I’m grateful for the 84-page application filed by the government of South Africa at the International Court of Justice charging Israel with committing genocide in the Palestinian land of Gaza. I can only hope that it earns the worldwide news coverage that it deserves, and that some of the news details seep into the consciousness of Israeli civilians who’ve been sheltered from learning about the widespread devastation that has befallen Palestinians in Gaza during the past 3 months by current Israeli media news outlets. The ICJ court hearings before the Hague began on January 11, 2024. Israel presented its arguments countering the allegation of genocide on January 12th.

And if it’s determined that the accusation of genocide is plausible, the court can immediately order provisional measures like demanding that Israel allow for ample humanitarian aid to reach Gazans, that all evidence be preserved and even the requirement for Israel to desist in its war efforts.

Critically for Israel, the bar to establish plausibility of genocidal actions is low enough for the International Court of Justice (ICJ) justices to take more immediate action, even though it will be years before a final determination is made. This puts the Jewish state of Israel in significant potential peril because if the ICJ determines that Israel might be committing genocide, it makes it much more difficult for the US, or any other country to stand with Israel.

Since Israel’s rebuttal to this charge of genocide has been mostly about how Israel has an absolute right to defend its peoples from the likelihood of future brutal massacres like the one imposed on them on October 7, 2023 when Hamas from Gaza killed 1,200 and kidnapped 240 innocents to be used as hostages, the court should include in its inquiries, the collection of all evidence regarding the timely, ample, accurate, detailed intelligence data from allies and from within shared with Israeli officials, prior to October 7. It’s important to paint the picture of how preventable the Oct 7 massacre by Hamas, was.

U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration should seriously consider an attitude adjustment regarding South Africa’s allegation of genocide by Israel counter to the recent comments by the National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby who called the lawsuit “meritless, counterproductive, and completely without any basis in fact whatsoever.”

Because both Israel and the U.S.A. are bound by the rulings of the International Court of Justice in the Hague, if Israel is found to be guilty of genocide, the U.S. could also be charged with complicity. Instead, if the court rules against Israel, the U.S. could find itself to be in a better position to demand some changes.

See: NYT Opinion | America Must Face Up to Israel’s Extremism

See: The New Yorker: In the Cities of Killing | Milled

The following opinion piece advises the Biden administration NOT to discount this allegation of genocide.As per the January 12, 2024 New York Times report, “Don’t Turn Away From the Charges of Genocide Against Israel” by Megan K. Stack:

Excerpts:

“With the question of whether Israel is committing genocide in Gaza now before the International Court of Justice, the Biden administration has struck a tone of glib dismissal.”

“The administration’s posture of indifference strains credulity.  The 84-page case submitted to the court by South Africa is crammed with devastating evidence that Israel has breached its obligations under the 1948 international genocide convention, which defines genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.” The document before the court is meticulously footnoted and sourced, and many experts say the legal argument is unusually strong.”

“Top Israeli political and military leaders have themselves helped to bolster the case against their government. The words of Israeli officials are being offered as evidence of intent: from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urging Israelis to “remember” the Old Testament account of the carnage of Amalek (“Spare no one, but kill alike men and women, infants and sucklings,” ); to Defense Minister Yoav Gallant vowing that “Gaza won’t return to what it was before — we will eliminate everything”; to the minister of energy and infrastructure pledging, “They will not receive a drop of water or a single battery until they leave this world.” By speaking openly about destroying Gaza and dispersing its residents, Israeli leaders have publicized what has, in other cases of genocide, been hidden or denied.”

“This week’s hearings in The Hague will not answer whether Israel is committing genocide — that will come after a more painstaking collection and presentation of evidence and could take years. For now, South Africa has asked the court “as a matter of extreme urgency” to order Israel to halt its onslaught in order to protect Palestinians and preserve evidence. The panel of judges has to be convinced only that the accusation of genocide is plausible to order provisional measures in the coming days or weeks.”

“Even a determination that evidence suggests genocide would oblige the international community to protect the shellshocked, starving people of Gaza by demanding a cease-fire and flooding the Palestinians with aid. In the long run, the case could lay early groundwork for sanctions against Israel or the prosecution of its officials.”

