The United Nation’s top court on Thursday opened two days of hearings into a request from South Africa to ask the court to issue additional temporary orders against Israel to require it to halt its military operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where more than half of Gaza’s population has sought shelter. The hearing is expected to last two hours. Watch it live:
South Africa representative at the hearing
( UN WEB TV )
It is the fourth time South Africa has asked the International Court of Justice for emergency measures since the nation launched proceedings alleging that Israel’s military action in its war with Hamas in Gaza amounts to genocide. The court will make the decision on whether to grant South Africa's request within a few days, due to the urgency of the request, Israeli experts believe.
If Israel ignores any new orders, the issue will go to the Security Council, where the US may side with Israel and impose a veto. However, in Jerusalem, there is fear that disobeying the orders to stop the war could further complicate Israel's political situation vis-à-vis various countries, and especially vis-à-vis important countries such as Great Britain and Germany, and may even cause those countries to consider imposing an arms embargo.
Issuing orders that Israel will not comply with could also greatly increase the chance that the International Criminal Court in The Hague will issue arrest warrants against senior Israeli officials. The Office of the Chief Prosecutor in The Hague is already discussing several open cases against Israel and Hamas and, as far as is known, at least one of them is related to construction in the settlements and one to the war in Gaza.
Ynet learned Wednesday that Israel asked to postpone the hearing in The Hague until next week but the request was rejected by the court and its Lebanese president. The Israeli team includes representatives from the ministries of Justice, Foreign Affairs, and Defense. The delegations headed by the Deputy Ombudsman for International Legal Affairs, Dr. Gil-ad Noam.
In the first months of the war, South Africa appealed to the International Court of Justice and accused Israel of genocide in Gaza. In her renewed application to the court, she asked for orders to be issued in order to "protect against further, serious and irreversible damage to the rights of the Palestinian people within the framework of the Genocide Convention", and "to ensure Israel's compliance with its obligation under the Genocide Convention not to engage in genocide, and to prevent and punish for genocide."
“The sitting is open,” said ICJ President Nawaf Salam, who is Lebanese.
South Africa has asked the court to order Israel to withdraw from Rafah; to take measures to ensure unimpeded access for U.N. officials, humanitarian organizations and journalists to the Gaza Strip; and to report back within one week on how it is meeting these demands.
According to the latest request, the previous preliminary orders by The Hague-based court were not sufficient to address “a brutal military attack on the sole remaining refuge for the people of Gaza.”
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Zane Dengor of the Department of International Relations of South Africa and South African Ambassador to the Netherlands Wasimozi Madonsela
(Photo: Yves Herman/Reuters)
Israel has portrayed Rafah as the last stronghold of the militant group, brushing off warnings from the United States and other allies that any major operation there would be catastrophic for civilians.
South Africa has asked the court to order Israel to withdraw from Rafah; to take measures to ensure unimpeded access for U.N. officials, humanitarian organizations and journalists to the Gaza Strip; and to report back within one week on how it is meeting these demands.
During hearings earlier this year, Israel strongly denied committing genocide in Gaza and said it does all it can to spare civilians and is only targeting Hamas militants. It says Hamas’ tactic of embedding in civilian areas makes it difficult to avoid civilian casualties.
In January, judges ordered Israel to do all it can to prevent death, destruction and any acts of genocide in Gaza, but the panel stopped short of ordering an end to the military offensive that has laid waste to the Palestinian enclave.
In a second order in March, the court said Israel must take measures to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza, including opening more land crossings to allow food, water, fuel and other supplies to enter.
South Africa initiated proceedings in December 2023 and sees the legal campaign as rooted in issues central to its identity. Its governing party, the African National Congress, has long compared Israel’s policies in Gaza and the occupied West Bank to its own history under the apartheid regime of white minority rule, which restricted most Blacks to “homelands.” Apartheid ended in 1994.
On Sunday, Egypt announced it plans to join the case. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Israeli military actions “constitute a flagrant violation of international law, humanitarian law, and the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 regarding the protection of civilians during wartime.”
Several countries have also indicated they plan to intervene, but so far only Libya, Nicaragua and Colombia have filed formal requests to do so.