I also listened to some of the opening submissions. What I found interesting (apart from the Nuttyahoo glitch mentioned by @CJ1 above) was the occasional view of the judges. Some listened and made notes at key points. Others seemed to be more interested in leafing through documents. One or two looked like they might have trouble making it to lunch.
That aside, I cannot see (from the presentations), how they can do anything but find in SA’s favour. The real test will be what action they then take.
As far as action is concerned, at this stage the ICJ can issue a cease and desist ruling. That would already be a terrible blow to Israeli propaganda efforts and their quisling euro-us supporters. This would then go to the Security Council where it will presumably be vetoed by the US. That opens the door back up in the General Assembly where the law states that member states have a duty to prevent genocide and can determine a wide range of actions such as economic or diplomatic sanctions right up to choosing to suspend Israel from the UN altogether.
The way I see it is that all these are steps on the road to a full de-legitimising of the Jewish supremecist colonial state.
Weaseling out of this will only delegitimise our governments’ support for genocide.
My slip may not be a slip based on the oral statements from the Israeli team I have just heard ( I missed the earlier statements before the morning break so I can’t comment on those yet.) - the later statements were just assertions based on Israeli authority assertions without any evidence from unbiased sources or sources free of conflicts of interest. Why would we trust Israeli statements on its own conduct - over 30,000 innocent Palestinians murdered in around 100 days which is still continuing speaks for itself - to suggest Hamas killed even some of these people requires real evidence not just State assertions, imo.
I am sad to say that I think the court will throw the case out, imo, because of the massive implications for the whole of Western armed conflicts now and in the future and because Israel will have access to the same kind of information Epstein had as well as the trillions it can throw at the target. But if they do it spells the end of the ICJ and ultimately the end of the UN and Israel for bringing it about.
Thanks for these reports on proceedings. Can’t expect honest coverage in the mainstream that’s for sure.
Tangentially, I’ve not seen any report so far not describing Houthis as simply attacking western shipping, like it isn’t ships heading for Israel that are being stopped.
As if it’s legtimate to bomb a country that is policing its own waters.
Hi @Evvy_dense , I meant to contrast the biased Israeli “evidence” from conflicted interests with the numerous objective statements from UN organisations and personnel as well as Israeli sources found in the footnotes of the 84 page RSA application. Norman Finkelstein made the point here at around 12 mins in:
Is there a danger of overthinking the concept.
In genocide you don’t have to kill them all.
If this is decided by micro-arguments you might as well abandon the legal idea of genocide, which was aimed first and foremost at deterring what was obvious - the deliberate elimination of a people.
There were supposed to be no buts. Israel has been openly floating all sorts of ideas, common to which is the absence of the to-be-obliterated Gaza, and of course of Gazans themselves who are meeting whatever fate befalls them in the murderous and reckless shake-up that Israel has actively and deliberately brought about, with western approval.
Here’s Norman Finkelstein again ( its 3 out of a YT 4 parter) on the Israeli oral part of the ICJ proceedings - his conclusion, Israel may have gotten away with it yet again!
cheers
P.S. a summary of the Israeli oral presentation is here, there are no comments on it :
Thanks @CJ1 I’ve been checking in periodically but not finding this. I heard that BBC and Sky were streaming the proceedings of Israel’s defence BUT NOT Day 1…
Edit: Craig confirms this. I thought it was a quite marvellous piece, especially given the time constraints, and his self-criticism is both harsh and very honest.
If only he could concede to having misjudged the flu d’etat . . .
This may not figure in the Genocide case against Israel but is certainly relevant to a crime against humanity - the use of gas to kill indiscriminately and thereby breaching the prohibition on the use of chemical and biological weapons ( but of course no-one mentions this ):
" Maayan also questioned whether Israel was trying to whitewash the operation, as she believes they may have sacrificed the three hostages in order to kill Jarandor.
She said the Israeli army pumped poisonous gas into the tunnel area where her son was being held.
Hi folks, whatever happens on the ground in Palestine following the ICJ’s judgement on the plausible case for genocide by Israel and the issuing of provisional measures, the ICJ has thrown everything they could at Israel:
It is now law that it is plausible that Israel has committed the worst human crime on the books - genocide - and inter alia must immediately stop killing Palestinians.
It will be interesting to see whether BiBiC, Skynews, Mainstream Press actually report this decision and if they do how do they spin it.
cheers
PS apparently TLN commentators and sites like Aljazeerea consider that the provisional measures announced by the UN ICJ do not demand a ceasefire - how does the binding provisional measure from the ICJ on Israel to - not kill any Palestinians or inflict serious bodily or mental harm on any Palestinian in Gaza from this day forth and requiring Israel to make sure its military do not do these acts - not amount to an order of the court to ceasefire?
