On Friday, United Nations Secretary Antonio Guterres voiced concern over reports of the Israeli military using artificial intelligence (AI) in its bombing in Gaza.
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The Israeli magazine +972 published a report showing that Israeli occupation forces use artificial intelligence to identify targets in Gaza, "in some cases with as little as 20 seconds of human oversight," the Insider Paper reported.
"The +972 report claims that 'the Israeli army has marked tens of thousands of Gazans as suspects for assassination, using an AI targeting system with little human oversight and a permissive policy for casualties'," it added.
Reports show that the "Lavender" AI system was used to identify targets, particularly in "densely populated residential areas, resulting in a high level of civilian casualties," UN Secretary Guterres told reporters.
"No part of life-and-death decisions, which impact entire families, should be delegated to the cold calculation of algorithms," he added.
The Israeli military campaign has reportedly killed more than 32,000 and injured more than 75,000 others, the vast majority of them women and children, Guterres said, recalling that over a million people in Gaza are facing hunger, with children dying for lack of food and water.
"Nothing can justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people," said the UN Secretary pointed out.
"An AI program called 'Where’s Daddy?' bombs houses of suspected militants when they enter, killing their families It's exterminating families," explained Ben Norton, a U.S. journalist.