Israel has deliberately displaced Palestinian civilians in Gaza and is responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said in a report.

The 154-page report, "Hopeless, Starving and Besieged," examined Israel's conduct since the war in Gaza broke out last October and found the Israeli government carried out "widespread and systematic" forced displacement. Israel's actions "meet the definition of ethnic cleansing," the authors wrote.

The United States stressed at the United Nations on Tuesday that "there must be no forcible displacement, nor policy of starvation in Gaza" by Israel, warning that it would have grave implications under U.