There are 149 states party to the Genocide Convention. Every one of them has the right to call out the genocide in progress in Gaza and report it to the United Nations. In the event that another state party disputes the claim of genocide – and Israel, the United States and the United Kingdom are all states party – then the International Court of Justice is required to adjudicate on “the responsibility of a State for genocide”.
These are the relevant articles of the genocide convention:
Article VIII
Any Contracting Party may call upon the competent organs of the United Nations to take such action under the Charter of the United Nations as they consider appropriate for the prevention and suppression of acts of genocide or any of the other acts enumerated in article III.
Article IX
Disputes between the Contracting Parties relating to the interpretation, application or fulfilment of the present Convention, including those relating to the responsibility of a State for genocide or for any of the other acts enumerated in article III, shall be submitted to the International Court of Justice at the request of any of the parties to the dispute.
Note that here “parties to the dispute” means the states disputing the facts of genocide, not the parties to the genocide/conflict. Any single state party is able to invoke the Convention.
There is no doubt that Israel’s actions amount to genocide. Numerous international law experts have said so and genocidal intent has been directly expressed by numerous Israeli ministers, generals and public officials.
This is the definition of genocide in international law, from the Genocide Convention:
Article II
In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group
I can see no room to doubt whatsoever that Israel’s current campaign of bombing of civilians and of the deprivation of food, water and other necessities of life to Palestinians amounts to genocide under articles II a), b) and c).
It is also worth considering Articles III and IV:
Article III
The following acts shall be punishable:
(a) Genocide;
(b) Conspiracy to commit genocide;
(c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;
(d) Attempt to commit genocide;
(e) Complicity in genocide.
Article IV
Persons committing genocide or any of the other acts enumerated in article III shall be punished, whether they are constitutionally responsible rulers, public officials or private individuals.
There is, at the very least, a strong prima facie case that the actions of the United States and United Kingdom and others, in openly providing direct military support to be used in genocide, are complicity in genocide. The point of Article IV is that individuals are responsible, not just states. So Netanyahu, Biden and Sunak bear individual responsibility. So, indeed, do all those who have been calling for the destruction of the Palestinians.
It is very definitely worth activating the Genocide Convention. A judgement of the International Court of Justice that Israel is guilty of genocide would have an extraordinary diplomatic effect and would cause domestic difficulties in the UK and even in the US in continuing to subsidise and arm Israel. The International Court of Justice is the most respected of international institutions; while the United States has repudiated its compulsory jurisdiction, the United Kingdom has not and the EU positively accepts it.
If the International Court of Justice makes a determination of genocide, then the International Criminal Court does not have to determine that genocide has happened. This is important because unlike the august and independent ICJ, the ICC is very much a western government puppet institution which will wiggle out of action if it can. But a determination of the ICJ of genocide and of complicity in genocide would reduce the ICC’s task to determining which individuals bear the responsibility. That is a prospect which can indeed alter the calculations of politicians.
It is also the fact that a reference for genocide would force the western media to address the issue and use the term, rather than just pump out propaganda about Hamas fighting bases in hospitals. Furthermore a judgement from the ICJ would automatically trigger a reference to the United Nations General Assembly – crucially not to the western-vetoed Security Council.
All this begs the question of why no state has yet invoked the Genocide Convention. This is especially remarkable as Palestine is one of the 149 states party to the Genocide Convention, and for this purpose would have standing before both the UN and the ICJ.
I am afraid the question of why Palestine has not invoked the Genocide Convention takes us somewhere very dark. Anyone who, like George Galloway and myself, cut their political teeth in left-wing politics of Dundee of the 1970s has (long story) their experience and contacts with Fatah, and my sympathies have always very much lain with Fatah rather than Hamas. They still do, with the aspiration for a democratic, secular Palestine. It is Fatah who occupy the Palestinian seat at the United Nations, and the decision for Palestine to call into play the Genocide Convention lies with Mahmoud Abbas.
