CAPE TOWN – South Africa says there is an urgent need for the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to grant it provisional measures that would protect the lives of Palestinians.
In its oral arguments before the world’s highest court on Thursday, its legal team argued that Israel’s retaliation for Hamas’s October attacks on Israelis was tantamount to genocide.
On Friday, Israel will respond to South Africa’s claims that it had been acting with the express intent to wipe out the Palestinian population of Gaza, and that its military operations had been indiscriminate.
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Impressing on the court the urgency of the matter, external counsel for South Africa Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh pointed out that United Nations (UN) resolutions calling for a ceasefire have all failed.
She told the court there is no safe space in Gaza, and that granting interim measures would be in line with court rulings in similar cases.
“If the indication of provisional measures were justified on the facts of those cases I’ve cited, how could it not be here in a situation of much greater severity where the imminent risk of irreparable harm is so much greater.”
Another external counsel, Vaughan Lowe, argued that Israel could not deny its grip on Gaza and the lives of Palestinians.
“It is that no matter how monstrous or appalling an attack or provocation, genocide is never a permitted response.”
South Africa told the court that Israel could not claim that its attacks were purely intended to flush out Hamas militants.