January, 26 2024, 11:25am EDT
Gaza: World Court Orders Israel to Prevent Genocide
The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordered provisional measures on January 26, 2024, in South Africa’s case alleging that Israel is violating the Genocide Convention, Human Rights Watch said today. The court adopted “provisional measures,” or binding orders, that include requiring Israel to prevent genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, enable the provision of basic services and humanitarian assistance, and prevent and punish incitement to commit genocide.
The ICJ held hearings on January 11 and 12 to consider South Africa’s request for provisional measures, which featured the first formal response by Israel before an independent and impartial court to allegations of atrocities against the Palestinian people since October 7, 2023. On December 29, 2023, South Africa had filed a case with the court alleging that Israel is violating the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
“The World Court’s landmark decision puts Israel and its allies on notice that immediate action is needed to prevent genocide and further atrocities against Palestinians in Gaza,” said Balkees Jarrah, associate international justice director at Human Rights Watch. “Lives hang in the balance, and governments need to urgently use their leverage to ensure that the order is enforced. The scale and gravity of civilian suffering in Gaza driven by Israeli war crimes demands nothing less.”
The ICJ concluded it was necessary to indicate certain measures “in order to protect the rights claimed by South Africa that the Court has found to be plausible,” including “the right of the Palestinians in Gaza to be protected from acts of genocide.” The court’s order also requires Israel to prevent the destruction and ensure the preservation of evidence related to the case, as well as to report on the implementation of the measures ordered within one month.
The order is legally binding on the parties. Although South Africa had requested certain other measures in their application, the court’s rules allow the judges to determine what measures to order. The provisional measures order will be automatically sent to the UN Security Council.
The case before the ICJ is not a criminal case against individual alleged perpetrators and it does not involve the International Criminal Court (ICC), a separate body. Rather, the case is “state-to-state” litigation between UN member states governed by legal provisions in the UN Charter, the ICJ Statute, and the Genocide Convention.
ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan recently confirmed that his office has since March 2021 been conducting an investigation into alleged atrocity crimes committed in Gaza and the West Bank since 2014, and that his office has jurisdiction over crimes in the current hostilities between Israel and Palestinian armed groups that covers unlawful conduct by all parties.
“The ICJ’s speedy ruling is recognition of the dire situation in Gaza, where civilians face starvation and are being killed daily at levels unprecedented in the recent history of Israel and Palestine,” Jarrah said. “The court’s clear and binding order raise the stakes for Israel’s allies to back up their stated commitment to a global rules-based order by helping ensure compliance with this watershed ruling.”
Human Rights Watch is one of the world's leading independent organizations dedicated to defending and protecting human rights. By focusing international attention where human rights are violated, we give voice to the oppressed and hold oppressors accountable for their crimes. Our rigorous, objective investigations and strategic, targeted advocacy build intense pressure for action and raise the cost of human rights abuse. For 30 years, Human Rights Watch has worked tenaciously to lay the legal and moral groundwork for deep-rooted change and has fought to bring greater justice and security to people around the world.
LATEST NEWS
'Shameful': 16 Dems Help GOP Pass Israel Security Assistance Support Act
Even if the bill passes the Senate, President Joe Biden has threatened to veto it.
May 16, 2024
Despite U.S. President Joe Biden's threat to veto the Israel Security Assistance Support Act, 16 Democrats in the House of Representatives on Thursday voted alongside 208 Republicans to pass the bill, which will now head to the Senate.
House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense Chair Ken Calvert (R-Calif.) introduced H.R. 8369, which his office claimed "curbs President Biden's misguided efforts to withhold critical security resources appropriated in U.S. law by compelling the delivery of defense weapons to Israel as they fight to protect themselves against radical terrorists."
The House vote was 224-187, with only three GOP members opposing the legislation—Reps. Warren Davidson (Ohio), Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.), and Thomas Massie (Ky.)—and six Republicans and 13 Democrats not voting.
The Democrats who supported the bill are Reps. Matt Cartwright (Pa.), Angie Craig (Minn.), Henry Cuellar (Texas), Don Davis (N.C.), Lois Frankel (Fla.), Jared Golden (Maine), Josh Gottheimer (N.J.), Greg Landsman (Ohio), Jared Moskowitz (Fla.), Frank Pallone (N.J.), Mary Sattler Peltola (Alaska), Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (Wash.), David Scott (Ga.), Darren Soto (Fla.), Thomas Suozzi (N.Y.), and Ritchie Torres (N.Y.).