It is more and more difficult daily to support Abbas. He seems extraordinarily passive, and the suspicion that he is more concerned with refighting the Palestinian civil war than with resisting the genocide is impossible to shake. By invoking the Genocide Convention he could put himself and Fatah back at the centre of the narrative. But he does nothing. I do not want to believe that corruption and a Blinken promise of inheriting Gaza are Mahmoud’s motivators. But at the moment, I cannot grab on to any other explanation to believe in.
Any one of the 139 states party could invoke the Genocide Convention against Israel and its co-conspirators. Those states include Iran, Russia, Libya, Malaysia, Bolivia, Venezuela, Brazil, Afghanistan, Cuba, Ireland, Iceland, Jordan, South Africa, Turkey and Qatar. But not one of these states has called out the genocide. Why?
It is not because the Genocide Convention is a dead letter. It is not. It was invoked against Serbia by Bosnia and Herzegovina and the ICJ ruled against Serbia with regard to the massacre at Srebrenica. This fed directly through to ICC prosecutions.
Some states may simply not have thought of it. For Arab states in particular, the fact that Palestine itself has not invoked the Genocide Convention may provide an excuse. EU states can hide behind bloc unanimity.
But I am afraid that the truth is that no state cares sufficiently about the thousands of Palestinian children already killed and thousands more who will shortly be killed, to introduce another factor of hostility in their relationship with the United States. Just as at this weekend’s summit in Saudi Arabia, where Islamic countries could not agree an oil and gas boycott of Israel, the truth is that those in power really do not care about a genocide in Gaza. They care about their own interests.
It just needs one state to invoke the Genocide Convention and change the narrative and the international dynamic. That will only happen through the power of the people in pressing the idea on their governments. This is where everybody can do a little something to add to the pressure. Please do what you can.
Hat tip to the indefatigable Sam Husseini who has been pressing the Genocide Convention on the White House.
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Jeremy Scahill ridicule the weapons-claim by Israel
“The Israelis have a multidecade track record of lying, of promoting false information, releasing doctored videos, … so this is a real gamble, and I think that what we’ve seen is Joe Biden using his bully pulpit as the most powerful leader of the most powerful country in the world to give cover for the Israelis to continue their rampage,” Scahill told Al Jazeera.
“I watched the so-called evidence the Israelis have released, and I’m an American from the United States, and I’ve seen more guns in the homes of ordinary Americans than in this purported Hamas Pentagon under al-Shifa Hospital,” he added.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2023/11/16/israel-hamas-war-live-israel-rejects-un-security-council-gaza-resolution
This is pretty funny though, a guy imitating the israeli propaganda videos:
https://twitter.com/rafaelshimunov/status/1724421151911297100#m
By the way, is not the whole brouhaha about palestinians, allegedly storing firearms inside hospital, quite absurd?
Considering that Israel have not only in this war but atleast 40 years back targeted hospitals where the most vunlerable have taken refugee, why would palestinian resistance groups not have weapons at close hand to protect their defenseless people in such a situation?
The situation is also absurd where a defenseless people are to follow the same rules that their military-stronger occupier are to follow?
Everything however small alleged transgression of laws of war palestinians allegedly do is criticized directly by the west while Israel’s systematic and grave warcrimes are excused.
«however small alleged transgression of laws of war palestinians allegedly do is criticized directly by the west while Israel’s systematic and grave warcrimes are excused.»
It is the eternal distinction between our “freedom-fighters” and their “terrorists”, here is a beautiful example:
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2023/11/activating-the-genocide-convention/comment-page-1/#comment-1050096
“You are right Bayard and Antonym is making a silly error. Genocide is killing people because of their type. It is not killing a majority or any fixed percentage of that type. The ICJ found Srebrenica to be a genocidal act. It did not kill a large percentage of Bosnians.”
