THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS –South Africa accused Israel on Thursday of subjecting Palestinians to genocidal acts at the opening of hearings at the top UN court on a case brought against the Israeli operation in Gaza.
Eight representatives of South Africa pleaded at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), calling on the United Nation’s judicial body to impose provisional measures for Israel to stop completely all military actions in the Gaza Strip. The South African speakers accused Israel with genocidal acts, genocidal rhetoric, and genocidal incitement.
Quoting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, advocate of the South African High Court Tembeka Ngcukitobi focused on the issue of alleged intent in carrying out genocidal acts and argued that the premier’s invocation of the biblical order to eliminate Amalek in a speech he made to Israeli troops shows that Israel intended and is intending to commit genocidal acts against Palestinians in Gaza.
Stating that the invocation of Amalek has been used by IDF soldiers to justify the killing of women and children, Ngcukitobi showed a video of soldiers dancing while singing ‘’it’s a blessing to kill the descendants of Amalek,’’ and, ‘’there is no such thing as uninvolved’’ civilians. Another video shown by the South Africa team was that of soldiers filming detonations of buildings carried out in the Shujaiya neighborhood.
Ngcukitobi decried what he called ‘’genocidal rhetoric’’ expressed by Knesset members, who allegedly called to crush and destroy all of Gaza and all Gazans, including saying that ‘’there are no uninvolved, there are no innocents in Gaza.’’
Arguing that Israeli leaders indeed incited to genocidal acts, Ngcukaiobi mentioned comments made early after Oct. 7 by Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who allegedly addressed Palestinians in Gaza as animals. “I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals, and we are acting accordingly.”
In the same vein, Ngcukaiobi quoted COGAT, who said, “Human animals must be treated as such. There will be no electricity and no water [in Gaza], there will only be destruction. You wanted hell, you will get hell.”
Blaming Knesset members for genocidal rhetoric, Ngcukaiobi quoted a post on X by Knesset Speaker Nissim Vaturi, “erasing the Gaza Strip from the face of the earth.”
Arguing that for Israel’s leadership, the enemy is not just the Hamas military branch or the organization of Hamas, but all of the Gaza population, he quoted comments made by President Herzog on Oct. 13 - “It is an entire nation out there that is responsible. It is not true this rhetoric about civilians not being aware, not involved. It’s absolutely not true. They could have risen up. They could have fought against that evil regime which took over Gaza in a coup d’etat.”
South African Blinne Ni Ghralaigh KC spoke about ‘’Scenes of horror movies’’ with unnecessary hysterectomies carried out. ‘’Boys and men stripped and degraded are broadcast to the world,’’ she said, adding that boys and men were separated from their families, rounded up and put on trucks, transferred to unknown destinations.
‘’Israel continues to deny it is responsible for the humanitarian crisis, even as Gaza starves,’’ said Ghralaigh, arguing that trucks with the humanitarian aid are either blocked from entering, or rarely approved. Staff who could operate in security, electricity, possibility of communication, all of these are absent, which is while it is impossible to deliver humanitarian aid properly, she argued. ‘’No where and none is safe in Gaza,’’ she added, saying that the humanitarian aiders are also at high risk, with an unprecedented number of UN and aid workers killed in the Strip.
In a clear reference to the Holocaust, ending her plead, Ghralaigh said that every human being must think, ‘’where was I when Gaza was going through a genocide.’’
South Africa demands an emergency suspension of Israel's military campaign in the Palestinian enclave.
"South Africa contends that Israel has transgressed Article Two of the (Genocide) convention, committing acts that fall within the definition of genocide. The actions show a systematic pattern of conduct from which genocide can be inferred," Adila Hassim, advocate of South Africa's high court, told the ICJ.
South Africa points to Israel's sustained bombing campaign, which has killed over 23,000 people in the small, densely populated Gaza Strip, according to Gaza health authorities.
Israel has said South Africa's case is baseless.
Israel launched all-out war after a cross-border rampage on Oct. 7 by terrorists of Gaza's ruling Palestinian Islamist group Hamas in which 1,200 people were killed and 240 taken hostage back to Gaza.
The ICJ is hearing South Africa's arguments on Thursday and Israel's response to the allegations on Friday.
It is expected to rule on possible emergency measures later this month. The court will not rule at that time on the genocide allegations - those proceedings could take years.
The ICJ's decisions are final and without appeal, but the court has no way to enforce them.
With the politically charged case attracting global attention, supporters of both sides of the case planned marches and rallies in The Hague.
Thousands of pro-Israel protesters marched in freezing temperatures in the city center early on Thursday, carrying Israeli and Dutch flags and posters with images of people taken hostage by Hamas.
Heavy police presence made sure the pro-Israel march and a pro-Palestinian march were kept separate.
Gabi Patlis, a native of Tel Aviv who now lives in the Netherlands, said it was painful to hear Israel accused of genocide. "Especially after 7 October - we were the ones that were attacked," he told Reuters at the rally.
The 1948 Genocide Convention defines genocide as "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group."
Israeli forces launched their offensive after Hamas fighters carried out a lightning attack across the border in what became the deadliest day in Israel's 75-year history.
Since then, the offensive has laid much of the densely populated Gaza Strip to waste, and nearly all its 2.3 million people have been driven from their homes at least once, causing a humanitarian catastrophe.
Prof. Vaughan Lowe, offering external council and asked why South Africa had not lodged a complaint against Hamas, said, "
Hamas is not a state and cannot be party to the [genocide] convention, and cannot be party to these proceedings. Other bodies could address the question of past atrocities.’’
Lowe said that Israeli authorities have done ‘’practically nothing’’ to stop the rhetoric of incitement, criticizing what he described as ‘’Israel’s inability to see it has done something wrong, in grinding Gaza and its people into the dust.’’