[Salon] Day 2 of the ICJ Genocide Hearings

[Chas Freeman <cwfresidence@gmail.com>]

FM: John Whitbeck

Today's Israeli defense in the ICJ genocide case was a painful-to-watch flood of substantive lies and distortions which should be obvious anyone who has been paying attention to Israel's actions and publicly expressed intentions over the past three months and which judges who have been paying attention should have found insulting, objectionable and prejudicial to Israel's defense.

Extraordinarily, the Israeli legal team argued that the Hamas attack of October 7 meets the legal definition of "genocide" and that South Africa is therefore complicit in genocide, while everything that Israel has done in Gaza since October 7 has not only been in legitimate self-defense but in full compliance with international law, with constant attention to avoiding or mitigating any harm to Palestinian civilians.

However, there was one technical argument to which the Israeli legal team paid considerable attention which is potentially worrying -- that, prior to December 29, when South Africa submitted its application to the ICJ, there was no "dispute" between South Africa and Israel, as is necessary to establish ICJ jurisdiction in this case.

Somehow, this technical argument does not appear to have been an obstacle to Gambia's genocide case against Myanimar, but it may be Israel's best hope in this case and could be seized upon by any judge reluctant to anger the American and Israeli governments.

I would hope that no judge other than the American judge will be tempted to seize this escape route.

If the ICJ does not decisively order all or most of the "provisional measures" sought by South Africa, it will, in my view, be definitively destroying the very concept of international law which Israel and the United States have done so much to destroy or deform in recent decades, giving a legal green light to continuing genocide and restoring "Might Makes Right" as the only functional principle of international relations.

Much more than the potential relief of Palestinians from the genocidal assault currently being inflicted upon them is at stake in this case.