The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled this Friday that Israel must “immediately” stop its military offensive in Rafah, southern Gaza.
South Africa asked the court to issue this decision as an emergency measure, noting that Israel’s activities in Rafah constitute a “genocidal” operation and threaten the survival of the Palestinian people.
The request is part of a broader case South Africa brought to the court over Israel’s actions in Loop.
Israel maintains that the offensive Rafah is key to defeating Hamas after the October 7 attacks and assures that the South African case is “totally unfounded.”
The ICJ is the highest court of United Nations and can issue legally binding rulings in disputes between countries, but has few mechanisms to enforce its rulings.
In its ruling this Friday, the Court said that Israel must “immediately stop its military offensive and any other action in the Rafah governorate that could inflict on the Palestinian group in Gaza living conditions that could lead to its total or partial physical destruction.”
Is about the first time this court has issued a ruling forcing Israel to significantly change its military operation in Gaza.
Israeli government sources denied the accusations against him and indicated that They would ignore any order to stop their operations.
Right to protection
The judges said Israel did not convince them that the evacuation efforts and the measures it claims to have taken to improve the security of the civilians in the Gaza Stripand in particular of those displaced from Rafah, are sufficient to alleviate the immense risk to which the Palestinian population is exposed as a result of the military offensive in the area.
The case was brought by South Africa under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocidewhich was enacted in 1948, after the Jewish Holocaust during World War II.
South Africa argued that the Palestinians’ inalienable right to protection under that convention was at risk of being violated and called for the ICJ to intervene.
The court’s decision does not determine whether or not genocidal acts are being committed in Gaza, but rather whether there is a plausible risk to the Palestinian people’s right to protection, explains BBC journalist Anna Holligan from the court in The Hague.
The decision constitutes a court order to stop the deterioration of the situation or at least keep it in a kind of waiting period, until the judges consider the broader merits of the case.
“Disastrous” situation
The presiding judge of the ICJ, Nawaf Salamstated that the situation in Gaza has deteriorated since the court last ordered Israel to take measures to improve it.
He assured that the attacks could provoke “physical destruction” of the Palestinians and added that Israel must allow access to Gaza for any UN body investigating accusations of genocide.
The ruling also reiterated the requirement that Israel allow “the unimpeded provision at scale” of basic services and humanitarian aid for the affected areas.
“The humanitarian situation [en Gaza] “it must now be characterized as disastrous,” the ruling says.
International humanitarian aid agencies have noted that insufficient amounts of aid are reaching the people of Gaza, who are facing famine.
The UN suspended food distribution in Rafah on Tuesday due to the dangerous situation. Israel says it has made “great efforts” to ensure humanitarian aid “flows to Gaza.”
Salam also indicated that the court finds it “deeply worrying” that Hamas and other armed groups continue to hold Israeli hostages in Gaza, and called for “their immediate and unconditional release.”
Reactions to failure
South Africa welcomed the order of the highest UN court.
“I think it is a much stronger set of interim measures in terms of wording, a very clear call for a cessation,” South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor said, as reported by the AFP news agency.
Meanwhile, Israel has vowed to ignore the ICJ order to stop its offensive in Rafah or other operations in Gaza.
An Israeli government spokesman, David Mencer, told the BBC: “There is no power in the world that would push us to commit public suicide, because that is what this is about, stopping our war against Hamas.”
For its part, the office of the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahuon Friday rejected accusations of genocide as “false and outrageous,” and said his campaign in Rafah has not “led and will not lead to the destruction of the Palestinian civilian population.”
The presidential spokesperson for the Palestinian AuthorityNabil Abu Rudeina, noted that the ruling “represents an international consensus to end the war in the Gaza Strip“reported the Reuters news agency.
The Palestinian Authority governs areas of the occupied West Bank.
Hamaswho governs Gaza, assured that the call to stop the offensive should cover the entire Gaza Strip and not just Rafah.
“We welcome the decision of the International Court of Justice, which demands that the brutal Zionist entity stop its aggression against our people in the city of Rafah,” a Hamas representative told the BBC.
Minutes after the ICJ decision became known, Israeli fighter jets launched a series of air strikes against Shaboura campin the center of the city of Rafah.
Hamas gunmen attacked southern Israel on October 7, killing about 1,200 people and taking 253 hostages. Since then, more than 35,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in the Israeli offensive in Gaza.
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