Israel's second day at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) hearing on its war in Gaza played out like a national drama. On Friday, January 12, Israeli radio stations broadcast the pleadings of the country's lawyers before the highest court of the United Nations. On December 29, 2023, South Africa filed a complaint against Israel, accusing it of violating the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Very few Israeli citizens considered this complaint legitimate.
A few hundred of them did sign the South African petition, many of them doing so anonymously. These are the same people who have tried to protest against the war in the streets, at rallies that provoke hostile reactions from passers-by, and which the police banned again on Saturday in Haifa (northern Israel), arguing that they cannot guarantee security. The right-wing political faction condemned these hearings and the official state response was outrage. The center, as personified by journalist Nadav Eyal, saw them as "a perversion" and deplored the fact that the country had already "lost" by the mere fact that these hearings were taking place.
This rejection of the hearings stemmed from a widely shared perception of a war of "necessity," imposed by Hamas, and which remains a defensive act – no matter how it is being waged. It stemmed from the horror of the attack of October 7, 2023, the worst massacre perpetrated against the Jewish people since the Holocaust, which undermined the raison d'être of the protective state. "If there were acts of genocide, they were perpetrated against Israel," said Israel's legal adviser, Tal Becker, at the opening of the hearing.
Claiming that "South Africa enjoys close relations with Hamas, even after the October 7 atrocities," Becker denounced a procedure that would "thwart Israel’s inherent right to defend itself – to let Hamas not just get away with its murder, literally, but render Israel defenseless as Hamas continues to commit it." During the three hours of arguments, Israel tried to convince the 17 judges to reject the "provisional measures" demanded by Pretoria. In particular, South Africa asked them to order Israel to "suspend its military operations" as a matter of urgency, to improve the living conditions of Gazans by opening up access to humanitarian aid, and to allow commissions of inquiry access to the territory.
The matter of intent is what lies at the heart of the crime of genocide and makes it unique. In response to South Africa's claims on Thursday, Israel's lawyers replied that the state had no intention of exterminating the Palestinians of Gaza, despite the more than 23,000 deaths, the displacement of 2 million people, the systematic destruction of the enclave and the partial siege to which Gaza remains subjected to, which has triggered famine, raised fears of the spread of disease and threatens to force Gazans to flee to Egypt. Israel's adviser rejected this death toll estimate, provided by the Hamas-administered enclave's Ministry of Health, even though the Israeli army itself no longer questions it.
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