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Following Hamas's terrorist attack on Israel over the weekend, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced a "complete siege" of Gaza, the densely-populated territory where Gaza rules. Gallant said that would include "no electricity, no food, no fuel" for the territory's roughly 2 million residents.
"The targeting of civilians is a war crime, no matter who does it," said Sanders. "Israel's blanket denial of food, water, and other necessities to Gaza is a serious violation of international law and will do nothing but harm innocent civilians."
Targeting civilians, even during a time of war, violates Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions of 1949.

Common Article 3 of the Fourth Geneva Convention:

Art. 3. In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:
(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.
To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:
(a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
(b) taking of hostages;
(c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment;
(d) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.
(2) The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.
An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.
The Parties to the conflict should further endeavour to bring into force, by means of special agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.
The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of the Parties to the conflict.

International Humanitarian Law (IHL) defines who is a combatant. A civilian is anyone who is not a combatant. Such a civilian, should he engage in acts of war, did not enjoy any combatant privilege, his acts are merely crimes. Should he shoot at someone and miss, it could be attempted murder. Should he kill somebody, it could be murder.

https://www.icrc.org/en/doc/resources/documents/faq/terrorism-ihl-210705.htm

International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)

2. Who is a combatant?
International humanitarian law permits members of the armed forces of a State party to an international armed conflict and associated militias who fulfil the requisite criteria to directly engage in hostilities. They are generally considered lawful, or privileged, combatants who may not be prosecuted for the taking part in hostilities as long as they respect international humanitarian law. Upon capture they are entitled to prisoner of war status.
If civilians directly engage in hostilities, they are considered "unlawful" or "unprivileged" combatants or belligerents (the treaties of humanitarian law do not expressly contain these terms). They may be prosecuted under the domestic law of the detaining state for such action.
Both lawful and unlawful combatants may be interned in wartime, may be interrogated and may be prosecuted for war crimes. Both are entitled to humane treatment in the hands of the enemy.
[...]
4. Who is entitled to "prisoner of war" status? What is the consequence of failure to qualify for prisoner of war status?
a. In international armed conflict
As previously mentioned, in international armed conflict, members of the armed forces of the States involved (and associated militias) are lawful combatants. It should be borne in mind that in this type of conflict, there are lawful combatants on two (or more) sides: the armed forces of one State fighting the armed forces of another State.
The four Geneva Conventions apply to situations of international armed conflict. It is the Third Geneva Convention which regulates the protection of lawful combatants upon capture by the enemy. Its procedures for determination of entitlement to prisoner of war status by a " competent tribunal " in case of doubt are mandatory.
Unlawful combatants do not qualify for prisoner of war status. Their situation upon capture by the enemy is covered by the Fourth (Civilian) Geneva Convention if they fulfill the nationality criteria and by the relevant provisions of the Additional Protocol I, if ratified by the detaining power. [woodpusher - Israel has not ratified Additional Protocol I].
This protection is not the same as that afforded to lawful combatants. To the contrary, persons protected by the Fourth Convention and the relevant provisions of Protocol I may be prosecuted under domestic law for directly participating in hostilities. They may be interned for as long as they pose a serious security threat, and, while in detention, may under specific conditions be denied certain privileges under the Fourth Geneva Convention. They may also be prosecuted for war crimes and other crimes and sentenced to terms exceeding the length of the conflict, including the range of penalties provided for under domestic law.
Persons not covered by either the Third or the Fourth Geneva Convention in international armed conflict are entitled to the fundamental guarantees provided for by customary international law (as reflected in Article 75 of Additional Protocol I), as well as by applicable domestic and human rights law. All these legal sources provide for rights of detainees in relation to treatment, conditions and due process of law.
Therefore, contrary to some assertions, the ICRC has never stated that all persons who have taken part in hostilities in an international armed conflict are entitled to prisoner of war status.

Noam Lubbell, Extraterritorial Use of Force Against Non-State Actors, Oxford University Press, 2010, paperback 2011.

Noam Lubell is Lecturer, Irish Centre for Human Rights, School of Law, National University of Ireland, Galway.

1.1 Combatants
[...]
The term combatant is used to describe those who are recognized by the law as having the right to take part in the fighting and who will be entitled to prisoner of war status if captured.

1.2 Civilians
Civilian persons, as with civilian objects, are not the subject of a descriptive defnition within the law, but are defined by negation: anything which does meet the definition of military is civilian.
[...]
A civilian who takes up arms becomes an unprivileged civilian who may be targeted and killed, or criminally prosecuted on capture. He does not become a combatant lawfully authorized to engage in combat. Combatants are entitled to prisoner of war status if captured and may not be prosecuted.

Mary Ellen O'Connell, International Law and the Use of Force, Foundation Press, 2005. pg 536, excerpt,

They were illegal combatants, or, as the late Professor and Judge Richard Baxter once described such persons, they were "unprivileged belligerents," that is, belligerent persons who lack the privilege enjoyed by the armed forces of a state to engage in warfare with immunity from any liability under national or international law, except as prescribed by the international laws of war. This vulnerability to prosecution for simply taking part in an armed conflict and for injuries that may have been caused in that connection is the sanction prescribed by the law to deter illegal combatants.

Neither Hamas fighters nor the rest of Gaza are combatants. There is no such thing as the uniformed armed services of the recognized nation of Gaza. Those who do not qualify as combatants are classified as civilians. Whether one classifies Hamas as a terrorist organization or not, its members are civilians and not combatants.

