Palestinian and solidarity groups criticized United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon for not including Israel on an annual list of major violators of children’s rights released last week.

“By removing Israel’s armed forces from the children’s ‘list of shame,’ Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has provided tacit approval for Israeli forces to continue carrying out grave violations against children with impunity,” said Khaled Quzmar, general director of Defense for Children International Palestine.

Quzmar continued: “It is deplorable that a proven and strong evidence-based accountability tool to protect children during armed conflict has been significantly undermined in an effort to shield Israel from accountability.”

DCIP, a children’s rights group based in Ramallah, published extensive research on Israeli forces’ killings of 547 children in the Gaza Strip during a 51-day military operation last summer, as well as their treatment of child detainees from the West Bank.

“It is deplorable that a proven and strong evidence-based accountability tool to protect children during armed conflict has been significantly undermined in an effort to shield Israel from accountability.”

The deaths made last year a historically lethal one for Palestinian children. Despite omitting Israel from the list in its annex, the U.N. report acknowledged that “the number of Palestinian children killed (557) is the third highest in 2014 after the number of children killed in Afghanistan (710) and Iraq (679), and before Syria (368) and Darfur (197). The number of schools damaged or destroyed in the State of Palestine (at least 543) was the highest recorded number of all situations in 2014.”

DCIP had urged Ban to follow the recommendation of Leila Zerrougui, his special representative for children and armed conflict, by including the Israeli military on the list.

The stated criteria for the list, including parties which “kill or maim children” or “engage in attacks on schools and/or hospitals in situations of armed conflict,” offer no clear grounds to exclude it.

“Ample evidence on persistent grave violations”

Ban’s decision to remove the Israeli military from the list came on the heels of intense pressure from both Israel and the United States.

“There’s a report that may come out any day now where the United Nations is considering the State of Israel in the same category as Boko Haram when it comes to crimes against children,” South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham warned in a speech on U.S. funding for the U.N.

“If that ever happened, if the United Nations embraced a report putting the State of Israel in the same categories with terrorist organizations in terms of the way they treat innocent people, particularly children, that would be an outrage that would not go unanswered,” he said.

By removing Israel’s armed forces from Zerrougui’s draft, Ban both ignored evidence of those forces’ offenses against Palestinian children and increased chances that such offenses would continue, DCIP attorney and international advocacy officer Brad Parker told MintPress News.

“The annual report and its annex, or children’s ‘list of shame,’ has been a strong evidence-based accountability tool proven to help increase protections for children in armed conflict situations,” Parker said. “There is ample evidence on persistent grave violations committed by Israeli forces since at least 2006 that should have triggered listing.”

Other Palestinian human rights groups in the Gaza Strip, many working to assemble International Criminal Court complaints ahead of a June 25 filing date, joined in the condemnation.

Ban’s decision, the Hemaya Center for Human Rights said in a statement, “twists the knife in the heart of every Palestinian parent, making it very clear that in the eyes of the United Nations, Palestinian children’s lives don’t count.”

“If there is no price to pay, then what is to make the Israeli government think twice before launching another such assault in the future?” asked Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor Chairman Ramy Abdu.

Official Palestinian bodies and major factions similarly criticized the move.

“The decision of UN Secretary General is wrong, tasteless and unperceptive,” said Saeb Erekat, a member of the PLO executive committee and chief negotiator. “The international community must cease avoiding its responsibilities in holding Israel accountable. Only justice will bring about a just and lasting peace.”

The “UN decision not to add Israel to blacklist of children’s rights violators rewards Israel for its crimes and gives it licence to commit more,” a tweet from the Hamas movement’s official Twitter account said.

“You have not been fulfilling your mandate”

These are only the latest claims that Ban has twisted the purpose of his office to Israel’s advantage.

At the height of last summer’s offensive, a statement by 129 Palestinian and international organizations and individuals accused him of complicity in Israel’s attacks against the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

“You do not maintain peace and security; nor do you ensure human rights,” they wrote on Aug. 8.

“By reviewing yours (sic) statements, it becomes evident you have not been fulfilling your mandate. In contrary, your statements have not only allowed the continuance of Israel’s killing our people, but also, encouraged States to continue providing Israel with impunity.”

On the same day, Wikileaks released a diplomatic cable apparently showing that Ban had secretly worked with Israel and the U.S. to soften the results of a U.N. investigation into Israel’s conduct during its 2008-2009 offensive against the Gaza Strip.

According to the leaked document, Ban told then-U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice “his staff was working with an Israeli delegation on the text of the cover letter” for the supposedly “independent” Board of Inquiry’s findings.

“Ambassador Rice asked the Secretary-General to be back in touch with her before the letter and summary are released to the Council,” a request with which he complied, speaking to her twice more about “a satisfactory cover letter.”

The discussions seemed to violate Article 100 of the U.N. Charter, which states, “In the performance of their duties the Secretary-General and the staff shall not seek or receive instructions from any government or from any other authority external to the Organization” and obligates member states “to respect the exclusively international character of the responsibilities of the Secretary-General and the staff and not to seek to influence them in the discharge of their responsibilities.”

“Tacit approval to continue committing grave violations”

In 2012, the families of Palestinian political prisoners, angered by Ban’s refusal to meet with them despite his vocal support for a former Israeli prisoner of war, pelted his car with shoes and sticks as he arrived for a visit to the Gaza Strip.

The incident came during a previous hunger strike by celebrated political prisoner Khader Adnan, giving the issue heightened potency.

Leading figures in the Gaza Strip refused his invitation to meet without any detainees’ relatives.

“We express our strong dissatisfaction towards the Secretary-General’s position, especially as he repeatedly met with the family of the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit,” they wrote in a public letter.

Ban’s apparent pattern of bias toward Israel has harmed the U.N.’s reputation, some Palestinians say, making its perception hardly better than that of the European Union or the U.S.

Yet in a sprawling, unwieldy body like the U.N., Ban’s control is limited and various agencies can act outside the agenda set by his leadership.

“Israel was put on two U.N. lists in the past two months, #1 violator of human rights and #1 violator of women’s rights,” Shawn Robinson of the 4PalKids campaign, which pushed for Israel’s inclusion on the “list of shame,” told MintPress. “Being on the third list with respect to children would be difficult for them to refute.”

But Israel’s exclusion from a list with such clear criteria could embolden its future actions against Palestinians, Parker said.

He warned: “The Secretary-General’s decision to place politics above justice and accountability for Palestinian children has provided Israeli forces with tacit approval to continue committing grave violations against children with impunity.”

Read the Report of the Secretary-General on Children and armed conflict: