Israel Defends Itself At ICJ Against The Lies Of South Africa And False Accusation of Genocide
The entire proceeding is a farce. South Africa, through a highly distorted set of accusations, doesn’t seek to prevent genocide, it seeks to enable genocide against Jews by preventing Israel from defending itself.
South Africa’s political leaders are closely aligned with Hamas, so it’s not surprising that South Africa took it on itself to bring a claim of Genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) against Israel for Israel defending itself against the Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and Palestinian “civilians” who murdered, tortured, sexually mutilated, and raped Israelis and foreigners on October 7.
The entire proceeding is a farce. South Africa seeks to weaponize the ICJ so that Hamas and other Islamist radicals can commit genocide against Jews. It’s a complete inversion of the purpose of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and the role of the ICJ – South Africa doesn’t seek to prevent genocide, it seeks to enable genocide against Jews by preventing Israel from defending itself and making sure the butchers of October 7 can never do it again – and they have promised to do it again. South Africa seeks extraordinary “provisional remedies” ordering Israel to cease military actions.
Just because the charge of Genocide is a farce doesn’t mean Israel will prevail at the ICJ, which serves under the tutelage of the U.N. General Assembly. The Judges have superficially impressive credentials, and on any other issue perhaps that would matter. But as to Israel, is a Judge from Lebanon really going to rule against Hamas? Same with Judges from Russia, China, Somalia, and several other countries hostile to Israel.
It’s basically a U.N. General Assembly vote, where you keep hoping they will do the right thing, but they never do. Maybe this time will be different because the nationality of Judges from countries hostile to Israel is not as skewed as in the overall General Assembly, but I’m not hopeful.
Here is Israel’s entire presentation today:
Below is Israel’s opening statement
𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐯𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐨 𝐢𝐬 𝟑𝟎 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐮𝐭𝐞𝐬, 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐢𝐭’𝐬 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐡 𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐬𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐢𝐭.
Today Dr. Tal Becker and Israel’s legal team presented its case to the @CIJ_ICJ.
With them stood the souls of the more than 1,000 Israelis who… pic.twitter.com/dQhSGAaY1y
— Israel ישראל 🇮🇱 (@Israel) January 12, 2024
My selected excerpts (full transcript below):
7. We live at a time when words are cheap. In an age of social media and identity politics, the temptation to reach for the most outrageous term, to vilify and demonize, has become for many irresistible. But if there is one place where words should still matter, where truth should still matter, it is surely a court of law.
8. The Applicant has regrettably put before the Court a profoundly distorted factual and legal picture. The entirety of its case hinges on a deliberately curated, decontextualized, and manipulative description of the reality of current hostilities.
11. The attempt to weaponize the term genocide against Israel in the present context, does more than tell the Court a grossly distorted story, and it does more than empty the word of its unique force and special meaning. It subverts the object and purpose of the Convention itself – with ramifications for all States seeking to defend themselves against those who demonstrate total disdain for life and for the law.
23. The annihilationist language of Hamas’s Charter is repeated regularly by its leaders, with the goal, in the words of one member Hamas’s political bureau, of the “cleansing of Palestine of the filth of the Jews”. It is expressed no less chillingly in the words of senior Hamas member, Ghazi Hamad, to Lebanese Television on October 24th, 2023 who refers to the October 7th attacks, what Hamas calls the Al Aqsa Flood, as follows: [Screen clip 2] [“The Al Aqsa Flood”, he says “is just the first time, and there will be a second, a third and a fourth”]. In the continuation of this interview, Hamad is asked: “Does that mean the annihilation of Israel”. “Yes, of course.” he answers. “The existence of Israel is illogical”; and then says “Nobody should blame us for the things we do. On October 7, October 10, October 1,000,0000 – everything we do is justified”. Given that on October 7, before any military response by Israel, South Africa issued an official statement blaming Israel for the “recent conflagration”, – essentially blaming Israel for the murder of its own citizens – one wonders whether the Applicant agrees.
24. Second, it is in response to the slaughter of October 7 – which Hamas openly vows to repeat – and to the ongoing attacks against it from Gaza, that Israel has the inherent right to take all legitimate measures to defend its citizens and secure the release of the hostages. This right is also not in doubt. It has been acknowledged by States across the world.
25. Astonishingly, the Court has been requested to indicate a provisional measure calling on Israel to suspend its military operations. But this amounts to an attempt to deny Israel its ability to meet its legal obligations to the defense of its citizens, to the hostages, and to over 110,000 internally displaced Israelis unable to safely return to their homes.
