HELD JERUSALEM: Human rights groups of Palestine and Israel litigated to compel the Israeli air force to stop causing sonic booms over the Gaza Strip, calling the practice "collective punishment" as it traumatizes children.

Physicians for Human Rights-Israel and the Gaza Community Mental Health Program appealed to Israel's Supreme Court to stop the supersonic flights, which the United Nations reportedly said is an abuse of human rights.

These extremely loud booms have caused physical and mental harm to the population as well as damage to property.

Israeli warplanes set off sonic booms over Gaza during the day and night, though they refrain from supersonic flights over Israel.

According to international law "the booms are collective punishment against the civilian population and thus illegal," the two groups said in the statement.

The head of the Gaza group, Dr Eyad Sarraj, a psychiatrist, wrote that the sonic booms have serious effects on Gaza children, causing anxiety, panic, fear, poor concentration, stuttering and low academic achievement, according to a statement.

"We at the United Nations have already submitted a letter of protest to the Israeli government urging them to stop ... the sonic booming and the air raids immediately," BBC quoted the chairman of the UN Development Program in the Gaza Strip Khaled Abdul Shafi as saying. "(Because) we simply think that this is a violation of basic human rights, especially rights of children to live in peace and to be educated in peace."