the West Bank.
‘Such decisions are contrary to Israel’s obligations under international law and must be immediately reversed.
‘Our strong opposition to any form of annexation.’
The group reiterated its rejection of ‘all measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem’.
‘Such measures violate international law, undermine the ongoing efforts for peace and stability in the region, run counter to the Comprehensive Plan, and jeopardise the prospect of reaching a peace agreement ending the conflict,’ the statement said.
The countries also reaffirmed their commitment, reflected in the New York Declaration, ‘to take concrete measures, in accordance with international law’, and in line with relevant UN resolutions and the July 2024 advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which declared Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory illegal and called for the evacuation of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Israel has intensified military operations in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, since launching its war on the Gaza Strip in October 2023.
The operations have included killings, arrests, displacement and settlement expansion, according to Palestinian officials, who say the measures aim to impose new realities on the ground.
At least 1,114 Palestinians have since been killed, 11,500 wounded and 22,000 arrested in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, according to official Palestinian data.
According to Palestinian media sources, Israeli forces on Wednesday stormed the Harayek area of al-Khalil City south of Jerusalem, adjacent to the illegal Haggai settlement, and used bulldozers to demolish a block of flats belonging to the Salhab family.
The demolition proceeded despite the family holding all the documents and legal papers, including a land deed proving their ownership of the property. They had already filed a formal objection to the demolition orders with an Israeli court.
