Gaza Ruins War crimes israel
Palestinian women walk near the ruins of houses, which witnesses said were destroyed by Israeli shelling during the most recent conflict between Israel and Hamas, in the east of Gaza City Reuters

Israel has dismissed accusations of war crimes moved against its military by human rights groups as a "decontextualized description of events".

Amnesty International accused the Israeli military of breaching international humanitarian law by carrying out deliberate attacks on civilian buildings during its military operation in Gaza this summer.

"Amnesty in its latest report on this summer's conflict between Israel and Hamas, chooses to focus on monetary losses to Palestinian civilians, rather than investigate the systematic and deliberate firing of rockets and mortars at Israel's civilian population by an internationally-recognised Jihadist terror group," the Israeli embassy in London said.

"The report offers a decontextualized description of events, while relying heavily on testimonies gathered by unnamed local 'fieldworkers,' who are not identified and whose credibility is never questioned".

The embassy also reiterated accusations of bias against Amnesty, which it branded a propaganda tool for Hamas after the publication of another report on Gaza in November.

"The absence of reports on Hamas, coupled with outrageous public statements by Amnesty officials recently, comparing Israel to the terror group ISIL [Islamic State], cast serious doubt as to Amnesty's capacity to play a constructive role in covering this issue," the embassy said.

In its report, the human rights watchdog said Israel bombed four buildings in the last days of Operation Protective Edge in August, not for military purposes but as a form of collective punishment against the Palestinians.

"All the evidence we have shows this large-scale destruction was carried out deliberately and with no military justification," said Philip Luther, director of the Middle East and North Africa programme at Amnesty International.

More than 2,100 Palestinians -- three-quarters of whom were civilians -- were killed during the two months of conflict that ended after a truce was signed last month, according to the United Nations.

The UN has set up a commission of inquiry to investigate possible human rights violations and war crimes committed by Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

Related