The Laws of War are passé, having been replaced by the Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC). The conflict involving Israel and Gaza is a conflict of a non-international character. Gaza has no status as a recognized nation state.

A civilian group of unlawful belligerents going about Israel shooting and killing civilians, and taking hostages, is considered a criminal group to be prosecuted under criminal law.

Israel is in a declared state of armed conflict of a non-international character with Gaza. Israel has implemented a siege against Gaza. With its continued firing of rockets and holding of hostages, Gaza contiues its use of non-privileged belligerent civilians to commit violations of the LOAC.

Pursuant to Common Article 3, when Israel takes non-privileged belligerent fighters prisoner, they will not be afforded prisoner of war status, but must be treated humanely. This does not mean that for the duration of the conflict, Israel must give aid and comfort to the unlawful force it is combatting.

With Gaza, there is no lawful combatant force to identify. There are only civilians.

A naval blockade, or its land-based equivalent of a siege, permit starving the sieged area, and forceably repelling civilians attempting to leave the sieged area. The central purpose of a siege is not to starve the opponents to death but to starve them into submission.

See below for a Nuremburg trial result.

http://werle.rewi.hu-berlin.de/High%20Command%20Case.pdf

The United States of America vs. Wilhelm von Leeb et al.

US Military Tribunal Nuremberg, Judgment of 27 October 1948

The High Command Trial, pp. 74-75

6. CRIMINAL CONDUCT PERTAINING TO THE SIEGE OF LENINGRAD
Leningrad was encircled and besieged. Its defenders and the civilian population were in great straits and it was feared the population would undertake to flee through the German lines. Orders were issued to use artillery to "prevent any such attempt at the greatest possible distance from our own lines by opening fire as early as possible, so that the infantry, if possible, is spared shooting on civilians." We find this was known to and approved by von Leeb. Was it an unlawful order?
"A belligerent commander may lawfully lay siege to a place controlled by the enemy and endeavor by a process of isolation to cause its surrender. The propriety of attempting to reduce it by starvation is not questioned. Hence, the cutting off of every source of sustenance from without is deemed legitimate. It is said that if the commander of a besieged place expels the noncombatants, in order to lessen the number of those who consume his stock of provisions, it is lawful, though an extreme measure, to drive them back so as to hasten the surrender."¹ We might wish the law were otherwise but we must administer it as we find it. Consequently, we hold no criminality attached on this charge.
¹ Hyde, International Law (Little, Brown and Co., Boston, 1945) 2d Revised Edition, vol. Ill, pp. 1802-1803.

While Israel must treat the unlawful enemy fighters humanely upon capture, it does not have to feed or give aid and comfort to the unlawful enemy force during the conflict.

Correction: I left out a rather important word.

1.2 Civilians
Civilian persons, as with civilian objects, are not the subject of a descriptive defnition within the law, but are defined by negation: anything which does not meet the definition of military is civilian.

Perhaps some may also find one of the citations made by the Nuremburg court to be of interest.

International Law, Chiefly as Interpreted and Applied by the United States, Vol II, Charles Cheney HYDE, pg. 328

§ 656. Sieges and Bombardments.
A belligerent commander may lawfully lay siege to a place controlled by the enemy and endeavor by a process of isolation to cause its surrender.^l The propriety of attempting to reduce it by starvation is not questioned.² Hence the cutting off of every source of sustenance from without is deemed legitimate.³ It is said that if the commander of a besieged place expels the noncombatants, in order to lessen the number of those who consume his stock of provisions, it is lawful, though an extreme measure, to drive them back, so as to hasten the surrender.⁴
__________
¹ "Assault is the rush of an armed force upon enemy forces in the battlefield, or upon intrenchments, fortifications, habitations, villages, or towns, such rushing force committing every violence against opposing persons and destroying all impediments. Siege is the surrounding and investing of an enemy locality by an armed force, cutting off those inside from all communication for the purpose of starving them into surrender or for the purpose of attacking the invested locality and taking it by assault. Bombardment is the throwing by artillery of shot and shell upon persons and things. Siege can be accompanied by bombardment and assault, but this is not necessary, since a siege can be carried out by mere investment and starvation caused thereby. Assault, siege, and bombardment are severally and jointly perfectly legitimate means of warfare." Oppenheim, 2 ed., II, § 155.
See, also, J. M. Spaight, War Rights on Land, Chap. V; Laws of Land Warfare, prepared by Joseph R. Baker, and Henry G. Crocker, Dept. of State, 1919, 198-213.
² "War is not carried on by arms alone. It is lawful to starve the hostile belligerent, armed or unarmed, so that it leads to the speedier subjugation of the enemy." § XVII General Orders, No. 100, of 1863, quoted in No. 173, note I, Rules of Land Warfare. [woodpusher - General Orders Number 100 is the Lieber Code, the Laws of War as published by the Union government during the American Civil War.]
³ According to No. 224 of Rules of Land Warfare "The commander of the investing force has the absolute right to forbid all communications between the besieged place and the outside. The application of this rule to diplomatic envoys of neutral powers is unsettled."
No. 219 of the Rules of Land Warfare provides that "Diplomatic agents of a neutral power should not be prevented from leaving a besieged place before hostilities commence. This privilege cannot be claimed while hostilities are in progress. The same privileges should properly be accorded to a consular officer of a neutral power. Should they voluntarily decide to remain, they must undergo the same treatment as the other inhabitants."
⁴ No. 222, Rules of Land Warfare; also Section XVII General Orders, No. 100, of 1863