‘’If there have been acts that may be characterized as genocidal, then they have been perpetrated against Israel,’’ stated Tal Becker, legal advisor to the Israeli foreign ministry, during Israel’s defense presentation at the International Court of Jusstice in The Hague, adding that ‘’if there is a concern about the obligations of states under the Genocide Convention, then it is in relation to their responsibilities to act against Hamas’s proudly declared agenda of annihilation, which is not a secret, and is not in doubt.’’
European Coalition for Israel (ECI) called out the South African government for spreading “a modern version of medieval antisemitic blood libels” as the first day of hearings at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague came to a close on Thursday.
In the monthly European Report talk show of the European Coalition for Israel (ECI) recorded in the European Parliament in Brussels on the same day, German MEP Lars Patrick Berg, from the Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group, pointed out that “it was probably no coincidence that the South African President Cyril Ramaphosa conducted important meetings in Doha, Qatar, prior to launching the ICJ probe against Israel.”
Moreover, several officials of the Hamas terrorist organization visited South Africa in December.
Qatar is hosting the political wing of Hamas in Doha and has a long history of animosity towards the Jewish state. Apart from being an important trade partner with Qatar, South Africa has taken the lead in the international campaigning to isolate Israel diplomatically using lawfare as one of their most effective tools to achieve their goals.
In 2001 the South African government hosted the infamous UN conference against racism in Durban which has been described by the late Holocaust survivor and US Congressman Tom Lantos as “the worst expression of international antisemitism after the Shoah.”
In the European Report ECI Founding director Tomas Sandell dismissed the ICJ court case as “a blood libel”. He noted that in the past Jews were accused of being “Christ killers”. Today their crime is “genocide” but the spirit behind these accusations is one and the same, ancient antisemitism.
By presenting this probe at the ICJ, the initiators know fully well that their accusations will give further fuel to the various extremist groups who are currently demonstrating on the streets in Europe in support of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. This will also help to legitimise any form of violence against the State of Israel and the Jewish people based on their false accusations.
“The Jewish jurist Raphael Lemkin, who after the end of Second World War led the campaign which in 1948 led to the adoption of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide would turn in his grave if he only knew that his lifework to prevent another Holocaust would be used against the Jewish people only three months after they had experienced the worst pogroms after the Shoah”, Sandell said.
He concluded by saying that “the civilized world will now have to stand firm against these baseless accusations unless we want to unleash a new wave of antisemitism.”
The hearings in the Hague continued on Friday with Israel’s defense presentation and a verdict can be expected already within the next few weeks.
During Friday’s hearing, Tal Backer, legal adviser to the Israeli ministry of foreign affdairs said : ‘’Rafael Lemkin, a Polish Jew who witnessed the unspeakable horrors of the Holocaust, is credited with coining the term Genocide. He helped the world recognize that the existing legal lexicon was simply inadequate to capture the devasting evil that the Nazi Holocaust unleashed.
‘’The Applicant has now sought to invoke this term in the context of Israel’s conduct in a war it did not start and did not want. A war in which Israel is defending itself against Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and other terrorist organizations whose brutality knows no bounds,’’ he said.
‘’If there have been acts that may be characterized as genocidal, then they have been perpetrated against Israel,’’ stated Tal Becker, adding that ‘’if there is a concern about the obligations of states under the Genocide Convention, then it is in relation to their responsibilities to act against Hamas’s proudly declared agenda of annihilation, which is not a secret, and is not in doubt.’’
He added, ‘’the civilian suffering in this war, like in all wars, is tragic. It is heartbreaking. The harsh realities of the current hostilities are made especially agonizing for civilians given Hamas’s reprehensible strategy of seeking to maximize civilian harm to both Israelis and Palestinians, even as Israel seeks to minimize it.”
Some observers noted that in 2017 the International Court of Justice condemned South Africa for hosting then Sudanese leader Omar al-Bashir who was wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity.