A new report by the Palestinian Feminist Collective details the destruction of health facilities and the environment, as well as the execution of mothers and children.
Written by: Oscar Rickett
Israel has been committing „reproductive genocide” against the Palestinian people for decades, destroying medical facilities, executing women and children, and degrading living conditions to the point of leading to infertility, a new report claims.
According to a report by the Palestinian Feminist Collective, this practice has accelerated since Israel began its genocide in Gaza after October 7, 2023, with the intention of making it impossible for Palestinian life to continue.
Last week, the top UN body investigating Palestinian and Israeli violations concluded that Israeli forces have deliberately targeted Palestinian children as a central element of their assault on Gaza. The UN report examined the full range of harms inflicted on children, from precision strikes by snipers and drones to torture of detainees, reproductive violence and the destruction of schools and hospitals.
According to the UN, Israel has killed more than 21,000 Palestinian children since October 2023, and another 5,160 are believed to be buried under the rubble. By October 2024, at least 15,000 children had lost their mothers.
In one case documented by the UN, the cutting off of power to the al-Nasr Children's Hospital by Israeli forces led to the deaths of four infants, whose decomposing bodies were later found still connected to life-support machines that were no longer functioning.
At the start of the genocide, the UN estimated that there were 50,000 pregnant women in Gaza, giving birth to 5,500 babies a month. Many needed emergency care that the Israeli military made impossible. Miscarriages increased by more than 300 percent as widespread malnutrition, anemia, and prenatal vitamin deficiencies exacerbated the risk of premature birth, low birth weight, and fatal hemorrhage during childbirth.
„"A predatory state"”
The 188-page, „A Predatory State: Israel’s Systemic Sexualized and Gender-Based Violence Against Palestinians” The report, which was supported by Progressive International, notes that as the Israelis cut off clean water, sanitary products and basic supplies, many Palestinian women „resorted to homemade pads or took birth control pills to stop their periods.”.
The report, based on research conducted between December 2025 and April 2026, summarizes testimonies from survivors and witnesses, classified Israeli archives, Palestinian oral histories, academic research, documents, and international reports.
„Palestinian mothers in Gaza are left with the inhuman task of giving birth and caring for their children” – writes the Palestinian Feminist Collective.
In Gaza, bombed hospitals lack fuel, electricity, anesthesia, or sterile equipment, forcing Palestinian women to give birth in overcrowded shelters, homes, or on the streets. International doctors have described the horror of performing surgeries, including cesarean sections, without anesthesia. New mothers are denied access to basic items such as diapers, food, water, or formula.
The report says that Israel’s assault on Gaza is working in part „through the systematic destruction of reproductive health facilities and other everyday infrastructure that make Palestinian life precarious, if not impossible.” Israel has destroyed maternity wards and IVF clinics. The weapons used by the military, such as white phosphorus, „will have long-term, intergenerational effects on fertility.”.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinian mothers have been left as sole caregivers for their families as widows or partners of political prisoners, while thousands have been separated from their families by systematic displacement and imprisonment.
Murdered mothers
The report highlights the cases of Rania Abu Anza and Jomana Arafa. Abu Anza gave birth to twins, Naeim and Wissam, after ten years of IVF treatment. Both babies died in an Israeli airstrike in March 2024, along with their father. Arafa died two days after giving birth to her twins, along with her babies and her own mother, while seeking refuge in an Israeli „humanitarian zone.”.
These cases are described in the report as „just the tip of the iceberg.” A UN investigation found that the Israeli military systematically targeted maternity wards, fertility clinics, and neonatal intensive care units. For the first time in Gaza’s history, famine broke out due to severe Israeli restrictions on food supplies.
The report points to historical Israeli fears about Palestinian reproduction. It cites a 1995 incident when Israeli geographer Arnon Soffer warned that „the most serious threat Israel faces is the womb of Arab women,” arguing that the Palestinian birth rate threatened Israel’s national security. Golda Meir, Israeli Prime Minister (1969–1974), noted that her nightmares stemmed from the knowledge that „another Palestinian child would be born.”.
Responding to the report, Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Palestinian Territories, said: „This is an indictment of a system that has transformed Palestinian life – bodies, homes, families, reproductive existence, even the dead – into instruments of control and domination. It is time to understand that crimes against Palestinians are not isolated abuses, but a system of oppression and erasure.”
