United Nations investigators say Israel violated a range of human rights during its invasion of Gaza, including targeting civilians and using a child as a human shield.
The accusations came in reports to the UN Human Rights Council which also called for an urgent end to Israeli restrictions on humanitarian supplies to Gaza and a full international investigation into the conflict.
A UN special representative, Radhika Coomaraswamy, said civilian targets, particularly homes and their occupants, appear to have taken the brunt of the attacks, but schools and medical facilities have also been hit.
The Sri Lankan human rights lawyer visited the region in early February. She cited a long series of incidents to back her charges.
In one, she said, Israeli soldiers shot a father after ordering him out of his house and then opened fire into the room where the rest of the family was sheltering, wounding the mother and three brothers and killing a fourth.
Her comments formed part of a much longer report from nine UN investigators including specialists on the right to health, to food, to adequate housing and education and on summary executions and violence against women.
All cited violations by Israel -- and in some cases by the Hamas Islamic movement that controls Gaza -- during the invasion from 27 December until 17 January which Israeli leaders say was launched to stop rocket attacks by Hamas from the territory.
Palestinian officials say 1,434 people in Gaza, of whom 960 were civilians, were killed in the fighting, a figure Israel contests. The report from the nine gave the total as 1,440, saying of these 431 were children and 114 women.
Israel's ambassador Aharon Leshno Yar said the report wilfully ignores and downplays the terrorist and other threats faced by Israel and the use by Hamas of human shields.
Leshno Yar said the document was part of a pattern of "demonising Israel" in the council.
