South African human rights lawyer Navanethem “Navi” Pillay has won the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize for her role in prosecuting war crimes and genocide after she led a United Nations inquiry that concluded Israel committed genocide against Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee announced the award on Friday, recognizing Pillay for her efforts to promote international law and ensure accountability for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.

The decision comes amid mounting pressure on international legal institutions seeking to hold states and their leaders accountable for violations of international law.

Pillay chaired the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territories. The commission concluded that Israel had committed four genocidal acts in Gaza with the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in the besieged strip, in whole or in part.

Speaking in a press conference in September 2025, Pillay said that the commission she had led concluded that the Israeli regime “is responsible for the commission of four genocidal acts in Gaza with the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza.”

The commission also found that Israel’s president, prime minister and former war minister had incited the commission of genocide.

Pillay’s work on Palestine forms part of a decades-long career in international justice. She previously served as a judge at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and the International Criminal Court (ICC), and as the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights from 2008 to 2014. She is also an ad hoc judge at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in proceedings concerning the genocide of the Rohingya population by Myanmar.

Her award comes as international courts face mounting political pressure, including US sanctions imposed on the ICC over its arrest warrants for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former minister of war Yoav Gallant over war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Pillay was attending an annual conference of human rights lawyers in Nuremberg, Germany, when news of the award broke. Her colleagues greeted the announcement with a prolonged ovation punctuated by shouts of “Bravo!”

“If you clap a little bit more, I may share this prize with Trump,” she joked, drawing laughter from the audience.

US President Donald Trump has repeatedly campaigned for a Nobel Peace Prize, but this year’s award went to a jurist whose work has included the key US ally in West Asia that has committed genocide in Gaza.

Since October 2023, Israel has killed more than 74,000 Palestinians and injured over 175,000 others in Gaza, also destroying about 90% of the besieged strip’s infrastructure.