Israel faces Gaza 'genocide' case at UN top court

By: AFP
Published: 06:15 PM, 9 Jan, 2024
Israel faces Gaza 'genocide' case at UN top court
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Israel and South Africa face off at the UN's top court from Thursday, after Pretoria accused Israel of "genocidal acts" in Gaza, charges the Israelis have dismissed as "blood libel".


In an 84-page submission to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), South Africa urged judges to order Israel to "immediately suspend its military operations" in Gaza.


South Africa alleges that Israel "has engaged in, is engaging in, and risks further engaging in genocidal acts against the Palestinian people in Gaza".


Israel has angrily hit back at the accusations, with government spokesman Eylon Levy vowing to fight the South African case he described as "absurd blood libel".


"How tragic that the rainbow nation that prides itself on fighting racism will be fighting pro bono for anti-Jewish racists," added Levy.


"No, South Africa, it is not we who have come to perpetrate genocide, it is Hamas," said Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.



Top officials from the two countries will face off in the ICJ's Great Hall of Justice housed in the extravagant Peace Palace in The Hague -- a world away from the death and destruction seen recently in Gaza and Israel.


In response to the bloodiest attack in its history carried out by Hamas militants on October 7, Israel has reduced large parts of the Gaza Strip to rubble with its bombing campaign.


The October 7 Hamas attack resulted in the deaths of around 1,140 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.


Israel's military campaign has killed at least 22,722, according to the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry. The United Nations estimates 1.9 million Gazans are displaced, with fears growing of famine and disease.


The ICJ rules on disputes between states and while its decisions are legally binding, it has limited power to enforce them.


The court could in theory order Israel to stop its invasion but it is highly doubtful it would be obeyed.


In March 2022, the ICJ ordered Russia to "immediately suspend" its invasion of Ukraine -- a directive Moscow has ignored.


Johann Soufi, a lawyer and international justice expert, told AFP there would be an "extremely significant symbolic impact" if the court ruled against Israel.


"Of course there is the problem of implementing the decision. But at the end of the day, international justice is all there is left," said Soufi, who worked for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees in Gaza.


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- 'Criminally complicit' -


South Africa has filed the case against Israel because both countries have signed the UN Genocide Convention, created in 1948 as a response to the Holocaust.


Any country that has signed the convention can sue another at the ICJ if they disagree on the "interpretation, application or fulfilment" of the rules designed to prevent genocide.


South Africa said it was "acutely aware of the particular weight of responsibility in initiating proceedings against Israel for violations of the Genocide Convention".


It also "unequivocally" condemned the Hamas attack but said "no armed attack... no matter how serious... can provide any possible justification for breaches" of the Genocide Convention.


Pretoria's case is that Israeli action in Gaza is "intended to bring about the destruction of a substantial part of the Palestinian national, racial and ethnical group".


It says Israel's "genocidal acts" stem from the killing of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza, forced displacement, and preventing adequate aid access, resulting in starvation.



South Africa wants the ICJ to impose so-called "provisional measures", or emergency actions, while the broader case is being considered -- which would probably take years.


"The circumstances could not be more urgent," argues Pretoria, describing an "exceptionally brutal military campaign by Israel in Gaza, which is extensive and ongoing".


Other measures requested by South Africa include reparations and reconstruction of Gaza, plus the safe return of displaced Palestinian refugees.


The case has been dismissed in Washington as "meritless, counterproductive and completely without any basis in fact whatsoever".


Levy, the Israeli government spokesman, said South Africa was giving "political and legal cover" to the Hamas attacks and was "criminally complicit with Hamas's campaign of genocide against our people".


"History will judge South Africa for abetting the modern heirs of the Nazis," Levy said.



Blinken in Israel


Top US diplomat Antony Blinken arrived in Tel Aviv late Monday as part of a regional tour seeking to avert regional escalation as Israel pounded Hamas-ruled Gaza and Lebanon's Hezbollah said an Israeli strike killed a top commander.


Palestinian militants reported fierce ground combat in southern Gaza, where Israel says its focus has shifted along with the territory's centre three months into its war with Hamas.


Sirens sounded Monday in central and southern Israel to warn of incoming rocket fire. And while battles raged in the besieged Gaza Strip, the situation to Israel's north has also caused increasing regional and global concern.


Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah, a Hamas ally, have engaged in regular cross-border fire during the war that began on October 7 with Hamas's unprecedented attack against Israel.


