South Africa filed with the International Court of Justice its full submission, or Memorial, on Monday, alleging that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza during its ongoing military operation against terror group Hamas, and claiming that Israel has failed to abide by numerous clauses of the genocide convention and its international obligations.
Although Pretoria has already filed several motions requesting interim measures against Israel with the ICJ — the UN’s top court, which adjudicates disputes between nations — it was obligated to file its comprehensive arguments for a final ruling.
Israel rejects allegations of genocide in the war that began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas led a devastating cross-border assault, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.
The South African Department of International Relations & Cooperation said that the 750-page document it filed, together with 4,000 pages of “exhibits and annexes,” provides “evidence” that Israel has violated the genocide convention by “promoting the destruction of Palestinians living in Gaza,” killing them, depriving them of access to humanitarian assistance, and “causing conditions of life which are aimed at their physical destruction.”
It also alleged that Israel has had genocidal intent in its actions in Gaza, a key component of a genocide charge, has failed to prevent incitement to genocide, and has failed to punish those who have allegedly incited to genocide and committed alleged acts of genocide.
“The international community cannot stand idly by while innocent civilians – including women, children, hospital workers, humanitarian aid workers, and journalists are killed for simply being. That is a world we cannot accept,” the Department of International Relations & Cooperation said in a statement to the press.
As per court procedures, South Africa’s submission will not be made public.
Israel has until July 2025 to file its response. The Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on South Africa’s submission.
Israel has strongly denied that it has committed any genocidal acts against Palestinians in Gaza, asserting in oral hearings and written submissions to the ICJ that statements by Israeli elected officials cited by South Africa as evidence of genocidal intent were either taken out of context, mendaciously interpreted, or not reflective of government policy.
Jerusalem argued in court that civilian deaths were not deliberate and that they were largely caused by Hamas’s tactic of embedding its military personnel and infrastructure throughout the civilian infrastructure of Gaza, including in hospitals, mosques, schools, civilian homes, UN facilities, and in its vast tunnel network running under Gazan cities.
Israel’s legal team has also pointed to the large amounts of aid, whose entry into Gaza Israel has facilitated, as evidence that it has sought to ensure Gazan civilians’ access to necessary food and humanitarian supplies.
South Africa filed its case with the ICJ late last year, alleging that Israel was breaching the genocide convention in its military assault against Hamas, launched in response to the October 7 attack. In addition to rejecting the accusations, Israel says South Africa is acting as an emissary of Hamas, which rules Gaza and seeks to eliminate the Jewish state.
Preliminary hearings have already been held in the ICJ case against Israel, but the court is expected to take years to reach a final decision.
In the interim, the court has issued four rulings against Israel since January 26, the most recent of which was an order in May for Israel to “immediately halt its military offensive, and any other action in the Rafah governorate, which may inflict on the Palestinian group in Gaza conditions of life that could bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”
The ambiguous order was approved by 13 votes to two but its exact interpretation was disputed among the judges. Some read it as a blanket order to entirely halt the offensive in the southernmost Gaza city, while others suggested that it was a limited order instructing Israel not to violate the Genocide Convention while carrying out its military campaign.
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says more than 42,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the fighting so far, though the toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed some 17,000 combatants in battle as of August and another 1,000 terrorists inside Israel on October 7.