"These are the fringe extremists of the Democratic Party."
"These 16 House Democrats just voted with Republicans to ignore U.S. human rights law and fast-track weapons to Israel," the Institute for Middle East Understanding Policy Project said on social media, listing the lawmakers. "Shameful."
Noting that the bill would cut off funds from the National Security Council as well as the Defense and State departments until withheld weapons were sent to Israel, Justice Democrats declared, "These are the fringe extremists of the Democratic Party."
While generally supporting Israel's seven-month assault of the Gaza Strip—as critics worldwide decry it as genocide—Biden has recently halted the delivery of some weapons and threatened to withhold more from the Middle East ally, which has now killed over 35,272 Palestinians in the Hamas-governed enclave and wounded another 79,205, according to local officials.
The White House said in a statement earlier this week that the Biden administration "strongly opposes H.R. 8369," which "would undermine the president's ability to execute an effective foreign policy" and "could raise serious concerns about infringement on the president's authorities under Article II of the Constitution."
"The bill is a misguided reaction to a deliberate distortion of the administration's approach to Israel. The president has been clear: We will always ensure Israel has what it needs to defend itself. Our commitment to Israel is ironclad," the White House asserted. "The administration will continue to use all funds appropriated for Israel consistent with legal requirements, including in the recent supplemental, rendering this bill unnecessary and unwise."
"Furthermore, this bill, if enacted, could lead to spiraling unintended consequences, prohibiting the United States from adjusting our security assistance posture with respect to Israel in any way, including to address unanticipated emergent needs, even if Israel and the United States agree that military needs have changed and supplies should change accordingly," the White House warned.
The president has faced mounting pressure—including from some Democrats in Congress—to limit or fully cut off U.S. weapons to Israel, as rights groups have documented Israeli forces' use of American arms to commit alleged war crimes.
Despite such evidence, the Biden administration concluded in a report to Congress last week that Israeli government assurances about U.S. weapons use are "credible and reliable so as to allow the provision of defense articles" to continue.
Politicopointed out Thursday that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) signaled the chamber may not even take up the measure, saying that "the president has already said he'd veto it, so it's not going anywhere," while House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) pledged that "we will sustain the president's veto, as we have done consistently throughout the 118th Congress."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Jews for Jamaal' and Squad Push Back Against AIPAC Attack on Bowman
"It's our duty to fight back," said Rep. Summer Lee, arguing that no super PAC "should be able to drop millions to usurp the conversation for their agenda."
May 16, 2024
As the leading U.S. pro-Israel lobby's political action committee unleashes a nearly $2 million ad blitz targeting Congressman Jamaal Bowman, Jewish allies of the New York Democrat—who is an outspoken critic of what he and many experts call Israel's genocide in Gaza—on Thursday joined progressive lawmakers in condemning right-wing efforts to defeat pro-Palestine incumbents.
United Democracy Project (UDP), the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's (AIPAC) super PAC, has booked $1.9 million in television ads to influence the outcome of the Democratic primary in New York's 16th Congressional District, according to Wednesday reporting by Sludge's David Moore.
"This new ad spending in New York shows once and for all that my opponent, George Latimer, is bankrolled by a right-wing super PAC that has received over $40 million from Republican megadonors who want to defend Republican insurrectionists, overturn voting rights, and ban abortion nationwide," Bowman said in a statement.
"Democrats across New York deserve better, and will reject these attempts to buy our elections and undermine our democracy," he added.
Jews for Jamaal, a pro-Bowman coalition spearheaded by the group Jews for Racial & Economic Justice Action, said in a statement that "we recognize this media blitz for what it is: a desperate move by powerful interests to silence the district's first Black representative in history."
"UDP is overwhelmingly spending its millions in Democratic primaries, mostly against Black and brown Democratic incumbents who speak out against war and for the human rights of Palestinians," the coalition continued. "This massive amount of spending distorts the political landscape, drowning out the needs and voices of everyday constituents with the interests of a few wealthy donors."
"It undermines the very foundation of our democracy, which must be built on the principles of transparency, accountability, and genuine representation," Jews for Jamaal added.
