What is South Africa's genocide case against Israel?

The Star

South Africa will this week ask the U.N.'s highest legal body to order Israel to suspend its military campaign in Gaza - the first step in a case alleging genocide that could take several years to complete.   WATCH MORE: https://thestartv.com/c/news SUBSCRIBE: https://cutt.ly/TheStar LIKE: https://fb.com/TheStarOnline

Transcript

00:00 A South African case accusing Israel of genocide in the Gaza war heads to the International

00:07 Court of Justice for hearings this week.

00:11 So what's it about?

00:12 And what happens next?

00:16 The ICJ, also known as the World Court, is the highest United Nations legal body.

00:22 It should not be confused with the International Criminal Court, also in The Hague, which handles

00:27 war crimes cases against individuals.

00:30 The ICJ deals with "disputes between states."

00:34 That's often about borders, but increasingly includes cases by countries accusing others

00:39 of breaking UN treaty obligations.

00:42 Gambia, for example, brought an ongoing genocide case against Myanmar in 2019, over the latter's

00:50 treatment of the Rohingya minority group.

00:55 South Africa's 84-page filing accuses Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians

01:00 in Gaza.

01:01 It's doing this, South Africa claims, by killing them, causing serious mental and bodily

01:07 harm and by creating conditions on life "calculated to bring about their physical destruction."

01:14 South Africa, which has a long history of supporting the Palestinian cause, also alleges

01:19 that Israel has failed to curb incitement to genocide by its own officials, in violation

01:25 of the Genocide Convention.

01:30 Israel has called the claim "baseless" and said it will present its case in court.

01:34 A government spokesman accused South Africa of "an absurd blood libel."

01:41 Israel began its bombardment of Gaza following Hamas' October 7th cross-border rampage,

01:47 in which, according to Israeli officials, 1,200 people were killed.

01:52 The Israeli military says it tries to avoid harm to civilians but blames Hamas for embedding

01:57 fighters within residential areas, something the group denies.

02:02 Palestinian health officials say the Israeli offensive has so far killed more than 23,000

02:08 Palestinians in Gaza.

02:14 The ICJ hearing on January 11th and 12th will deal with a request by South Africa for "provisional

02:20 measures," including ordering Israel to suspend its military campaign in Gaza.

02:25 Such measures are designed to prevent a dispute from getting worse, while the court looks

02:29 at the full case.

02:31 The ICJ's rulings are final and without appeal, but it has no way of enforcing them.

02:37 However, a ruling against Israel could hurt its international reputation and set a legal

02:42 precedent.

02:43 There are several hoops to jump through before a full case could be heard.

02:49 The ICJ needs to find that it has prima facie jurisdiction, after which Israel would get

02:53 another chance to argue the court has no grounds to look at South Africa's claim.

02:57 It is not unusual for several years to pass between the initial claim and the actual hearing

03:01 of the case on its merits.

03:03 For more information visit www.icj.org

03:05 For more information visit www.icj.org

03:07 For more information visit www.icj.org

03:09 For more information visit www.icj.org

03:11 [BLANK_AUDIO]

Category

Transcript

Recommended