By Joseph A. Klein, CFP United Nations Columnist ——Bio and Archives--February 1, 2024
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On the same day that the United Nations in New York honored the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust, the UN’s Hague-based International Court of Justice (ICJ) defiled these victims’ memory. The ICJ decided in its provisional ruling to move forward with a meritless case that South Africa brought against Israel, alleging that Israel has been committing genocide against Palestinians living in Gaza. South Africa claimed that it was simply enforcing rights protected by the international Genocide Convention to which both countries are signatories.
The ICJ is helping South Africa to weaponize against the Jewish State of Israel the Genocide Convention, which was enacted in 1948 when the genocide of Jews by the Nazis during the Holocaust was still fresh in peoples’ minds. To hurl an accusation of genocide against Israel, where at least one of the nearly 150,000 Holocaust survivors still living in Israel was killed during Hamas's October 7th attack, is obscene.
Instead of throwing the case out immediately as it should have, the ICJ bought South Africa’s argument that it did not have to be directly injured by Israel’s alleged actions in Gaza to bring its Gaza genocide suit against Israel. The ICJ deferred making a final judgement on the merits of South Africa’s genocide claims, which could take months or even years to decide. However, the ICJ issued provisional orders to take immediate effect, which are prejudicial to Israel’s inherent sovereign right of self-defense. Fortunately, although the ICJ’s orders technically are legally binding, the ICJ lacks any mechanism to enforce them. But even if the ICJ’s ruling proves to be only a symbolic gesture, it will further isolate Israel and serve to put increased pressure on Israel to wind down its military operations in Gaza as quickly as possible.
While the ICJ did not order an immediate ceasefire, it did order Israel to “take all measures within its power to prevent the commission of all acts within the scope of Article II of this [Genocide] Convention, in particular:
Article II of the Genocide Convention prohibits its member states from committing such acts with the “intent to destroy in whole or in part a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such.” (Emphasis added) Israel’s intention is to destroy the Hamas terrorist organization that savagely attacked innocent Israeli civilians on October 7th. Israel’s conduct of its military actions during the Gaza war belies South Africa’s allegation that Israel has acted with any genocidal intent to destroy the Palestinian people collectively as a group. To the contrary, Israel is doing all it can to mitigate civilian casualties consistent with its obligations under the Geneva Conventions. Hamas, not Israel, is responsible for the needless loss of Palestinian civilian lives and devastation in Gaza by deliberately embedding Hamas fighters, weaponry, and command centers among the civilian population and using Palestinian women and children as human shields.
The ICJ also ordered that “The State of Israel shall take immediate and effective measures to enable the provision of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance to address the adverse conditions of life faced by Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.”
Israel has cooperated in facilitating the safe delivery of humanitarian aid to Gazans in need. Israel also just recently offered a two-month suspension of fighting to allow more unencumbered delivery of humanitarian aid, but Hamas rejected the offer.
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South African President Cyril Ramaphosa exulted in the ICJ’s conclusion that South Africa has a plausible case against Israel that it committed genocide in violation of the Genocide Convention. “Some have told us that we should mind our own business and not get involved in the affairs of other countries,” President Ramaphosa said. “Others have said it was not our place. And yet it is very much our place as the people who know too well the pain of dispossession, discrimination, state-sponsored violence…”
The ICJ rationalized its decision to allow South Africa – a non-injured party – to bring its case against Israel regarding events occurring more than 4300 miles away from South Africa by using a globalist doctrine known as erga omnes partes. According to this doctrine, the ICJ ruled, “any State party to the Genocide Convention may invoke the responsibility of another State party, including through the institution of proceedings before the Court, with a view to determining the alleged failure to comply with its obligations…under the Convention and to bringing that failure to an end.”
This globalist doctrine negates a longstanding traditional principle of judicial standing, requiring a court to dismiss those cases where the complainant cannot demonstrate concrete injury to its own material interests or legal rights. Applying traditional judicial procedures that define standing, South Africa’s claim should have been dismissed on that basis alone.
Moreover, South Africa's claim that it is entitled under international law to vindicate in court the right of any group of people to be protected against genocide committed by another Genocide Convention party, is a sham. South Africa is serving as nothing more than a shill for Hamas.
Just one day after Hamas’s genocidal attack against Israeli civilians innocently going about their lives in Israel on October 7th, South Africa’s government blamed Israel for what happened. It issued an official statement, declaring: “The new conflagration has arisen from the continued illegal occupation of Palestine land, continued settlement expansion, desecration of the Al Aqsa mosque and Christian holy sites, and ongoing oppression of the Palestinian people."
A mere ten days after the October 7th attack, South Africa’s Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor held a phone call with Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. The Jewish News Syndicate reported Hamas’s claim that Pandor had called to congratulate Hamas for the success of its October 7th rampage.
“The minister of foreign affairs calling a Hamas leader at the same time as every other country in the free world has condemned the Hamas attacks shows that Minister Pandor has taken a side and has dragged South Africa into a very, very dangerous situation as she supports Hamas militants,” said Karen Milner, the chairperson of South Africa’s Jewish Board of Deputies.
Last December, just weeks after Hamas’s horrific October 7th genocidal attack, senior Hamas officials visited South Africa to participate in the Fifth Global Convention of Solidarity with Palestine.
South Africa is not the protector of people everywhere from genocide, as it has falsely portrayed itself to the ICJ. The South African government is advocating for a savage terrorist group, whose founding mission, repeated by its leaders on multiple occasions since, is to destroy the Jewish State of Israel and kill as many Jews as possible.
Iran, the world’s number one state sponsor of terrorists, is complicit in Hamas’s campaign of genocide against Israeli Jews by funding, arming, and training the Hamas terrorists. Just two months before Hamas launched its genocidal attack on Israeli soil, South Africa solidified its cozy relationship with Hamas's sponsor Iran by signing a joint economic cooperation agreement with Iran.
In short, South Africa has brought its case against Israel in bad faith. It is not acting as a neutral party to the Genocide Convention seeking to hold another party to account for allegedly violating its obligations under that Convention. South Africa is acting in bad faith by putting up a smoke screen before the ICJ to conceal its bias in favor of the genocidal terrorists who were the aggressors.
Hamas has threatened to repeat its October 7th style massacres, sexual assaults, and kidnappings of Israeli civilians over and over again. Yet, according to South Africa’s perverted notion of justice, Israel’s defense of its citizens by destroying Hamas’s capability to carry out more such genocidal attacks constitutes genocide itself.
Israel’s inherent right of self-defense is enshrined in Article 51 of the United Nations Charter when “an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations.” The International Court of Justice, created under the auspices of the UN Charter, has disgracefully closed its eyes to South Africa’s obscene misuse of the Court to thwart Israel’s right to defend its people from another Hamas genocidal attack.
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Joseph A. Klein is the author of Global Deception: The UN’s Stealth Assault on America’s Freedom.