[time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]
Back in January, the International Court of Justice responded to a petition asking it to rule that Israel’s campaign in Gaza amounted to genocide. To the disappointment of the petitioner,
The court did conclude, however, that it was “plausible” that crimes related to genocide—possibly but not necessarily including genocide itself—might have occurred (a finding that drew Israel’s ire). In six
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The crux of the
In the weeks after the ICJ order, battle casualties declined: roughly two-thirds of the roughly 32,000 deaths had already occurred by the new year. However, the humanitarian crisis—the part about which the ICG expressed explicit concern—has deepened. The UN
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It is worth asking, given the court’s concerns, whether the humanitarian crisis constitutes genocide. In legal terms, whether the situation can be deemed an act (or policy) of genocide depends on the parsing of the complete wording of Clause 2(C ): whether the conditions were “deliberately inflicted,” whether they reflect a calculation “to bring about . . . the destruction” of the Gaza’s Palestinian population, and, if so, whether an “intent to destroy” at least part of that population can be found to underlay that calculation.
In lay terms, the case is less complicated. The forced movement of much of Gaza’s population from the north of the territory to shelters and tent cities in the south—twinned with the policy of restricting relief to all of Gaza—has made famine practically inevitable. Any plausible assessment of the consequences of these policies would have to constitute a calculation that the population would face the type of risks it now confronts. Indeed,
Moreover, dangerous, slow-developing, and woefully insufficient famine mitigation measures like air-drops and temporary piers demonstrates both an awareness of the need for relief at a policy level and a willingness to be delusionally satisfied in with band-aid measures. That Israel cited these measures, even though they were undertaken by other countries, as evidence of its good will and clean intentions, is damning rather than exculpatory.
What Gaza needs is a massive well-coordinated relief effort. The cessation of hostilities is a prerequisite for that. Recalcitrance on the part of either Israel or Hamas on reaching that cessation is inseparable from responsibility for the humanitarian crisis. In the absence of trust between one another, both sides should commit to allowing a third party—whether the UN, the U.S., the EU, Saudi Arabia or other Arab states, or whomever can be negotiated to play the role—to oversee the delivery of relief and monitor its distribution. Policy debates on issues including sovereignty status, security guarantees, and accountability for international crimes are an essential part of the medium-term solution for Gaza—but they can only begin after Gaza’s human crisis has been addressed.
The reason to act is not that the International Court of Justice might mandate it. Nor because failing to act raises the possibility the court will make a finding of genocide under clause 2(c) of the Convention (although, it might). The reason to act is the moral responsibility to avert a preventable human catastrophe.