The occupation of Palestinian lands by Israel remains the reality that defines the conditions of civil rights in 2025 and conditions on a daily basis in the West Bank and Gaza. The military operations were intensifying due to the escalations in the end of 2024, and as of November 2025, UN agencies reported over 45,000 Palestinian dead. Such circumstances increase limitations on movement, assembly and expression which are the pillars of civil rights evidence in the international human rights law.
According to Addameer, administrative detentions increased by 30 percent in the first half of 2025 with a population of over 10,000 Palestinians in administrative detention. The practice undermined the due process guarantees and hastened the displacement in the Area C where the settlement growth displaced over 2,500 families this year.
Civil Rights Erosion
Roadblocks, checkpoints and barriers keep chopping Palestinian movement with thousands of residents increasing their travelling time by two times in the West Bank. In 2025, Israel had given approval to 12 more outposts consolidating settlement networks that block access to education, medical services, and jobs. According to Palestinian Authority statistics, mobility is restricted among 40 percent of young people especially those traveling to universities.
The blockade became even stricter in the year 2025 and left 2.3 million people of Gaza imprisoned with severe lack of essential services. According to UNRWA over 150,000 new displaced residents were reported in the north of Gaza in October 2025, which caused concerns about the violation of rights related to a good standard of living under the international covenants.
Expression And Assembly
The limitations against protests grew to a great extent. In September, 2025, demonstrations protesting settlement expansion were met with arrests of about 500 people. The media shutdowns were also increased where two Al Jazeera affiliates were closed down under the name of national security. The Human Rights Watch noted over 120 attacks on journalists in the West Bank and Gaza this year.
The freedom of expression online is still questionable. Over 300 Palestinian social media pages have been blocked on the grounds of security-related content, trends marked as specific violations of the rights groups that claim that this was a direct opposition to the safeguard of ICCPR Articles 19.
International Legal Frameworks
Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits the occupation power to change the demographic character of the occupied territories and yet the settlement expansion rose by 15 percent in 2025. In 2024 and then 2025, the occupation is again declared illegal by the advice of the ICJ, and urgent action is called. Its implementation has been pending owing to on-repeated vetoes on related resolutions passed by the UN Security Council.
Resolutions of the UNHRC that were introduced in March 2025 and September 2025 condemned continued violations and demanded mechanisms of accountability. In spite of these statements, some states have arms trade relations with Israel such as exports of over EUR200 million annually by the EU making it hard to implement international humanitarian standards.
Institutional Responses
The UN General Assembly passed a resolution, which demanded a termination of the occupation by 2026 and had 124 votes on its side, 14 against and 43 abstentions. These structural rights violations were documented by Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese who pointed out that there were policies that were akin to apartheid like segregation. Her results led to revision of UN databases which monitor corporate involvement in settlement operations.
To preserve cultural heritage, UNESCO made intervention moves to delist places associated with settlement construction and intervened to save over 50 Palestinian heritage sites in danger of demolitions.
ICC Proceedings
The ICC Prosecutor, Karim Khan, filed applications regarding arrest warrants in May 2025 in connection with the occupation offenses against people who are accused of committing systematic crimes against rights. The formal support of these proceedings was made by more than 60 state parties, but jurisdictional conflict still remains to slack the advancement. The Palestinian civil society organizations focused on symbolic and deterring worth of the ICC involvement and submitted 25 communications to the pertinent treaty organs that addressed torture, arbitrary imprisonment, and forced displacement.
Developments In 2025
The process of rebuilding Gaza is tense with just 10 percent of foreign aid entering the country via Kerem Shalom crossing by November 2025, based on OCHA. The violence in the West Bank intensified greatly, with over 800 settler attacks reported this year and putting pressure on the Palestinian settlements and showing that governance challenges exist in the Palestinian Authority.
In October 2025, the Biden administration sanctioned a EUR3.8 billion aid to Israel which was criticized by the EU parliamentarians, who claimed it circumvented human rights conditionality frameworks. In the meantime, the summit meeting of the Arab League in Riyadh had assured EUR1 billion of legal and diplomatic assistance in international cases in relation to the violation of occupation.
In July 2025, the Knesset of Israel discussed the proposal of the annexation of parts of the Area C of the Gaza Strip which indicated a long-term territorial course of action, despite a global backlash. Meanwhile, pressure from the world civil society increased. By the end of the year 15 universities were implementing divestment measures, making the BDS movement grow its influence.
Regional And Global Repercussions
Jordan suspended several water-sharing agreements due to growing fears of rights abuse, growing regional tension over resource scarcity. South Africa broadened its case to the ICJ on genocides to facilities related with occupation, obtaining preliminary rulings in its favor of further protective steps of Palestinians.
These changes in the law and diplomacy depict how the world is changing in reaction to a conflict that has taken a long time. With the continued violations and more delays in the enforcement of the normative structures, 2025 shows that the differences between the nature of occupation and the capability of the international community to protect the mechanisms are increasing.
Dilemmas between an increase in operations on the ground and an increase in legal attention overseas suggest further inquiry into the direction of global responsibility. It is still unclear whether the renewed diplomatic activities, such as deliberations of a reformed Quartet mechanism, will bring any changes to the existing dynamics, yet the situation on the ground seems to attract the global focus to upcoming alignments and the unresolved conflicts over Palestine civil rights future.