Reports

The 105-page report, “‘All My Dreams Have Been Erased’: Israel’s Forced Displacement of Palestinians in the West Bank,” details “Operation Iron Wall,” an Israeli military operation across Jenin, Tulkarem, and Nur Shams refugee camps that began on January 21, 2025, days after a temporary ceasefire was announced in Gaza. Israeli forces issued abrupt orders to civilians to leave their homes, including with loudspeakers mounted on drones. Witnesses said soldiers moved methodically through the camps, storming homes, ransacking properties, interrogating residents, and eventually forcing all families out.

The 81-page report, “‘You Have Arrived in Hell’: Torture and Other Abuses Against Venezuelans in El Salvador’s Mega Prison,” provides a comprehensive account of the treatment of these people in El Salvador. In March and April 2025, the US government sent 252 Venezuelans, including dozens of asylum seekers, to the Center for Terrorism Confinement (Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, CECOT) mega prison in El Salvador, despite credible reports of serious human rights abuses in El Salvador’s prisons. The Venezuelans were subject to refoulement—being sent to where they would face torture or persecution—arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance, torture, inhumane detention conditions and, in some cases, sexual violence.

The 72-page report, “‘Waiting for God’: Flood Displacement and Planned Relocation of Fisherfolk in Saint-Louis, Senegal,” concerns families who lost everything when coastal floods hit their historic fishing communities on the Langue de Barbarie peninsula in 2015 and 2016. They were moved to a site called Khar Yalla, which Senegalese officials acknowledge is unfit for permanent habitation. Authorities have violated their economic, social, and cultural rights through inaction, and left them out of a climate-related, planned relocation benefitting others from their communities.

The 92-page report, “‘You Feel Like Your Life is Over’: Abusive Practices at Three Florida Immigration Detention Centers Since January 2025,” documents that people detained at Krome North Service Processing Center (Krome), Broward Transitional Center (BTC), and the Federal Detention Center (FDC) in Miami have been held in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions and subjected to degrading treatment, and have not been given access to prompt and adequate medical care. The groups also reported the experiences of 17 immigrants in at the three detention facilities since January 20.

The 93-page report, “Hunted From Above: Russia’s Use of Drones to Attack Civilians in Kherson, Ukraine” and an accompanying web feature, document how Russian forces appear to be deliberately or recklessly carrying out drone strikes against civilians and civilian objects with these mostly inexpensive commercially available drones. The attacks spread terror among the civilian population and cause them to fear leaving their homes, and have caused the depopulation of the two areas being targeted in Kherson.

The 54-page report, “Facing the Bulldozers: Iban Indigenous Resistance to the Timber Industry in Sarawak, Malaysia,” details how the Malaysian company Zedtee, part of the Shin Yang Group timber conglomerate, logged in the ancestral territory of the Iban community Rumah Jeffery without their consent. Human Rights Watch found that Zedtee’s conduct did not meet Sarawak’s laws and policies, or the terms of the Malaysian Timber Certification Scheme. Rather than hold Zedtee accountable, the Sarawak state government threatened to arrest protesters and demolish Rumah Jeffery’s village.

The 104-page report, “Punished for Seeking Change: Killings, Enforced Disappearances and Arbitrary Detention Following Venezuela’s 2024 Election,” documents human rights violations against protesters, bystanders, opposition leaders, and critics during post-electoral protests and the months that followed. It implicates Venezuelan authorities and pro-government groups, known as colectivos, in widespread abuses, including killings of protesters and bystanders; enforced disappearances of opposition party members, their relatives, and foreign nationals; arbitrary detention and prosecution, including of children; and torture and ill-treatment of detainees.

The 66-page report, “‘There’s Just No More Land’: Community-led Planned Relocation as Last-resort Adaptation to Sea Level Rise in Solomon Islands,” documents why Walande community members made the difficult decision to relocate after decades of adapting to climate change in place, how they moved without adequate government and international assistance, and how their enjoyment of their economic, social, and cultural rights is still threatened. Human Rights Watch found that the Solomon Islands’ government has taken important steps to support communities facing the most acute impacts of the climate crisis, including by adopting Planned Relocation Guidelines, but has not yet fully put them in operation.

The 67-page report, “Poisonous Profit: Lead Waste Mining and Children’s Right to a Healthy Environment in Kabwe, Zambia,” documents the Zambian government’s issuance of mining and processing licenses for South African, Chinese, and local businesses and its failure to intervene against blatant violations of Zambian environmental and mining law by several mining and processing companies.

The 154-page report, “‘Hopeless, Starving, and Besieged’: Israel’s Forced Displacement of Palestinians in Gaza,” examines how Israeli authorities’ conduct has led to the displacement of over 90 percent of the population of Gaza—1.9 million Palestinians—and the widespread destruction of much of Gaza over the last 13 months. Israeli forces have carried out deliberate, controlled demolitions of homes and civilian infrastructure, including in areas where they have apparent aims of creating “buffer zones” and security “corridors,” from which Palestinians are likely to be permanently displaced. Contrary to claims by Israeli officials, their actions do not comply with the laws of war.

The 83-page report, “‘They Destroyed What Was Inside Us’: Children with Disabilities Amid Israel’s Attacks on Gaza,” documents that children who have acquired a disability and children who already had a disability in Gaza face a precarious security situation and additional difficulties as they struggle to comply with frequent Israeli army evacuation orders and a lack of effective advance warning of attacks. The ongoing siege of Gaza, the unlawful obstruction of humanitarian aid, the use of starvation as a weapon of war, and damage and destruction of hospitals cause disproportionate harm to children with disabilities, who struggle to access desperately needed medical treatment and supplies, assistive devices, food, and water. They are at particular risk of lasting psychological harm.

The 337-page report, “‘You Have to Move!’ The Cruel and Ineffective Criminalization of Unhoused People in Los Angeles,” documents the experiences of people living on the streets and in vehicles, temporary shelters, and parks in Los Angeles, as they struggle to survive while facing criminalization and governmental failures to prioritize eviction prevention or access to permanent housing. Law enforcement and sanitation “sweeps” force unhoused people out of public view, often wasting resources on temporary shelter and punishments that do not address the underlying needs. Tens of thousands of people are living in the streets of Los Angeles; death rates among the unhoused have skyrocketed.

The 77-page report, “‘Worse Than Hell’: Death and Torture at Chad’s Koro Toro Prison,” documents in detail the detention of 72 people, several of whom were tortured or ill-treated at Koro Toro following the October 20 protests in the Chadian capital, N’Djamena, and in several other towns, to protest the two years extension of the transitional government. Security forces fired live ammunition at protesters. Hundreds were then taken to Koro Toro, a high security prison about 600 kilometers away. The transition ended in May 2024 with the election of Gen. Mahamat Idriss Déby.

The 218-page report, “‘The Massalit Will Not Come Home’: Ethnic Cleansing and Crimes Against Humanity in El Geneina, West Darfur, Sudan,” documents that the Rapid Support Forces, an independent military force in armed conflict with the Sudan military, and their allied mainly Arab militias, including the Third-Front Tamazuj, an armed group, targeted the predominantly Massalit neighborhoods of El Geneina in relentless waves of attacks from April to June. Abuses escalated again in early November. The attackers committed other serious abuses such as torture, rape, and looting. More than half a million refugees from West Darfur have fled to Chad since April 2023. As of late October 2023, 75 percent were from El Geneina.