The United Nations International Court of Justice (ICJ) has declared on Friday that Israel’s control over the occupied Palestinian territories – the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem – “violates international law”, in particular in the case of the exploitation of natural resources and the policy of settler settlements. According to the judges, all of this “amounts to a permanent annexation that prevents the self-determination of the Palestinians”. The UN court, based in The Hague (Netherlands), has denounced that there has been “discrimination and segregation”.
It also urged the Israeli government to cease settlement activity and repair the damage caused by the occupation. The court told Israel to “stop settlements and evacuate the settlers,” more than half a million of them, and urged all states “not to recognize the Israeli presence in the occupied territories as legal.” In addition, the ICJ has asked the General Assembly and the United Nations Security Council to take decisions “to put an end to this situation.”
The ICJ’s advisory opinion on the “legal consequences” of nearly six decades of Israeli control over “the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967” is not binding. However, it is a weighty statement that could help the international community put pressure on Israel to seek a two-state solution.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu immediately reacted to the ruling by arguing that the Jewish people cannot be considered occupiers in what they consider their historic land. “No false decision in The Hague will distort this historical truth,” he argued, “the legality of Israeli settlements in all the territories of our homeland cannot be questioned,” according to a statement from his office.
The case that the court has decided predates the ongoing war in Gaza, and was brought to the court in 2022 at the behest of the UN General Assembly. Nawaf Salam, president of the ICJ, said that “the restrictions on movement imposed by Israel on Palestinians, and the demolition of their homes, constitute acts of systematic discrimination.” He also said that, because of this, Palestinians are unable to exercise their rights. “The occupation cannot be used as a permanent fact.”
Knowing what’s happening outside means understanding what’s going to happen inside, so don’t miss anything.
KEEP READING
In forming its opinion, the court had to review the terms of “the occupation, settlements and annexation of the Palestinian Territories, together with the measures intended to alter the demographic composition, character and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem, and the adoption [por parte de Israel] “legislation and related discriminatory measures,” the General Assembly requested. The Jewish state does not consider these to be legally occupied areas, calling them “disputed territories.”
Last February, some fifty UN member countries filed submissions in this case asking the ICJ to declare the occupation illegal. Some cited the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, which oversees compliance with the UN Convention aimed at preventing it, and which in its Article 3 includes the right to apartheid.
The judges noted that Israel’s separation of Israeli settlers from Palestinian citizens in the West Bank and East Jerusalem “violates that provision.” Riad Mansour, the Palestinian representative to the UN, told the court that his decision would contribute “to ending the occupation immediately, paving the way for a just and lasting peace.” Israel did not participate in the hearings, but sent a five-page statement, published by the court, calling the advisory opinion “harmful” to resolving the conflict.
Israel occupied Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem – the areas that Palestine claims for its own state – during the 1967 war. Since then, it has been building and expanding Israeli settler settlements in the West Bank. In 2004, the ICJ itself declared Israel’s separation wall in most of the West Bank “contrary to international law.” It also demanded that it be destroyed and that affected families be compensated. As it was, as now, a non-binding ruling, Israel said it did not accept it.
The fate of the occupied territories is a different matter from that submitted by South Africa to the ICJ three months after the start of the war in Gaza, which was unleashed after the assault carried out by Hamas on Israeli soil on October 7, 2023, leaving 1,200 dead and 250 hostages, including civilians and soldiers. To date, almost 39,700 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli attacks, according to data from the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health in Gaza.
South Africa argues that Israel has “genocidal intent” against the Palestinian population, and invokes the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide (1948) to which both are parties and which they must abide by. Since then, the ICJ has ordered three rounds of mandatory precautionary measures to prevent acts of genocide against the Palestinian population, including famine.
It is no surprise that Netanyahu has led the Israeli authorities in their rejection of the ICJ announcement. Various ministers and politicians of different persuasions have joined in the criticism, while in the West Bank, Jewish settlers have continued to carry out attacks on Palestinian properties and camps on Friday, unhindered by Israeli occupation troops.
Netanyahu has expanded his reaction of rejection: “The Jewish people are not occupiers in their own land, not even in our eternal capital, Jerusalem, nor in Judea and Samaria. [como se refieren a Cisjordania]“Our historic homeland,” he said. “No absurd opinion in The Hague can deny this historic truth or the legal right of Israelis to live in their own communities in our ancestral home,” he added.
Ultra-nationalists Itamar Ben-Gvir, the Minister of National Security, and Bezalel Smotrich, have been quick to call for the annexation of significant areas of the West Bank in response to the UN court. In a counter-trend to most of the political spectrum, the Israeli NGO Peace Now has issued a statement saying: “It is time to realise that we must end the occupation.”
The ICJ announcement, according to well-known opposition figure Benny Gantz, “is further evidence of external interference that is not only counterproductive to regional security and stability and ignores the October 7 massacre and the terror in Judea and Samaria, but also serves as another example of the ‘judicialization’ of a political conflict.” Gantz claims, according to statements published in the local press, that Israel will continue to defend itself.
Palestinian reaction
The Palestinian National Authority (PNA) welcomed the ICJ’s announcement recognizing an illegality dating back to at least 1967, according to a statement from the office of President Mahmoud Abbas, published by the official Palestinian news agency Wafa. It is “a triumph of justice, affirming that the Israeli occupation is illegal,” the statement said.
The statement welcomed the call for an end to the occupation, the evacuation of settlers and the obligation to compensate Palestinians for material and moral damages. The ruling represents a “reaffirmation of the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination, to their land and to their statehood,” the statement added.
Follow all the international information at Facebook and Xor in our weekly newsletter.