27. Hamas is not party to these proceedings. The Applicant, by its request, seeks to thwart Israel’s inherent right to defend itself – to let Hamas not just get away with its murder, literally, but render Israel defenseless as Hamas continues to commit it.
29. 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. An organization that has violated every past ceasefire and used it to rearm and plan new atrocities. An organization that declares its unequivocal resolve to advance its genocidal plans. That is an unconscionable request, and it is respectfully submitted that it cannot stand.
30. Third, the Court is informed of the events of October 7 because, if there are any Provisional Measures that should appropriately be indicated here, they are indeed with respect to South Africa itself.
31. It is a matter of public record, that South Africa enjoys close relations with Hamas, despite its formal recognition as a terrorist organization by numerous States across the world. These relations have continued unabated even after the October 7 atrocities. South Africa has long hosted and celebrated its ties with Hamas figures, including a senior Hamas delegation that – incredibly – visited the country for a “solidarity gathering” just weeks after the massacre.
50. In these circumstances, there can hardly be a charge more false or more malevolent than the allegation against Israel of genocide.
51. The Applicant has, regrettably, engaged in a transparent attempt to abuse the Convention’s compulsory jurisdiction mechanism, and in particular the Provisional Measures phase of proceedings, to bring under the purview of the Court matters over which, in truth, it lacks jurisdiction.
52. Madame President, Members of the Court, the Genocide Convention was a solemn promise made to the Jewish people, to all peoples, of “Never Again”. The Applicant invites the Court to betray that promise. If the term genocide can be so diminished in the way it advocates, if Provisional Measures can be triggered in the way it suggests, the Convention becomes an aggressor’s charter. It will reward, indeed encourage, the terrorists who hide behind civilians, at the expense of the States seeking to defend against them.
53. To maintain the integrity of the Genocide Convention, to maintain its promise, and the Court’s own role as its guardian, it is respectfully submitted that this Application and Request should be dismissed for what they are – a libel, designed to deny Israel the right to defend itself according to the law from the unprecedented terrorist onslaught it continues to face, and to free the 136 hostages Hamas still holds.
#Watch: Dr. Galit Rajuan brutally dismantles South Africa in a 4-minute presentation at the ICJ. pic.twitter.com/56SKmYulg6
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) January 12, 2024
Not all heroes wear capes, but many of them wear gowns.
Our superstar legal team rebutting South Africa’s absurd blood libel at the ICJ, headed by the expert who literally wrote the textbook on international law. pic.twitter.com/cMzEvauaTL
— Eylon Levy (@EylonALevy) January 12, 2024
Germany is intervening on the side of Israel:
The Federal Government rejects the accusation of genocide made against Israel before the @CIJ_ICJ. It is unfounded. In the main hearing Germany will therefore express its position as a third party. We continue to support the work of the ICJ as we have for decades. https://t.co/09HGbJC0Lw
— Steffen Seibert (@GerAmbTLV) January 12, 2024
Germany announced Friday it will Intervene in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) under an article allowing them to seek clarification on uses of a multilateral convention
South Africa has charged Israel with violations of the UN Genocide Convention
article:… pic.twitter.com/4JPx2gsWn5— AsperGirl (@an0nygir1) January 12, 2024
Now Canada speaks out against South Africa's baseless #ICJ genocide claim against Israel, with @JustinTrudeau saying Canada does not support "the premise of the case brought forward by South Africa."
Canada now joins US, Germany, UK and Austria, in opposing South Africa's claim. pic.twitter.com/PF8kwwTtia
— Arsen Ostrovsky 🎗️ (@Ostrov_A) January 12, 2024
The ICJ being a function of the General Assembly, has limited power to implement anything. But even the finding of Genocide, though without basis, would be another bullet in the guns of the fake human rights activists and genocidal terrorists and governments to use against Israel.
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Cut all aid to Africa, most goes to graft and is a complete waste of money.
We should be giving persecuted farmers from South Africa to America, while expelling those who do not belong here.
Why does anyone care about the ICJ? Of what consequence is their rulings?
Sadly we do need to care about it as the left uses rulings to further weaponise EVERYTHING against the Jews.
When Israel is found guilty, which of course they will be, the media and every leftist organ that exists out there will use the ruling to further incite hatred against Jews in Israel and around the world.
Unfortunately this is why these cases must be fought hard against!
If Israel is found to have committed genocide, it means that its leaders and its soldiers can become subject to arrest wherever they go. In other words, they will not be able to leave Israel. This theoretically applies to regular soldiers. It’s bad. It can chill the desire or ability of soldiers to defend Israel. I don’t know the exact mechanics. But I can tell you that Israelis fear this.
This nonsense from S. Africa is the exact reason I am so glad that the United States has never recognized the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice (ICJ). At least, not yet. Anything is possible under the Biden regime, after all.
Israel is making a huge mistake by even appearing at the sick joke of a fake “court of the world”. Anyone who gives that turd of an organization any credibility, at all, is making a serious and dangerous mistake. Israel should ignore the ICJ since it is not a court and has no power to do anything. It is a huge mistake to even acknowledge that POS joke.
And South Africa is a place that needs serious cleaning out. The richest country in all of Africa has been reduced to a barbaric, savage sh*thole where they can’t even keep the lights on. It will not long before that country totally devolves to jungle life – and worse – and everyone with a brain knew this was what was going to happen the minute the South Africans gave in and let Africa have control of that place. That was the end … and everyone knows it. Of course, no lefty will make a peep when they finally go full Rhodesia on the remaining whites and take South Africa totally into the abyss …
This whole world is in such sorry shape … and all of it just to try and let the losers of the world feel better about themselves, for no reason at all (other than the insane white delusional guilt of weak and damaged Westerners).
As bad as apartheid, was, the true measure is whether the people are better off now than then. ZA is a racist state. They wish to purge Africa of whites.
They wish order every single white
I thought the same too but the left will use the eventual guilty finding to further incite hatred against Jews where ever they can be found.
And because of this the case must be fought!
Of course the left (and all of the haters of the West) will use this show trial. That cannot be stopped. But it is a huge mistake to lend any credibility to such show trials. The ICJ is not a real thing. It should be ignored … if it can’t just be bombed out of existence.
It is a gigantic mistake to make pretend any of these putrid globalist organizations has any credibility or reason to even exist. They must be treated with the disgust and disdain they deserve. You do not get rid of these things by playing with them. Israel is making a grave error. Of course, I have been advising my Israeli friends that Israel should have left the UN decades ago – and it should have.
Jabotinsky laid out the best response to the likes of the ICJ. He was writing about the blood libel in Russia but there’s not much difference. https://web.archive.org/web/20080102223444/http://www.csuohio.edu/tagar/boris.htm
A cogent and compelling rebuttal by Israel. Good thing I wasn’t in charge. I’d have borrowed a line from the Bad News Bears and told South Africa to take their complaint and shove it up their ass.
I got up at 4:00 am to watch this because I thought it was important to see it.
Although all of Israel’s counsel were good, I thought Tal Becker and Galit Rajuan were particularly strong.
The South African agent was playing with his phone during the Israeli presentation. This was his way of showing disrespect for the Israelis but he also showed disrespect for the court. If I had done that in court when I was practicing the Judge would have excoriated me.
I was disappointed by John Dugard representing South Africa. First just the fact that he would do that. But also to learn that he had deceived the court by pretending that Israel had not responded to South Africa’s diplomatic note about the genocide assertion.
Really everything about the South African delegation and presentation was excrable
The UN started out as a forum for nations to work together; over time self-promoting to some international over-goverment, able to put demands on countries.
Then, the UN appointed themselves the prerogative to establish a court among nations, set up so Karen Countries can complain about issues they’re not involved in.
Well, with those origins and attitudes, I know I’m all about listening to them.
The UN started as the insane reaction of traumatized nations after WWII. It was never meant to be anything but a joke and for the duration of the Cold War it was understood by all to be nothing serious. The only thing that mattered during the Cold War was the US and the USSR thought about things. But that all changed when the Soviet Union fell and the idiot supreme – George HW Bush decided that that was the perfect opportunity to take an idiotic and dangerous idea and start empowering it. Bush supercharged the UN after the fall of the SOviets and that was one of the most disastrous and moronic acts in all of human history.
The UN was an idea that could never be justified by anyone with a brain. It was an idea that was not even theoretically defensible – a competitionless, peerless entity. Once such a thing was empowered it was guaranteed to grow in grotesque and dangerous ways, as we all know this from basic market theory and evolutionary theory. No peerless, competitionless entity can be allowed to have any power or it will overwhelm whatever system it is in and it will be unpredictable (aside from the certainty that it will be bad) in how it will develop since there is nothing around to shape or curb its growth.