“The proceedings are meaningful for the United States, too. The Biden administration has been the indispensable sponsor of this war — arming, funding and diplomatically shielding Israel despite increasingly dire reports of Palestinian death and displacement. If the violence in Gaza is found to be genocide, the US could be charged with complicity in genocide, a crime in its own right. Americans should understand that the case is both substantial and serious, and that their own government is implicated.”

“Israel and its U.S. backers will, of course, frame this differently. They will point out, correctly, that Israel suffered an intolerable blow on Oct. 7, when Hamas militants cut a path of atrocities through southern Israel, slaughtering hundreds of civilians and dragging hundreds more back into Gaza as hostages.”

“But self-defense cannot excuse or justify acts of genocide, and Israel’s assault on Gaza is a wildly disproportionate response to the crimes of Oct. 7. Israel did not promise, nor did it execute, a sharply targeted retaliation against Hamas (whose leaders run their political operations out of Qatar) or a strategic hunt for the hostages.”

“Israel has rescued only a single hostage — and Israeli soldiers shot dead three Israeli hostages who were waving a white flag and begging for rescue, later explaining they mistook them for Palestinians. Almost all of the 110 Israeli hostages who’ve made it home were released by truce, negotiation and prisoner exchange.”

“Within hours of the Hamas attack, Israel imposed a brutal blockade on the Gaza Strip, cutting off electricity, water, fuel and food to a trapped population of roughly 2.2 million, about half of whom are children. The blockade itself amounted to the war crime of collective punishment, but that was only the curtain raiser. Within hours, the bombs began to fall — and have continued to this day.”

“In an Israeli television clip cited by South Africa in its application, Col. Yogev Bar-Sheshet spoke from Gaza: “Whoever returns here, if they return here after, will find scorched earth,” he said. “No houses, no agriculture, no nothing. They have no future.”

“Israel has killed over 23,000 people in Gaza, according to the Gazan health ministry. More than 9,000 of the dead are children. More than 1,000 children had undergone agonizing amputations, sometimes with no anesthesia available, by late November, UNICEF says. Entire neighborhoods are crushed, and more than 85 percent of the population has been displaced.”

“To understand this extraordinary spasm of violence as an act of national self-defense, you’d have to accept that Israel’s only chance for safety depends upon Gaza being crushed and emptied — by death or displacement — of virtually all Palestinians.”

“And, indeed, Israeli officials have said as much.”

“Tzipi Hotovely, Israel’s ambassador to Britain, recently explained to the British TV host Iain Dale that Israel had to lay waste to Gaza because “every school, every mosque, every second house” was connected to a tunnel used by Hamas.”

“That’s an argument for destroying the whole of Gaza, every single building in it,” Mr. Dale said.”

“Do you have another solution?” Ms. Hotovely replied.”

“Raz Segal, an Israeli historian and genocide expert who has argued that Israel’s actions in Gaza are “a textbook case of genocide,” recently described to me this cognitive dissonance.”

“The idea that the Jewish state could commit war crimes, let alone genocide, becomes from the beginning an unthinkable idea,” said Dr. Segal, a professor at Stockton University in New Jersey. “Impunity for Israel is baked into the system.”

“Speaking before the tribunal on Thursday, the South African barrister Max du Plessis argued that Israel’s decades-long oppression of Palestinian rights must be regarded as crucial context of the violence in Gaza, which he said “is not correctly framed as a simple dispute between two parties.”

“Israel, he pointed out, is an occupying power “that has subjected the Palestinian people to an oppressive and prolonged violation to their rights to self-determination for more than half a century.”

“The harrowing details from Gaza go on and on. The crushing of the medical system. The slaughter of aid workers. The killing of journalists. The war on libraries, houses of worship and culture. The destruction of families and economic needs and possibility itself.”

“Nowhere is safe in Gaza. This line is repeated in the South African suit. Most of the people are starving. Around 70 percent of the dead are women and children and two mothers are killed every hour, the United Nations has estimated.”

“The South African advocate Tembeka Ngcukaitobi referred to Israel’s denial of fuel and water to Gaza.”

“This admits of no ambiguity: It means to create conditions of death of the Palestinian people in Gaza,” Mr. Ngcukaitobi said.”

“The destruction of bakeries, water pipes, sewerage and electricity networks. The hoisting of Israeli flags over the wreckage. Calls from Israel’s government to return settlers to Gaza.”

“I don’t have to wonder how it could have been allowed to happen. It is happening now, and we’ve all been watching.”