Human Rights Watch said in a report released Thursday that Israel's repeated evacuation orders in Gaza amount to the "war crime of forcible transfer", and to "ethnic cleansing" in parts of the Palestinian territory.
"Human Rights Watch has amassed evidence that Israeli officials are... committing the war crime of forcible transfer," the report said.
"Israel's actions appear to also meet the definition of ethnic cleansing" in the areas where Palestinians will not be able to return, HRW added.
Nadia Hardman, an HRW researcher, noted the 172-page report's findings are based on interviews with displaced Gazans, satellite imagery, and public reporting conducted until August 2024.
Although Israel says the displacement is justified for civilians' safety or by military imperatives, Hardman said that "Israel cannot simply rely on the presence of armed groups to justify the displacement of civilians".
"Israel would have to demonstrate in every instance that displacement of civilians was the only option", to fully comply with international humanitarian law.
According to the United Nations, 1.9 million Palestinians were displaced in Gaza as of October 2024. Before the start of the war on October 7, 2023, the official population figure for the territory was 2.4 million inhabitants.
"Systematically rendering large parts of Gaza uninhabitable... in some cases permanently... amounts to ethnic cleansing," Ahmed Benchemsi, spokesman for HRW's Middle East division said in a press briefing.
The HRW report pointed in particular to the Philadelphi and Netzarim corridors, running along the Egyptian border and cutting Gaza along its east-west axis respectively, which have been "razed, extended, and cleared", by Israel's army to create buffer zones and security corridors.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly insisted that Israeli forces must retain long-term control over the Philadelphi Corridor.
Hardman said Israeli forces have turned the central Netzarim corridor, between Gaza City and Wadi Gaza, into a buffer zone four kilometres (2.5 miles) wide mostly cleared of buildings.
The report excludes developments in the war since August 2024, particularly an intense Israeli offensive in northern Gaza since early October 2024.
The operation has forced the displacement of at least 100,000 people from the Palestinian territory's far north to Gaza City and surrounding areas, UN Palestinian refugee agency spokeswoman Louise Wateridge told AFP.
Ragheb al-Rubaiya, a 63-year-old Palestinian from north Gaza's Jabalia Camp, said to AFP that he had been driven from his home after "bombing started from the air and the tanks, and they drove us out against our will".
"They're destroying everything in Jabalia, and the goal is clear even to the blind: to wipe out the north and cut it off from Gaza," he added.
HRW's report argued "the actions of the Israeli authorities in Gaza are the actions of one ethnic or religious group to remove Palestinians, another ethnic or religious group, from areas within Gaza by violent means".
It pointed to the organised nature of the displacement, and the intention for Israeli forces to ensure affected areas will "remain permanently emptied and cleansed of Palestinians".