On Monday, Hezbollah announced the killing of a "commander" for the first time since October, naming him as Wissam Hassan Tawil.



A security official in Lebanon, requesting anonymity for security reasons, said Tawil "had a leading role in managing Hezbollah's operations in the south", and was killed there by an Israeli strike targeting his car.


The Israeli military said it struck Hezbollah "military sites" in Lebanon on Monday, but did not immediately comment on Tawil's death.


His is the second high-profile killing in Lebanon this month, following a strike in a Beirut stronghold of Hezbollah last week which killed Hamas deputy leader Saleh al-Aruri, heightening fears of the conflict spreading.


On Monday the Israeli army also said it had killed a "central figure" in Syria responsible for Hamas rocket attacks, naming him as Hassan Akasha.


The October 7 attack by Hamas which triggered the war resulted in about 1,140 deaths in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.


Hamas, considered a "terrorist" group by the United States and European Union, also took around 250 hostages, 132 of whom remain captive, Israel says. At least 25 are believed to have been killed.


Israel has responded with relentless bombardment and a ground invasion that have killed at least 23,084 people, mostly women and children, according to the Gaza health ministry.


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- 'Help Gaza recover' -


Violence has also surged in the occupied West Bank, where late Monday the Palestinian health ministry reported three deaths by Israeli fire.


Israeli police confirmed three were killed during a raid on Tulkarem, in the northern West Bank, to arrest a "wanted terrorist".


Israeli forces and settler attacks in the West Bank since October 7 have killed at least 333 Palestinians, according to the Ramallah-based health ministry.


US Secretary of State Blinken, on his fourth regional trip since the war began, met on Monday with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman after talks in the United Arab Emirates and ahead of his visit to Israel.


Before leaving Al Ula in Saudi Arabia, Blinken said: "We agreed to work together and coordinate our efforts to help Gaza stabilise and recover... and to work toward long term peace and security and stability."


Washington, Israel's main ally and arms supplier, has grown increasingly concerned over the war's civilian death toll.



US President Joe Biden said Monday he was working to get Israel to cut its military presence in Gaza, after protesters calling for a ceasefire disrupted him during a campaign speech. "I've been quietly working with the Israeli government to get them to reduce and significantly get out of Gaza," Biden said.


The Al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of militant group Islamic Jihad, reported "fierce clashes" on Monday, involving machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, with Israeli troops in the southern city of Khan Yunis.


Islamic Jihad, which has fought alongside Hamas in Gaza, later released a video it claimed showed an Israeli hostage alive in its custody.


Israel's military reported its forces have "been working in recent days to expand" operations around Khan Yunis and said troops and warplanes struck 30 "significant" targets in the major city overnight Sunday-Monday.


The fighting, now in its fourth month, has reduced swathes of the narrow Palestinian territory to rubble, and prompted international concern over dire humanitarian conditions.


The United Nations on Monday said it was "very concerned by the high death toll of media workers", a day after Qatar-based Al Jazeera network said an Israeli strike had killed two of its journalists, including the son of Gaza bureau chief Wael al-Dahdouh.


The UN rights office called for the deaths to be "thoroughly and independently investigated".


https://twitter.com/GazaMartyrs/status/1744448507505717300


- 'Everyone going hungry' -


The Israeli military on Monday showed journalists what a spokesman described as a cluster of weapons factories and tunnels in central Gaza used by Hamas to manufacture rockets.


Soldiers leading a media tour in Bureij said that what looked like cement factories and other industrial facilities were in fact used to make missiles and shells stored in deep shafts.


Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas was in Cairo on Monday to meet with President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi of Egypt, a mediator in the conflict.


Most of Gaza's population has been displaced, according to the United Nations, leaving people in overcrowded shelters or tents in the winter chill.



Many have fled to Rafah in Gaza's far south, where a strike on Monday ripped open a car killing two of Dahdouh's nephews. He was recently wounded himself in a strike, and lost his wife and two other children in an Israeli bombardment in the initial weeks of the war.


"They say Rafah is safe, but we don't see it is safe in Rafah. No place is safe," said Mohammad Hejazy, overlooking the blood-soaked road.


The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned of the risk of famine and disease, with only minimal aid entering the besieged territory.


Israeli rights group B'Tselem on Monday said "everyone in Gaza is going hungry" as "direct results of Israel's declared policy".



Washington has said Blinken will press Israel on its compliance with international humanitarian law and ask for "immediate measures" to boost aid to Gaza.

Categories : World

AFP

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