The highest court of the United Nations refused to dismiss South Africa’s case on Friday, despite not explicitly requesting a ceasefire. Instead, it acknowledged that there is a plausible risk of genocide in the bombarded Palestinian enclave.
Raed Jarrar, advocacy director at Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), a think tank in Washington, DC, stated, “It’s a huge defeat for Israel — one of the biggest defeats… in the past 75 years.”
But Jarrar told Al Jazeera that the ruling “goes beyond Israel alone” because it emphasizes countries’ legal and political obligations to prevent the alleged genocide in Gaza.
The decision made by the International Court of Justice in The Hague also sparked fresh calls to halt arms transfers to the Israeli government, which supporters claim constitute complicity and are in violation of international law. This includes shipments of weapons from the United States, Israel’s main supporter.
Jarrar stated, “It’s a watershed moment where the US government is put on notice that they cannot continue their blank-cheque policies with Israel.” The United States “cannot and should not continue its arms transfers with Israel at this time.” Not a “goodwill gesture” The United States provides Israel with at least $3.8 billion in annual military assistance. Rights advocates and a growing number of US lawmakers have pleaded with Washington to condition that assistance on Israel’s compliance with international law and human rights standards.
The Biden administration sent a request to Congress to approve a $14 billion foreign aid package for Israel, the majority of which would be military assistance, after Israel began the Gaza war on October 7 following an attack by Hamas that killed over 1,100 people in southern Israel. In addition, the US government twice defied Congress in order to provide the nation with thousands of artillery shells as it continued to bombard Gaza. To date, Israeli attacks have decimated the coastal territory and killed more than 26,000 Palestinians.
However, despite reports and investigations indicating that US weapons were utilized in Israeli bombings that resulted in the deaths of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, efforts to exert pressure on Washington to either end the transfers or determine whether the weapons are being used in violations of human rights have been unsuccessful. According to DAWN’s Jarrar, Washington has obligations under international and US law, and “we have been telling the Biden administration that this is not just a goodwill gesture” to stop the transfer of weapons to Israel.
