PARIS — French anti-terror prosecutors have opened two probes into “complicity in genocide” and “incitement to genocide” over French-Israelis suspected of having blocked aid intended for the Gaza Strip and the Israeli Defense Forces’ wartime conduct.

The anti-terror prosecutor’s office said the investigations were opened in the wake of two separate legal complaints and were to investigate possible “complicity in crimes against humanity” between January and May 2024.

Several sources with knowledge of the cases told AFP that they are the first known probes in France to investigate alleged violations of international law in Gaza.

One investigation was opened in response to the Jewish French Union for Peace (UFJP) and a French-Palestinian victim, who jointly filed a complaint in November targeting alleged French members of hardline right-wing groups “Israel is Forever” and “Tzav 9.”

It accused them of “physically” preventing the passage of trucks at border checkpoints controlled by the IDF.

In a separate case made public on the same day, the grandmother of two children with French nationality who were killed in an Israeli strike in Gaza has filed a legal complaint in Paris, accusing Israel of “genocide” and “murder,” her lawyer said.

The French judiciary has jurisdiction when French citizens are involved in such cases.

Israel vehemently rejects allegations that its ongoing offensive in Gaza, a response to Hamas’s October 7, 2023, massacre, amounts to genocide.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs in the first case, Damia Taharraoui and Marion Lafouge, told AFP they were happy a probe had been launched into the events in January 2024 — “a time when no one wanted to hear anything about genocide.”

A source close to the case said prosecutors last month urged the investigation in relation to events at the Nitzana border crossing point between Egypt and Israel, and the Kerem Shalom crossing from Israel into Gaza.

Around that time, hardline Israeli protesters — including some friends and relatives of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza — blocked aid trucks from entering Gaza and forced them to turn back at Kerem Shalom.

A second complaint from a group called the Lawyers for Justice in the Middle East (CAPJO) accused members of “Israel is Forever” of having blocked aid trucks, using photos, videos and public statements as evidence.

In the separate case, Jacqueline Rivault, the grandmother of six- and nine-year-old children allegedly killed in an Israeli strike, filed her complaint accusing Israel of “genocide” and “murder” with the crimes against humanity section of the Court of Paris, lawyer Arie Alimi said.

Though formally against unnamed parties, the complaint explicitly targets Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli government and the IDF.

The complaint states that an Israeli missile strike killed Janna, six, and Abderrahim Abudaher, nine, in northern Gaza on October 24, 2023.

“We believe these children are dead as part of a deliberate, organized policy targeting the whole of Gaza’s population with a possible genocidal intent,” Alimi said.

The children’s brother Omar, now five, was severely wounded but still lives in Gaza with their mother, identified as Yasmine Z, per the complaint.

A French court in 2019 convicted Yasmine Z. in absentia of having funded a “terrorist” group for giving money in Gaza to members of Palestinian terrorist groups Hamas and the Islamic Jihad.

Israel said last month it was easing the complete blockade of Gaza it imposed on March 2, but on May 30, the United Nations said the territory’s entire population of more than two million people remained at risk of famine.

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a US- and Israeli-backed aid group, last week began distributing humanitarian aid. Reports that the army shot dead dozens of Palestinians trying to collect food have sparked widespread condemnation, however the IDF insisted that those figures were exaggerated and described its fire as warning shots.

The UN and major aid organizations have refused to cooperate with the GHF, citing concerns that it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives.

Thousands of Hamas terrorists stormed Israel’s border communities on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages into Gaza, where dozens remain captive.

Israel launched a counteroffensive on the Gaza Strip that has killed more than 53,000 people, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in the enclave. The toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters.

Israel says it has killed some 20,000 combatants in battle as of January and another 1,600 terrorists inside Israel during the October 7 onslaught.

The International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants against Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.