South Africa has had enough of the world’s deafening silence on Israel’s genocide of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
The unprecedented number of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by Israel in the besieged coastal enclave over the past three months with impunity has called into question the credibility of international law and prompted South Africa Act. Its top lawyers compiled an 84-page document detailing evidence of these crimes and launched historic proceedings before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) accusing Israel of committing genocide in violation of the 1948 Genocide Convention .
This is music to Palestinian ears. No other country, Arab or Muslim, has ever dared to cross this “red line” before. After all, this is Israel, the spoiled baby of the colonial West – the one project it insisted on keeping alive after the end of the colonial era, camouflaging it with Enlightenment slogans and arming himself with his best weapons. Every state on Earth is undoubtedly aware of the crimes committed by Israel, but none dares to hold it accountable, fearing the reaction of its colonial bosses.
Fortunately, post-apartheid South Africa finally said “enough” and took Israel to the highest court of the United Nations. The nation that defeated a ruthless apartheid regime and built in its place a multiracial, democratic state recognized how the international community’s silence paved the way for Israel’s murderous excesses, and took an important step to put an end to it.
Indeed, charging Israel with the crime of genocide before the ICJ could end Israel’s impunity, create the conditions for a much-needed military embargo, and leave Israel isolated on the world stage. More importantly, South Africa’s case could lead to interim measures including an immediate ceasefire and the entry of sufficient humanitarian aid into Gaza. These measures are urgently needed as thousands of people die in the Gaza Strip every day. More than 23,000 people have already died and thousands more are missing under the rubble. Around 70 percent of the victims of this horror are women and children.
I happen to be both Palestinian and South African and a survivor of the Gaza genocide. I have lost many relatives, friends, colleagues, students and neighbors to Israeli violence over the years.
In Gaza, I survived five attacks or, more accurately, massacres perpetrated by Israel during apartheid between 2008 and 2023. I also experienced the consequences of the deadly siege it has imposed on the strip since 2006. My entire neighborhood was razed to the ground. strikes during the first week of the ongoing genocide. And I’ve been moved four times since.
Like everyone else in this coastal enclave, I experienced the same grim scenario with each massacre: Israel decided to “mow the lawn”, the so-called international community conveniently looked the other way, and for long days and nights, we faced alone the most immoral army in the world – an army that has hundreds of nuclear warheads and thousands of trigger-happy soldiers, armed with Merkava tanks, F-16s, Apache helicopters, naval combat helicopters and phosphorus bombs. Once the massacre was over, everything returned to “normal” and Israel continued to slowly kill us with a stifling siege that keeps our children malnourished, water contaminated and nights dark. And during the many iterations of this deadly cycle that we have experienced, at no time have we received a single word of sympathy or support from the Bidens, Sunaks, Macrons and von der Leyens of this world.
All these massacres committed with complete impunity have clearly shown that Israeli apartheid enjoys the unequivocal support of the white and “liberal” West to do what it wants with Gaza and its people. These massacres were dress rehearsals for the genocide taking place today. They have shown Israel that it can commit war crimes and crimes against humanity without receiving any sanction or condemnation from the international community. After all, no one said anything in 2008, 2012, 2014 and 2021, so why would it be any different now? This is the logic that has allowed Israeli leaders to be so open in recent months about their intentions to “exterminate” the Palestinians in Gaza.
Indeed, since the beginning of this latest massacre, this genocide, a wide range of Israeli officials, from the president and prime minister to senior members of the government, the media and civil society, have clearly expressed their intention to commit genocide. Last week, Israeli Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu, who previously said dropping a nuclear bomb on the Gaza Strip was “an option,” urged Israel to find ways “more painful than death” to force the Palestinians to leave the strip.
Israel’s intention to commit genocide in Gaza may be clearer today than ever, but it is by no means new. In 2004, Arnon Soffer, director of the Israeli Offensive Forces National Defense College and advisor to then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, had already outlined the desired results of Israel’s unilateral disengagement from Gaza in an interview with the Israeli newspaper Jerusalem . Post: “When 1.5 million people live in a closed Gaza Strip, it will be a human catastrophe. These people will become even bigger animals than they are today. … The pressure at the border will be terrible. This is going to be a terrible war. So if we want to stay alive, we will have to kill, kill and kill. All day, every day. …If we don’t kill, we will cease to exist. … Unilateral separation does not guarantee “peace”. It guarantees a Zionist Jewish state with an overwhelming Jewish majority. »
Today, 20 years after Soffer revealed Israel’s intention to “kill, kill and kill” in the Gaza Strip, Gaza is truly dying. People are being killed, maimed, starved and displaced en masse before the eyes of the world’s nations, in what has tragically become the first globally observed genocide in history.
We Palestinians will not forget the sickening cowardice of the so-called international community, which enabled and enabled this genocide. We will not forget how the nations of the world stood idly by while Israel’s racist leaders openly claimed that we, the indigenous people of Palestine, were the “Amalek” – the enemy that, according to the Torah, God had commanded the ancient Israelites to commit. genocide against – and embarked on a racist and inhumane quest to “wipe out” us all.
But we will also never forget what South Africa did for us. We will not forget how he showed us unwavering support and courageously took a stand for us in the world court when even our own brothers turned their backs on us in fear. We will always remember how it linked our struggle, our most fundamental human rights, to global justice and reminded the international community of our humanity.
The ongoing Israeli genocide in Gaza, committed openly and with impunity, has marked the beginning of the end of the Western-led, rules-based international order. However, by courageously standing up for what is right and taking Israel to the ICJ, South Africa has shown us that another world is possible: a world where no state is above the law, where crimes the most heinous such as genocide and apartheid are never accepted and where people are not accepted. from all over the world, united against injustice.
Thank you, South Africa!
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Tel Aviv Tribune.