I guess using the “freedom fighter”/”terrorist” logic, over ten years of HAMAS launching rockets at israeli civilians with no other apparent purpose than to kill a small number out of hatred for their type (nationality) is not genocide, and neither is to attack israeli villages with an incursion also with no military value and with no other apparent purpose (other than provoking a disproportionate reprisal) than to kill a significant number of people, or to take them as hostages, out of hatred for their type (nationality).
I personally think that the definition of “genocide” in the convention is ridiculously wide, and I think it was worded that way to make anti-zionism either advocacy for or attempt at or actual genocide.
But taken literally it not only puts a minimum number on “part”, but it applies to killing or causing serious harm etc. to soldiers as well as civilians (so killing israeli soldiers because of their nationality is also genocide), and so on.
Arguably neither HAMAS nor the israeli government are committing genocide in a proper sense, they are just committing repeated horrible crimes of massacres, even if on a different scale. It is a fanatical fight over the same land by two groups [of …] and their cannon fodder, where neither side holds back because of anything as trivial as scruples or morality, and the ones who profit most are those of their elites that take advantage of the fanaticism to stay in power (on 10/7 HAMAS made a huge gift to Likud, and vice-versa).
“It is the eternal distinction between our “freedom-fighters” and their “terrorists”, here is a beautiful example:”
There is only one thing of which your comment is a beautiful example and that is your total ignorance of anything approaching logic. Quite apart from neither Craig nor I mentioning either terrorists or freedom fighters*, you, as your fellow Zionist did earlier, failed to appreciate the fact that all the people killed were Jews does not mean that all the people killed were killed because they were Jews. If your enemy is of a single race, that does not make every action against them a genocide. If the Jews in the concentration camps had attacked their disarmed guards after the camps were liberated and killed them all, that would not have been genocide, even if all the guards were Germans. They would have been killed because they were concentration camp guards, and as far as I know, that is not a race.
*Always an example of sloppy thinking when these two categories are supposed to somehow be mutually exclusive.
«you, as your fellow Zionist did earlier,»
I guess that calling a series of HAMAS and israeli government actions “repeated horrible crimes of massacre” instead of misusing and cheapening concepts like “genocide” according to a ridiculous definition makes someone a Zionist.
But yes, I am a zionist like Jeremy Corbyn, I support the UN resolutions that give both palestinians and israelis the right to have their states in the Levant and live in them in peace and security, even if many people on both sides commit viciously vile crimes.
«failed to appreciate the fact that all the people killed were Jews does not mean that all the people killed were killed because they were Jews. If your enemy is of a single race, that does not make every action against them a genocide.»
Did I write “jew” anywhere in my comment? I wrote “israeli”, and I did not write “race” I wrote explicitly “their type (nationality)”.
Looks to me like a nasty misrepresentation, as well as comically stupid as the actual text I wrote is displayed just above, so the misrepresentation will not fool anybody.
«If the Jews»
Or if the french/polish/english/russian/… nationals, or the gypsies, or the homosexuals, …
«in the concentration camps had attacked their disarmed guards after the camps were liberated and killed them all, that would not have been genocide»
Because they had it coming like the fascist israeli white settlers or the HAMAS terrorists? 🙂
«even if all the guards were Germans.»
Yet hundreds of thousands of german nationality prisoners were “liquidated” by the USA and USSR militaries, and they were indeed “liquidated” solely because of hatred towards people of german nationality, and according to the Genocide Convention and the principle that “Genocide is killing people because of their type. It is not killing a majority or any fixed percentage of that type” that was genocide, even if that “did not kill a large percentage” of people of german nationality.
BTW while Ehrenburg wrote in the USSR press vile calls for the genocide of all or most germans, Ioseb dze Jughashvili wrote:
https://www.ibiblio.org/pha/policy/1942/420223a.html
“Order of the Day issued on Red Army Day, February 23, 1942 by Joseph Stalin, People’s Commissar of Defense and Chairman of the State Defense Committee of the U.S.S.R.”
“Occasionally the foreign press engages in prattle to the effect that the Red Army’s aim is to exterminate the German people and destroy the German state. This is, of course, a stupid lie and a witless slander against the Red Army. The Red Army has not and cannot have such idiotic aims. The Red Army’s aim is to drive out the German occupants from our country and liberate Soviet soil from the German fascist invaders. It is very likely that the war for the liberation of the Soviet land will result in ousting or destroying Hitler’s clique. We should welcome such an outcome. But it would be ridiculous to identify Hitler’s clique with the German people and the German State. History shows that Hitlers come and go, but the German people and the German State remain.”
Instead Churchill called for the mass “liquidation” of people of german nationality living in cities, out of hatred for their having german nationality, in a speech on 14 july 1941, wasn’t that first advocacy for, and then actual carrying out of “genocide” even if “It did not kill a large percentage of” people of german nationality:
“if tonight the people of London were asked to cast their vote whether a convention should be entered into to stop the bombing of all cities, the overwhelming majority would cry, ‘No, we will mete out to the Germans the measure, and more than the measure, that they have meted out to us.’ ”
“I guess that calling a series of HAMAS and israeli government actions “repeated horrible crimes of massacre” instead of misusing and cheapening concepts like “genocide” according to a ridiculous definition makes someone a Zionist.”
You guess wrong, what makes someone a Zionist is insisting on labelling the small number of Israeli civilians (and it is a small number compared with the number of Palestinian civilians killed) on October 7th a “genocide” as if it somehow is the same as the deaths of over ten thousand Palestinians.
“Did I write “jew” anywhere in my comment? I wrote “israeli”, and I did not write “race” I wrote explicitly “their type (nationality)”.
Looks to me like a nasty misrepresentation, as well as comically stupid as the actual text I wrote is displayed just above, so the misrepresentation will not fool anybody.”
I can read, you know. Are you really too thick to realise that the point I was making does not depend on the example I chose? I could have written “all cats…” and it would still have been the same point. The same goes for the point about the concentration camp guards. 0/10 for logic for you, too.
” Churchill called for the mass “liquidation” of people of german nationality living in cities ”
He did? Where?
https://www.nationalchurchillmuseum.org/do-your-worst-well-do-our-best.html
Bayard
There seems to be absolutely nothing “Zionist” about Blissex’s post.
You may disagree with what he thinks genocide is, but is that any reason for flinging around insults? Aren’t you doing what hasbara merchants do when they call anti-Zionists anti-semites?
Aguirre, anyone who tries to make out that the Israeli deaths on October 7th were some sort of genocide is a Zionist as far as I am concerned. If anti-Semitism can be redefined as including opposition to the policies of the government of Israel, then Zionism can be support for that same government.
The intent and action speaks clearly for that a genocide being commited by Israel. It is a creeping genocide, incremental. And Israel do not hide their goal either, they say that everyone is a target thus the whole of Gaza have also been targeted past 5 weeks.
UN experts point to evidence of Israel’s ‘genocidal incitement’ against Gaza
https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2023/11/16/714719/UN-experts-Israel-genocidal-incitement-Gaza
Hamas do not send rockets against Israel because they are jews, they send them because Israel keep killing palestinians since 1948 with impunity. You know that.
«Hamas do not send rockets against Israel because they are jews»
Actually HAMAS try to massacre israeli civilians not because they are jews, but because their type is being of israeli nationality; their declared objective is to abolish the state of Israel as currently located (my guess is that if the state of Israel were recreated in Greenland or Siberia or Namibia they would stop hating it) and thus the idea of israeli nationality, they repeatedly stated that they have no hatred towards “the jews” as an ethnic or religious group.
But that is also genocide, according to “Genocide is killing people because of their type. It is not killing a majority or any fixed percentage of that type.” and to “destroy, in whole or in part, a national […] group”.
Confusing israeli nationals and “ethnic” jews is a common antisemitic telltale, as also practiced repeatedly by Netanyahu and other fascists.
We are all just debating the ridiculous semantics of the word “genocide” as re-defined by the Genocide Convention because some malevolent buffoons want to claim that the hideous massacres by HAMAS (“freedom fighters”) are not “genocide” while the hideous massacres by the israeli government (“terrorists”) are indeed “genocide”, or *vice-versa*. It is just silly war propaganda, in particular point 5, as well as 1, 2, 4, 10.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2009/1/12/683319/-
“ 1. We don’t want war, we are only defending ourselves
2. The other guy is the sole responsible for this war
3. Our adversary’s leader is evil and looks evil
4. We are defending a noble purpose, not special interests
5. The enemy is purposefully causing atrocities; we only commit mistakes
6. The enemy is using unlawful weapons
7. We have very little losses, the enemy is losing big
8. Intellectuals and artists support our cause
9. Our cause is sacred
10. Those who doubt our propaganda are traitors”
Blissex
No they target them because Israel target palestinians civilians, they respond in kind. If there was no blockade, occupation, you would not have rockets sent from Gaza. With your logic of nationality palestinians are not even allowed to hit IDF because of their “nationality”.
Did you read the latest warning by the UN of a possible genocide unfolding in Gaza?
Israel’s ‘grave violations’ against Palestinians ‘point to a genocide in making’: UN experts
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/israels-grave-violations-against-palestinians-point-to-a-genocide-in-making-un-experts/3055677
In the end of the day we are dealing with an occupied defenseless people vs an occupier, we are not dealing with 2 equal actors, palestinians have the moral, legal backing to fight their tormentor.
“But that is also genocide, according to “Genocide is killing people because of their type. It is not killing a majority or any fixed percentage of that type.” and to “destroy, in whole or in part, a national […] group”.”
That’s not the wording and you know it. “Looks to me like a nasty misrepresentation, as well as comically stupid as the actual text …..is displayed just above, so the misrepresentation will not fool anybody.”
Blissex
You know water, food and power has been denied the confined people of Gaza for five weeks, during which time they have been bombed relentlessly and mercilessly from the skies. You know the Israeli government has targeted hospitals, universities, schools, bakeries, refugee camps. You know from that government’s own words as well as its actions that the intention is a second Nakba: to drive 2 million Palestinians out of Palestine and into the Egyptian desert, never to return.
People’s reactions to seeing this played out in front of their eyes are very revealing of who they are.
South Africa appears to have decided to refer Israel to the ICC for war crimes investigation.
Why not the ICJ? Have they all been threatened not to appeal to the ICJ?
«South Africa appears to have decided to refer Israel to the ICC for war crimes investigation.»
Note that is not referring the israeli government to the ICJ for “genocide”.
I think that I know the reason why it is very rare to start proceedings at the ICJ for “genocide”:
* The “Genocide Convention” redefines the word “genocide” in a ridiculously wide way, so that any kind of persecution or speech against an identity-based (“national, ethnical, racial or religious”) group becomes “genocide” or “attempted” or “conspiracy” or “advocacy” or “complicity” for “genocide”.
* The likely reason “genocide” was so ridiculously redefined was to allow any form, however mild, of anti-zionism to be associated with “genocide” (consider carefully the date and context).
* However the re-definition of “genocide” is so wide that it can be used in many other contexts, so very few governments, most of which have committed or have been complicit or advocated at some point some small or big massacre or some campaign of persecution (some may think of the alleged “hindutva” persecution of the muslims, or the alleged srilankan persecution of the tamils, or the alleged turkish persecution of the kurds, or the alleged massacre of a million chinese by the indonesian government, etc. etc. etc. etc.), want to start a “genocide” accusation race.
My guess is that if Israel is referred to the ICJ for “genocide” then the israeli government will refer HAMAS and many others (the iranian government, the “Houthis” etc.) to the ICJ for “genocide” and “complicity”, “advocacy”, “attempt”, etc., with pretty good chances of success.
What kind of military response by the Israeli government would have been appropriate/legal after the ICJ ruling of 2004?
I am a proud American and in the wholehearted adherence with the values of this great NATION I strongly and comprehensively condem the terrorist state of Israel – the occupier of Palestinian land and killer of its people.
May the GOD align the hearts and minds with the justifiable PEACE measures of those who are responsible as well as directly and indirectly involve or facilitate the ongoing occupation and parallel genocide for over 7 decades.
I would love to remain an active part of this convention and continue to support the actions against the crimes of Israel and other such terrorists.
Thank you Craig. You are a very brave man.
That’s an excellent post Craig. It also led me to read the linked post about the iniquity of the ICC.
Asking the UK government to invoke the convention would be an excellent subject for a petition and if enough signed would force a debate and provide an opportunity to put the evidence before the public and politicians.
stop the genocide. free palestine
Hi Craig, thank you very much for the article, I will repost with the link to the source on my substack.
From the river to the sea, everybody must be free!
I’ve started a petition on the UK Parliament site calling for the UK to invoke the convention. I need five signatures before the petition will go public. I’d be honoured if you were one of the signatories. You can sign the petition here:
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/651915/sponsors/new?token=ItHYqEPmZhL-UznNaKJV
what is more necessary to declare genocide !
Noam Chomsky 80 min. podcast/Video.
everyone should watch.
(I haven´t heard of him since Dan Ellsberg had died.)
It´s a good piece, but the interviewers are so submissive, so skip the first 7 minutes (various university faculty people involved)
Why watch?
– He questions the notions of Apartheid within Israel (but as always calls the occupied territories worse) and he questions indirectly the term “genocide” against the Palestinians. However he is against the use of the word in general. So you might say it´s a “philosophical” criticism “only”, since everyone is using it by now for anything which was not the original intention by Lemkin, so it lost its significance.
link:
https://znetwork.org/zvideo/israel-palestine-possible-futures-a-discussion-with-noam-chomsky/
They do not ask further on the “genocide” issue however (one of many mistakes).
He (as I have too pointed out) reminds of mass killings with 100,000s dead (East Timor). Which were more likely genocide.
(I once asked here a few weeks ago about “extermination” vs. genocide. But in this conversation no such question arose.)
-He doesn´t explicitly say that Gaza is not genocide. But I assume he would rather argue that the massacres there should in themselves be enough to call on the world for action.
Now I don´t know his position e.g. on invoking the Genocide Convention in this case in order to change things on the ground. Because he can be very practical on the other hand too:
e.g. “It makes no sense to claim that Palestinians will ever return to 1948. Because they will never. For that end Israel has even WMDs. So people should stop demanding that and use their energies for something that can be achieved.”
On the other hand he would surely be aware that lawyers seem to need some strong tool in international courts against nations killing people and using all tricks of power or deceit to get away with it. The genocide term is one.
So many questions could have been asked. Like the history of how the genocide term developed over the years. Things possibly hardly known by people on the outside.
– He also argues one needs to be realistic:
There is no legally binding decision on the Palestinians to return. UN resolution 194 was always only a recommendation. And any Israeli lawyer would win an anti-return case in any court on that matter.
He is rather optimistic in his projection nonetheless by creating a context of many decades. And putting today´s state in contrast to 100 years ago.
Of course one has to keep in mind that Chomsky has been deeply involved with the Palestinians for decades. He is their hero.
So he won´t spend time talking about the obvious.
And he tries to offer a different perspective to what is most pervasive via the media now, which, as he often says, are part of the mechanism to deter hope. The worst means of all.
So he sees his job to bring a perspective of hope. (Of course also due to his age and spatial confinement.)
I have been asking myself of late, why governments all over the world have taken it upon themselves to cull – can’t think of a better word – great swathes of their populations?
I think it’s fair to say that at this point in time there isn’t any political appointee that truly represents any nation’s peoples, and what is good for the nation is not good for governments and their handlers, so the chances of them doing anything here is a big fat nought.
Is there anywhere in these laws that might allow a natural person living in a country that has signed, to lay a charge/complaint?