UN chief decries Israeli military's AI use in Gaza bombing campaign

The UN chief said on Friday he is "deeply troubled" by reports of Israeli military's use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in its bombing campaign in Gaza.

Stating that AI is used as a tool for target identification, particularly in densely populated residential areas, resulting in a distressing number of civilian casualties, Antonio Guterres said: "No part of life and death decisions which impact entire families should be delegated to the cold calculation of algorithms."

"AI should be used as a force for good to benefit the world; not to contribute to waging war on an industrial level, blurring accountability," said Guterres during a press briefing.

On Israeli strike that killed seven aid workers of World Central Kitchen (WCK) food charity earlier this week, Guterres said the Israeli government has acknowledged errors.

"But the essential problem is not who made the mistakes, it is the military procedures in place that allow for those mistakes to multiply time and time again," he said.

Israel has killed more than 33,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, in the Gaza Strip since an Oct. 7 attack by Palestinian group Hamas which claimed 1,200 lives.