As more and more Democrats speak out against Israel's assault on Gaza—which according to Palestinian health officials has killed, maimed, or left missing more than 125,000 people—and violent repression by Israeli soldiers and settlers in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, AIPAC has lashed out at even the mildest criticism of Israeli government policies and practices, which many experts around the world call genocidal.
Last November, Slate's Alex Sammon reported that UDP was set to spend approximately $100 million in a bid to unseat both pro-Palestine congressional progressives and more moderate Democratic candidates who the powerful lobby group believes don't sufficiently support Israel. Sammon said that Bowman, along with fellow "Squad" members Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), Cori Bush (D-Mo.), and Summer Lee (D-Pa.) are among UDP's top targets.
Some of those lawmakers also rallied to Bowman's defense on Thursday.
"It's our duty to fight back," Lee said on social media. "As somebody who knows these folks intimately, I can speak to the damage UDP causes not just to the candidates they target and smear, but to the communities attached to us and democracy itself."
The congresswoman—who won her primary last month—continued:
Their campaign against me in 2022 was steeped in dog whistles and disinformation. Their most shameful million-dollar attack against me was just unsubtly implying I was a [former U.S. President Donald] Trump supporter... in mailers where my skin was oddly shadowed or darker. For three weeks, they plastered the airwaves and mailboxes in wall-to-wall attacks that overwhelmed our midsized media market. Cable and broadcast, digital and streaming... even children's programming on YouTube was targeted.
Omar asserted on social media that "a people-powered movement will always be stronger than special interest groups."
"We got your back, Jamaal Bowman," she added.
Bush said that Latimer "is being used as a Trojan Horse for far-right billionaires and anti-abortion extremists."
"But from the Bronx to St. Louis, we won't let them win," she vowed.
Bowman, in turn, posted in support of Bush, whom he pledged to defend against "Republican billionaires... coming for her."
Last month, another coalition—the youth-led Protect Our Power campaign—was launched in support of progressive congressional incumbents under attack by AIPAC and other pro-Israel groups.
"The only thing that beats organized money is organized people," the young organizers said at the time. "Fortunately, that's what we know how to do best."
Keep ReadingShow Less
"Yes, Trump, 'I Am a Hater' of Yours," Omar Responds to Ex-President
"You traffic in hate," the Minnesota Democrat said, pointing to his dozens of felony charges and "history of sexually assaulting women."
May 16, 2024
"Yes, Trump, 'I am a hater' of yours."
That's how U.S. Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) on Thursday responded to former President Donald Trump's attack on her during an on-camera interview with the right-wing Minnesota outlet Alpha News.
Reporter Liz Collin pointed out that the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party just endorsed Omar for reelection and asked Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, whether he thinks she is serving Minnesota's 5th Congressional District well.
"Well she hates Jewish people and she hates Israel, there's no question about that, and I think she does a terrible job," Trump claimed, while noting that she may be popular in some areas. "She's a hater, and she hates at levels... rarely seen before."
Since Omar, a Muslim Somali refugee, was elected to Congress in 2018, she has faced an onslaught of Islamaphobia, racism, and mischaracterizations of her positions and statements from right-wing political leaders and media—particularly her criticism of the Israeli government that is currently waging war on Gaza—which have fueled attacks from the public, including death threats.
Republicans last year voted to remove Omar from the House Foreign Affairs Committee. She said at the time: "Is anyone surprised that I am somehow deemed unworthy to speak about American foreign policy? Frankly, it is expected, because when you push power, power pushes back."
In her social media response to Trump on Thursday, Omar pointed to the ex-president's four ongoing criminal cases. He faces a total of 88 felony charges for two federal cases and two state cases—in Georgia and New York. A pair of them stem from Trump's efforts to overturn his 2020 loss to President Joe Biden, which culminated in the January 6, 2021 insurrection.
"You traffic in hate," she told Trump, "and have a history of sexually assaulting women."
Over two dozen women have accused Trump of sexual misconduct, including E. Jean Carroll. Last year, a jury in New York City found the former president civilly liable for sexually abusing Carroll in the 1990s and defaming her after she publicly accused him.
The group Justice Democrats also responded to Trump's attack on Omar Thursday, saying that "there's no greater threat or thorn to Trump and MAGA extremism than the Squad and progressives like Ilhan Omar. The Democratic Party should learn that and listen to them."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular