Israel Brusquely Dismisses South Africa’s Accusation of Genocide, Calling It a ‘Blood Libel’
South Africa made its filing at the Hague, where it seeks an order requiring Israel to halt the advances in Gaza.
South Africa’s filing at the International Court of Justice, accusing Israel of committing “genocidal actions” in Gaza, casts aside both morality and legality, and is being curtly dismissed by the Jewish state.
Israel, in rejecting the allegations, denounced them as a “blood libel,” the term used by historians to describe mythical accusations against Jews that served as an excuse for medieval antisemitic pogroms. The foreign ministry in Jerusalem describes the submission to the ICJ as “lacking both a factual and legal basis and constitutes a despicable and contemptuous exploitation of the Court.”
Never mind that on October 7, some 1,200 Israelis, most of them civilians, were slain by Hamas, shot or beaten to death, many raped, and burned alive in an orgy of medieval savagery. Or that Israel declined to join the ICJ out of the expectation that this UN-sponsored body would become a venue for “lawfare” – the exploitation of international legal systems to delegitimize political opponents.
This legal gambit at the ICJ was announced by South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, during his visit to Qatar, which has come under sustained international criticism since October 7 for its role as a major funder of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.
The South African submission asks the ICJ to order a suspension of Israel’s military operations, alleging that Gaza “has been turned into a concentration camp where genocide is taking place.” In reality, this initiative is the stuff of political theater rather than legal substance.
As history shows, the ICJ is a cumbersome institution with slow-moving wheels that launch war crimes prosecutions many years after the fact. Case in point, a Serbian leader, Radovan Karadzic, who was found guilty in 2016 of crimes against humanity committed during the Balkan civil war in 1992-95. Thus, South Africa’s call for an interim order from the ICJ with immediate effect is absurd on its face.
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The International Court of Justice is the venue in which the South Africans filed a claim against Israel. The name of the court was given incorrectly in the bulldog.
