Whatever the initial ruling, the full issue of whether Israel is carrying out genocide will likely drag on for years. Israel fought this charge bitterly. He views the accusations of genocide against it as “defamation,” given the brazen attack by Hamas on October 7 that sparked the current war, and the deeper history of the Holocaust that preceded the founding of the Jewish state.
“A terrorist organization committed the worst crime against the Jewish people since the Holocaust, and now someone comes to defend it in the name of the Holocaust? How impertinent,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in response to South Africa launching its case. “South Africa’s hypocrisy screams to the high heavens.”
ICJ rulings are legally binding, but require UN Security Council resolutions for there to be real mechanisms, such as sanctions, to implement them – unlikely in this context given the long-standing US practice of shielding Israel from international oversight. But the fact that Israel participated so heavily in the proceedings may mean that it may find it more difficult to ignore a ruling it does not like. South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor will be present in court on Friday, perhaps a sign of Pretoria's confidence in its case.
Team of Lawyers in South Africa I presented their argument In court two weeks ago. More than 100 days of fighting have seen the deaths of more than 25,000 Palestinians – the majority of them women and children – displacing more than 85 percent of Gaza's population from their homes, and causing a potential famine and humanitarian crisis whose combined speed could lead to… The severity of this phenomenon is unprecedented in recent memory.
“The scale of the destruction in Gaza, the targeting of family homes and civilians, and the fact that the war is a war on children, all make clear that genocidal intent was understood and put into practice. The clear intent was to destroy Palestinian lives,” said South African lawyer Tembeka Ngcukaitobi.
My colleagues have summarized the issue as follows: “South Africa notes Israel’s widespread killing and maiming of civilians; his use of “dumb” bombs; Mass displacement and destruction of neighborhoods; “Depriving civilians of access to adequate food and water,” medical care, shelter, clothing, hygiene and sanitation; Its obliteration of Palestinian civil institutions; And its failure to provide any safe place for the residents of Gaza. South Africa also accuses Israel of preventing Palestinian births by displacing pregnant women, depriving them of access to food, water, and care, and killing them.
The South African lawyers also presented a raft of statements by Israeli officials and politicians that appeared to demonstrate the “genocidal” intent of Israeli actions – including calls for the annihilation of Gaza and the mass displacement of Palestinians living there. In response, Israel said that these quotes were carefully selected, expressed at a moment of shock and anger in Israeli society, and did not reflect the official policy of the country's war cabinet.
As the trial in this case began, it also tapped into an apparent global divide. South Africa is leading the attack against Israel based on its historical commitment to the Palestinian people, who, as South African officials confirm, are subject to an apartheid regime in the twenty-first century that is not completely different from what existed in South Africa in the twentieth century. Nelson Mandela said in 1990: “Like us, the Palestinians are fighting for the right to self-determination.”
“The importance of the fact that the country bringing the case is South Africa – a symbol of the scourge of colonialism, settlement and apartheid – cannot be lost on anyone,” wrote Nisreen Malik, a Sudanese-British columnist for The Guardian. “It symbolizes massive racial injustice, which cannot be ignored as ancient history.”
Western commentators have been quick to point out the supposed hypocrisy in South Africa's position, given its government's cozy relationship with Russia and its apparent indifference to the Kremlin's alleged genocidal campaigns in Ukraine. But this example is already a source of frustration for many countries outside the West, which see a clear gap between American and European anger over Russian war crimes in Ukraine and its complicity in the destruction of Gaza.
“It is the Global South's complaint against Western standards of moral superiority,” noted Le Monde's Sylvie Kaufmann. “It questions the international order established by the defendant’s most powerful ally, the United States. It is also a challenge to the collective memory dominated by the Holocaust, which is openly opposed to the memory of colonialism.
South Africa is not alone. Behind it are a group of countries from the so-called Global South – from Brazil to Turkey, from Colombia to Bangladesh. Countries such as Chile and Mexico have also referred alleged Israeli crimes to the International Criminal Court for investigation. According to a tally by Sarang Chidur and Dan Ford of the Quincy Institute, governments representing about 60% of the population of countries in the Global South are now either leading or supporting international legal measures against Israel.
When Germany indicated it would present a third-party defense of Israel at the International Court of Justice, claiming that South Africa's case was “baseless,” it sparked an angry objection from Namibia – the former German colony that witnessed what is now known as the 20th century. The first genocide at the hands of German colonial authorities. It speaks to the global moment in which war in the Middle East could spark historical animosities between continents.
“Few conflicts in the world have as global repercussions as this one. People all over the world have a position on this,” Dalia Sheindlin, a political analyst based in Tel Aviv, told the Financial Times. “So I can imagine that any decision “By the court it will inflame both sides in one way or another.”
