Just last week, Friday, December 29th, 2023, before ringing in the New Year, South Africa launched a case, via the United Nations top court, against Israel accusing the country of conducting genocide against the Palestinians of Gaza.
It was recently reported in an article by the Associated Press that, according to South Africa, the magnitude of death, destruction, and humanitarian crisis in Gaza from the Israeli military campaign against Hamas meets the threshold of genocide under international law". South Africa also pointed to the country's "indiscriminate use of force and forcible removal of inhabitants" and asked the court to issue an interim order for Israel to halt its military operations in Gaza immediately.
Normally, Israel disregards cases against it referring to them as "unfair and biased". However, Eylon Levy, an official from the Prime Minister's office stated, "The state of Israel will before the International Court of Justice at the Hague to dispel South Africa's absurd blood libel". In another statement pulled from the local newspaper titled Yediot Aharonot, national security advisor Tazchi Hanegbi opined that "the Jewish people know more than any other what genocide is". In another statement to the Associated Press Barak Medinalaw, a professor at the Hebrew University Of Jerusalem, simply said "Israel can't afford to ignore this".
It is unclear as to how this case will be handled by the ICJ (International Court Of Justice) but Israel appears to be conducting business as usual. They've stated that "more than 8,000 militants" have been eliminated and placed the resulting civilian casualties on Hamas reiterating that the militants insert themselves in residential areas, as well as schools and hospitals. According to Reuters, "Lawyers representing South Africa are preparing for the hearing scheduled on January 11th and 12th".
The statement comes from Clayson Monyela, a spokesperson for South Africa's Department of International Relations and Cooperation who created a post regarding the case on X.
HNGN previously reported on the legal steps that South Africa is taking where Lior Haiat, the spokesperson for Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs told Forbes the claim "lacks both a factual and a legal basis, and constitutes a despicable and contemptuous exploitation of the Court." Haiat went on to accuse South Africa of "cooperating with a terrorist organization that is calling for the destruction of the State of Israel," and called on the ICJ and international community to reject the case.