1:15:00 in - a summary of the provisional measures: https://www.icj-cij.org/multimedia-live-original
they also go on to demand of Hamas and other Palestinian forces that Israeli hostages are handed back to Israel immediately.
PPS this was reported in Aljazeera:
" ‘If you read the order, by implication a ceasefire must happen’:
Speaking on the steps of the seat of the ICJ, Naledi Pandor, South Africa’s minister of international relations, tells reporters Israel will have to halt fighting in Gaza if it wants to adhere to the orders of the UN’s top court.
“How do you provide aid and water without a ceasefire?” Pandor said. “If you read the order, by implication a ceasefire must happen.”
Exactly. I don’t think the court could rule definitively on genocide in a short time period; so this ruling was the most usefult to Gazans that they could make at present.
“It is now law that it is plausible that Israel has committed the worst human crime on the books - genocide - and inter alia must immediately stop killing Palestinians.”
Yes. Reactions are understandable, and a call for ceasefire would have been good though unattainable in ths time frame. But the main point is that the calls for a ceasefire can now be built on this legal footing of the plausibility of genocide. The international community is supposed to stop plausible genocide scenarios too.
Thanks for articulating the key points that are being missed among the emotions.
Yves at Naked Capitalism makes the point that calling directly for a ceasefire might have resulted in accusations of bias as the ICJ has no jurisdiction over Hamas, so such an order would have been called one sided. The ICJ has sidestepped this.
As you say they are de facto calling for a ceasefire and have ordered Israel to report back in a month on exactly what measures they have taken in this regard.
Hi @AlanG , I think we have to be realistic about all Courts including the ICJ - the judges are political appointees and will be looking for ways to follow their political masters.
I noted that the US citizen, President of the ICJ, Joan Donoghue when reading out the decision of the ICJ very rarely lifted her eyes up from the script - but it was quite telling she did so at one point ( around 1:11:00 in ) having laid down provisional measures telling Israel to stop killing and injuring Palestinians in Gaza , she added we recall that to fall under the scope of section 2 of the convention you have to act with genocidal intent - i.e. to destroy in whole or in part the group under discussion ( the Gazans ) . This seemed to me to be almost like winking at the Israeli team - intent to destroy a substantial part of the group is key, show it doesn’t exist and we can get you off without all the judges looking corrupt …any way this was my mental doodle!
But at the same time the decision had already established what amounted to a prima facie case of genocide with evidence of both specifically prohibited acts combined with genocidal intent seen in express statements from key Israeli politicians and officials as well as implied intent by just looking at the extent and modus operandi of the acts involved. Given that prima facie genocidal intent has been shown then it would not be difficult for RSA to show further acts by Israel were a continuing operation flowing from the genocidal intent already established in the preliminary stage. So my initial thought ( purely from Joan Donoghue’s facial expression! ) that each and every act of Israeli violence against Palestinians in Gaza from today onwards could be discounted as being without genocidal intent by stamping out orders with an instruction saying " be careful not to harm civilians or their property" whilst winking and nudging - probably cannot be claimed because Israel’s intent discovered todate colours all later actions.
So my conclusion is that the preliminary measures against Israel are probably aimed at all military actions which harm the civilian population. This is surely the equivalent of a general ceasefire order.
The segue from Israel to Hamas was a political move, imo, ( along with the ICJ accepting the Israeli account of OCT 7 as to who killed Israelis and what atrocities took place on that date, and ignoring the Palestinian “hostages” taken by Israel for decades ) - and to justify mention of them by saying Hamas should return hostages immediately as they are in breach of humanitarian law in war was also a political move. Some lawyers might say that since the issue is genocide by Israel and since no act by Hamas could justify genocide by Israel, raising actions taken by Hamas cannot be part of the judgement ( obiter dictum) - but since it can’t be appealed, it seems the Rule of Claw applies yet again.
the result is that Hamas will be in a quandary - do they give up the hostages without any guarantee that Israel will abide by the preliminary measures demanded by the ICJ, or do they wait and see for a few weeks and risk giving Israel an official excuse not to agree to the ICJ’s rulings because Hamas are not obeying them. The ICJ just created this loophole for Israel without even considering a balance of justice - return all hostages Israeli and Palestinian!
sorry about the jumble of my thoughts here.
cheers
PS I bet Donoghue also tried to get the Yemeni Houthis on the humanitarian law point until someone pointed out they hadn’t actually hurt any humans in their Israeli red sea blockade - I wonder if they will be introducing new laws called containerarian laws!
