Israel Not Genocidal, US Tells International Court Of Justice In ‘Strongest Terms Possible’
The United States told the International Court of Justice, the principal judicial arm of the United Nations located in The Hague, last week that it intends to intervene in South Africa’s case against Israel and to defend the Jewish state against that country’s charges of genocide.
“To avoid any doubt, the United States affirms, in the strongest terms possible, that the allegations of ‘genocide’ against Israel are false,” wrote Reed Rubinstein, legal adviser of the U.S. Department of State. “They are also unfortunately nothing new.”
Washington “recalls that international fora have been misused to level false charges of ‘genocide’ against the State of Israel since at least May 19764 as part of a broader campaign, including U.N. General Assembly resolution 3379, to delegitimize the State of Israel and the Jewish people and to justify or encourage terrorism against them,” Rubinstein wrote. “Sadly, that effort remains ongoing.”
Pro-Hamas entities, including the Iranian regime, “were already falsely charging Israel once again with ‘genocide’” just days after the Hamas-led attacks on Oct. 7, Rubinstein wrote.
Earlier in the month, Paraguay filed a brief in the case and said that it wasn’t picking side in the case but that the court must not expand the definition of “genocide.”
Rubinstein made a similar point.
“The United States submits that the court should maintain its standard for inferring intent,” he wrote. “Lowering the standard risks broadening the application of the term ‘genocide’ such that it no longer carries its original weight and meaning, and invites attempts to misuse the Genocide Convention as a gateway for bringing extraneous disputes before the court.”
He added that under the convention, a charge of genocide, including during a war, requires proof that the offender intends to wipe a people out at least in part.
“If it might reasonably be inferred from a pattern of conduct that the perpetrator acted without such intent, the standard has not been met,” he wrote.
AIPAC thanked U.S. President Donald Trump and Marco Rubio, U.S. secretary of state, for “standing with Israel and soundly rejecting the outrageous case brought against our ally at the ICJ.”
“America must continue to be a voice of moral clarity in rejecting this baseless charge against our democratic ally,” the pro-Israel group said.
Marc Zell, chairman of Republicans Overseas Israel, called the U.S. intervention “powerful.”
“The United States has submitted to the International Court of Justice in The Hague a position opposing attempts to distort international law and the political exploitation of international judicial institutions, within the framework of the false proceeding initiated by South Africa against Israel,” he wrote.
“The United States emphasized, in the most resolute manner, that South Africa’s accusations are not only false but also intended to hurl false accusations against the State of Israel, as part of a broader campaign whose purpose is to undermine the legitimacy of the State of Israel and the Jewish people and to encourage terrorism against them,” Zell wrote.
“The State of Israel appreciates and values the stance of its friends alongside truth and historical justice, and especially the steadfast support of the United States in all arenas,” he added.
Also on Thursday, Namibia, Hungary and Fiji said that they would intervene in the case. Namibia supported South Africa’s case, while Hungary and Fiji defended the Jewish stated.
“The court has never been called upon before to define the scope of the convention in the context of intense urban warfare,” Fiji wrote. “The war between Hamas and Israel raises specific issues concerning combatants embedded within civilian infrastructure, the use of civilian shields, civilians directly participating in the hostilities, civil-military dual use objects and especially combatant strategies employing massively amassed civilian shields.”
“This situation comes before the court as a novel problem in application of the Genocide Convention,” it said. “It is, therefore, important that intervening states be given the fullest opportunity to present their views on these matters.”
“It is Fiji’s concern that a more lenient and expansive interpretation of the Genocide Convention, as proposed by South Africa and certain states and NGOs, will endanger future peacekeeping operations and participation by states in legitimate urban warfare operations by diminishing the incentive for states to assist therein,” it said.
“For example, if a state were willing in principle to participate in an international peacekeeping force, for instance to disarm a terrorist organization, but were thereby to become vulnerable in this scenario to genocide charges brought by the organisation’s supporting states, then the peacekeeping state would be reluctant to volunteer its military forces,” it added. “This outcome would impair both peacekeeping operations and could seriously impair the integrity and purpose of the Genocide Convention.”
Fiji also warned that “several interventions in this case urge the court to dismantle the accepted principles of treaty interpretation by introducing the novel notion of a so-called holistic approach to treaty interpretation.”
“In Fiji’s view, that holistic approach goes considerably beyond settled law of treaty interpretation and is especially dangerous to the international rule of law when dealing with the crime of genocide,” it said. “The approach departs from ordinary meaning of the terms of the Genocide Convention. It exhibits disregard for the international rules for treaty interpretation and the arrogation of a novel framework for genocide determinations.”
It added that the court shouldn’t necessarily take reports from U.N. bodies or nongovernmental organizations at face value. The latter, it said, “vary greatly in their missions, staffing, resources, partiality, political engagements, relationships with interlocutors, institutional integrity and familiarity with international law as it applies to use of military force by states.”
“The substance of NGO reports must be treated with great caution rather than accepted as ‘conclusive’ evidence,” it said.
“Amnesty International has been influential in promoting the ‘holistic approach’ to inferred genocidal intent and its approach is adopted in interventions made to the court in this case,” Fiji said. “However, the court should be aware that such reports can be based on a cherry-picked selection of statements made by a small number of public figures such as politicians without providing reliable contextual information whether they had command, control or influence over the missions and conduct of the military forces.”
“The making of unauthorised and ad hoe public comments by individual politicians is not uncommon in liberal democracies which uphold the freedom of political expression,” it added.
Further, terrorists and armed combatants cannot be considered “protected groups” under the Genocide Convention, according to Fiji.
“Thus, elements of the Gazan population comprising such armed groups as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Izz al Din al Kassam brigades and al Quds brigades are not protected,” it said. “Nor are their weapons dumps and other war materiel, command and intelligence operations, data centers, propaganda and psychological operations, storage infrastructure and support personnel, whether official or volunteer, irrespective of the size of such armed groups.”
“Even where they number in the tens of thousands, numbers that are comparable to armed forces of many states, these personnel cannot be qualified as merely civilians,” it said. “Nor are they generalizable as a national, ethnical, racial or religious group within the meaning of a protected group under the Genocide Convention.”
Hungary said that the circumstances of the case must be examined, in particular the “heinous terror attacks perpetrated by Hamas against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.”
“When interpreting the Genocide Convention, it cannot be dismissed that the circumstances referred to in the current case are during an armed conflict, where a non-state actor, the terrorist organization Hamas, has consequently been using civilian infrastructure, families and children as human shields,” Hungary wrote.
“The acts of Hamas need careful examination when taking into account civilian casualties and the relevant consequences that these actions might have on the fulfilment of obligations of international humanitarian law, a legal framework that is distinctively broader than the Genocide Convention,” it said.
Hungary added that “recent attempts to broaden the interpretation of the crime of genocide risk diluting the specific normative function of the convention, blurring its boundaries with other international obligations, and eventually undermining the framework of the convention.”
The day before the other filings with the court, the Netherlands and Iceland told the court they intend to intervene in support of South Africa’s allegations against Israel.
The pro-Israel Dutch politician Geert Wilders said that the Netherlands filing was “unacceptable.”
“I immediately introduced a motion of censure about this in our Dutch parliament yesterday,” he wrote. “We should support Israel instead of intervene in this crazy, anti-Israel case.” JNS
