LIVE FEED: Israel’s ICJ Response To Charges Of Genocide

NEW YORK (VINnews) — At the Hague International Court Of Justice, Israel is now responding to the claims by South Africa that is is perpetrating genocide in Gaza

Israeli lawyer Tal Becker started Israel’s defense at the court, claiming that South Africa’s allegations of genocide were “curated” and “distorted” allegations of genocide against Israel.

He also condemned South Africa’s assertion that Israel does not have the right to self-defense against Hamas.

“If the claim of the applicant now is that in the armed conflict between Israel and Hamas, Israel must be denied the ability to defend its citizens, then the absurd upshot of South Africa’s argument is this: Under the guise of the allegation against Israel of genocide, this court is asked to call for an end to operations against the ongoing attacks of an organization that pursues an actual genocidal agenda,” says Becker.

He also points to Hamas’s practice of embedding its military installations and fighters amid civilian infrastructure and of stealing humanitarian supplies as the real source of civilian death and suffering in Gaza.

“Hamas has systematically and unlawfully embedded its military operations, militants, and assets throughout Gaza, within and beneath densely populated civilian areas,” says Becker. “It has built an extensive warren of underground tunnels for its leaders and fighters several hundred miles in length throughout the strip, with thousands of access points and terrorist hubs located in homes, mosques, UN facilities, schools, and, perhaps most shockingly, hospitals. This is not an occasional tactic. It is an integrated, preplanned, extensive, and abhorrent method of warfare.”

Becker added that : “Israel is committed, as it must be, to comply with the law, but it does so in the face of Hamas’s utter contempt for the law. It is committed, as it must be, to demonstrate humanity. But it does so in the face of Hamas’s utter inhumanity.”

“The key component of genocide — the intention to destroy a people, in whole or in part — is totally lacking,” Becker says.

“What Israel seeks by operating in Gaza is not to destroy a people, but to protect a people — its people, who are under attack on multiple fronts — and to do so in accordance with the law, even as it faces a heartless enemy determined to use that very commitment against it.”

Becker was followed by British genocide law expert Professor Malcolm Shaw, who stressed that “Not every conflict is genocidal. The crime of genocide in international law and under the Genocide Convention is a uniquely malicious manifestation and stands alone among violations of international law as the zenith of evil, the crime of crimes, ultimate in wickedness”.

Dr. Galit Raguan, speaking in defense of Israel’s actions in Gaza, told the court that Israeli policies of warning Palestinian civilians to evacuate from war zones and providing humanitarian aid demonstrate that there is not even plausibility to South Africa’s claims of genocide.

Raguan provided evidence of these practices, as well as the widespread use by Hamas of civilian infrastructure in Gaza, and stressed that it is this deliberate military strategy of Hamas that is the true source of civilian harm in Gaza and not any claimed genocidal campaign.

Raguan also denounced South Africa’s claims that Israel’s warnings to civilians to evacuate combat areas were an effort to destroy the Palestinian people.

“The applicant astonishingly claims that these efforts are themselves genocidal. A measure intended to mitigate harm to civilians is proof, according to the applicant, of Israel’s intent to commit genocide when it in fact proves the exact opposite,” she added.

British barrister Christopher Staker argued that South Africa’s request for provisional measures against Israel to halt its military operation in Gaza are designed to protect Hamas from Israel’s response to the October 7 atrocities it perpetrated, and would encourage the terror group to repeat those outrages.

“Provisional measures would stop Israel defending its citizens, more citizens could be attacked, raped and tortured [by Hamas], and provisional measures would prevent Israel doing anything,” he said.

“If granted, it would mean that when a recognized terror group commits terrorist attacks on another state, a third party seeking provisional measures can stop a party from defending itself,” said Staker.

Dr. Gilad Noam, presenting the closing arguments for Israel’s defense against South Africa’s charges of genocide in the ICJ, told the court that were it to accept these claims it would embolden terrorist groups and provide them with cover to commit crimes against humanity in the future, as Hamas did on October 7.

“Entertaining the applicant’s request would weaken efforts to punish genocide and instead of [the court] being an instrument to prevent terrorist horrors would turn it into a weapon in hands of terrorist groups who have no regard for humanity and rule of law,” says Noam.