Bush Jr had a chance to pull us out of that disgusting entity but he wimped out and then turned around and helped empower it even more .. as the Bush side of him eventually took over his Presidency.
Trump once offered, back in New York, to take the UN and turn it into condos. That would have been a vast improvement in the world. Sadly, that fetid, disgusting, dangerous organization still exists and it wreaks havoc with everything it touches. It is all the losers int he world given gobs of money to show why they are all the losers of the world.
Trump never should have sent anyone to the UN. He should have just had a special chair made for our seat on the Security Council which stayed empty, except for a big placard on it that said “VETO”. And left that there until we could get US funding of that sh*thole withdrawn and have it wither away to the dust it rightfully should be. There are few things in this world more dangerous than the UN.
So, you have a take on this?
I don’t think only Feckless-R’s were el presidente through there, though the Screaming-D’s did demonstrate that they, too, could be ineffective.
Bush-the-Elder (R, establishment) of one term was preceded by one term of Jimmy Peanut Farmer (D, self-righteous), then succeeded by Slick Willy (D, er, slick willy) for two terms..
Then came Bush-the-Younger (R, dynasty? this?) for two terms, followed by Barry O (D, messiah) for two terms.
The Donald (R, bluster) had one term’s incremental unwinding. Now we have Dark Brandon (D, Where is that?) fronting whatever foreign policy he’s told to.
It should go the way of the League of Nations.
Amazing opening statement. Should be required for the ignorant woke.
Turning the Convention into a weapon. It does not get more cynical than when abusers pervert the system to protect abusers and destroy humanity in the process.
ICJ is stupid but this is a pretty good opportunity for Israel to make its case where many around the world will watch.
Bang on. I love the smell of realpolitik in the morning.
That such a garbage and vile claim is even entertained by the ICJ is despicable farce.
Transparently politicized and fallacious claims grounded in slander, bigotry and racial animus shouldn’t even be heard, in the first place.
That Israel has to actually appear (I realize that it could have blown off this proceeding, but, for the sake of morality and truth, understandably chose not to) to rebut these viciously false and slanderous claims is a product of the same moral and intellectual failures that have seen Israel and Israeli Jews relentlessly and unfairly demonized by Muslim supremacists and their useful idiot, European dhimmi and American Dhimmi-crat enablers and allies, who’ve also granted undeserved legitimacy and deference to manifestly contrived and fallacious narratives of alleged Arab Muslim “Palestinian” victimhood and grievance.
I would like to understand how South Africa, which is far removed from the Middle East, is able to make this complaint to the ICJ in the first place. After all, they aren’t really involved in the conflict between Israel & Gaza/Hamas so what is the legal basis for SA to make this complaint, exactly.
South Africa is standing on the notion of “anti-colonialism” to express solidarity with the Hamas terrorist thugs. There is a history of mutual support between the PLO and the African National Congress (Mandela’s party). I’m not saying this is a substitute for proffering a substantive legal rationale for this transparently slanderous and despicable filing, but, that’s the background history at work.
Of course, if South Africa actually acknowledged true facts and history, it would concede that Jews are the indigenous people of Israel; not the Arab Muslim, so-called “Palestinians” whose descendants came from Arabia and invaded innumerable states and territories, after their wretched ideology’s founding. The “Palestinians” are fairly characterized as invaders.
*whose ancestors came from Arabia…”
As I understand it, though far from certain, the ICJ is setup so *anyone* can make a claim on the basis of (in)justice, of several indentified types.
Any nation playing Karen has standing.
South Africa is an ally of Hamas and has very warm relations with their leadership caste.
There will be peace in Israel once the last militant arab conquistador masquerading under the guise of ‘Palestinian’ reaches room temperature
The South African U.N delegation members sitting on the ICJ which have for over 20 years turned their backs to the atrocities in Nigeria, Africa of Boko Haram Islamic terrorists who have decimated by genocide on Nigerian citizens where 50,000 Christians have been killed and forcing 2.5 million to flee. The same ICJ who fails to stand up and hold accountable Boko Haram for Genocide in just not Nigeria, but also Niger, Cameroon and Chad. Yeah…Right. The U.N.I.C.J. has no moral high road to charge Israel of Genocide as a retaliation of defending their citizens to being Jewish. as they blindly allow genocide in their South African countries where being Christian is forbidden. What laws are they citing which makes this remotely acceptable?