South Africa
Undated 2024-04-06
2024-02-14 AS’AD AbuKHALIL: Arabs Divided on ICJ Ruling The liberal Arab camp thinks the ICJ ruling will lead to a peaceful settlement of the Palestinian question, while the popular camp has lost faith in international organizations, including the ICJ. Israel will forever be stained with the label of genocide and its supporters will always be accused of supporting genocide after the International Court of Justice ruled last month that there was prima facie evidence to put Israel on trial for genocide. Even powerful foreign lobbies will find it difficult to remove the stigma. This is not lost on U.S. citizens who have spent untold millions of dollars and have heard too many lies to continue supporting an image of moral superiority.
If an Arab country rather than South Africa had brought the charge of genocide, the U.S., and other Israel supporters would have easily dismissed it, pointing to a sordid record of human rights violations and repression by that government. But this was South Africa which, given its own record of human rights adherence since the end of apartheid, and high standards of democracy and equality embedded in the South African constitution, has emerged as a moral leader not only of developing countries but of the world. South Africa is a moral superpower, while the U.S. has been reduced to a mere bully. South Africa now leads the “Free World” and not the U.S., NATO and its coalition of former colonial powers. South Africa is the new superpower, without nuclear weapons. Its soft power is not the same as America’s, which camouflages naked aggression and the subjugation of other countries.
There are two camps on ICJ ruling in the Arab world. The liberal intellectuals who are funded by Gulf despots and/or NATO governments/Soros insist that Arabs should never abandon their belief in the “international community” (a code word for the genocide axis of NATO) and in international law and human rights.
The other camp, which speaks more for free Arab public opinion, regard the notion of international law and human rights as tools and even Western government tricks to solidify their domination over people of the South. They want to tranquilize and delude them into thinking justice can be restored through international fora. The fact that a month after the ICJ ruling, Israel continues its genocide in Gaza, and Western governments continue to endorse and sponsor it is testimony to the limitations and even the impotence of international organizations. https://consortiumnews.com/2024/02/14/asad-abukhhalil-arabs-divided-on-icj-ruling/
2024-02-13 South Africa Calls on ICJ to Stop Israel’s Rafah Assault Israel’s bombardment of Rafah in southern Gaza and its stated plan to expand its attack with a ground assault puts the country in breach of a clear directive from the International Court of Justice, said South African officials on Tuesday, less than three weeks after the court ordered Israel to do everything in its power to prevent genocidal violence in Gaza.
The South African government made an urgent request of the ICJ, or the World Court, calling on it to take further action as more than 100 Palestinian people were killed by Israeli shelling and airstrikes in multiple locations across Rafah overnight Monday. https://consortiumnews.com/2024/02/13/south-africa-calls-on-icj-to-stop-israels-rafah-assault/
2024-01-15 South Africa to sue US, UK for complicity in Gaza genocide Nearly 50 South African lawyers, led by attorney Wikus Van Rensburg, are gearing up to file a lawsuit against the United States and the United Kingdom, asserting their complicity in Israeli forces’ war crimes in Palestine, Anadolu Agency reports. This initiative follows South Africa’s filing of a genocide case against “Israel” at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
Rensburg, the driving force behind the legal action, aims to prosecute those complicit in the crimes through civilian courts, collaborating with legal professionals in the US and UK. In an interview with Anadolu, Rensburg emphasized the need to hold the US accountable for its actions and highlighted the forthcoming legal proceedings against Washington and London.https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/south-africa-to-sue-us–uk-for-complicity-in-gaza-genocide
2024-01-11 At first ICJ hearing, South Africa provides evidence of ‘genocide’ South Africa has asked the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in a lawsuit to oblige “Israel” to immediately stop its military operation in the Gaza Strip, a representative of the South African delegation, lawyer Vaughan Lowe, said on Thursday.
South Africa’s legal team stated, in its opening statement at The Hague, that South Africa has recognized the ongoing Nakba of the Palestinian people through “Israel’s” colonization since 1948, “which has systematically and forcibly dispossessed, displaced and fragmented the Palestinian people, deliberately denying them the internationally recognised inalienable right to self determination and their internationally recognised rights of return as refugees to their towns and villages in what is now the state of Israel.” https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/at-first-icj-hearing–south-africa-provides–genocide–evide
2023-11-24 U.S. Marine Makes Undeniable Case For Hamas! Former United States Marine Kenneth O’Keefe has become an outspoken critic of Israeli policy toward Palestine, announcing that if he were Palestinian he would likely fight back against the occupation by any means necessary. In a clip dating from more than 10 years ago O’Keefe even compares Hamas to the African National Congress and Nelson Mandela. Jimmy and Americans’ Comedian Kurt Metzger discuss efforts by certain non-profit groups to label O’Keefe an anti-semite. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kuRZ2FcRaU
2023-11-22 South African Parliament votes to close the Israeli embassy and suspend diplomatic relations. 248-91 Full resolution proposed by EFF and amended by ANC: That the House –
(1) notes the latest developments in the Israel-Palestine conflict;
(2) further notes the continuing building of settler houses in the land of Palestinian people and further land encroachment that is against numerous United Nations resolutions;
(3) realises that the Apartheid-Israel government is in a perpetual breach of international law against annexation and, as a result, the Israeli government aggression gives rise to violent resistance;
(4) understands that the expansionist policy and further construction of settler houses in the Palestinian land is an impediment to the peaceful resolution of the century old Israel and Palestine conflict;
(5) further understands that the annexation of Palestinian land and killing of Palestinian children is a violent act which itself promotes a violent reaction, and that land dispossession is a violent exercise that undermines the very humanity of the Palestinian people;
(6) recognises that peace in the Middle East will never prevail for as long as the land of the Palestinians is occupied, and more of the little remaining land is annexed;
(7) condemns the killing of defenceless children and women in Gaza, including the bombing of hospitals; (calls on all freedom loving people of the world to support the Palestinian campaign to take back their land in all of its manifestations;
(9) calls upon the government to close the Israel Embassy in South Africa and suspend all diplomatic relations with Israel until a ceasefire is agreed to by Israel and Israel commits to binding United Nations facilitated negotiations whose outcome must be a just, sustainable and lasting peace; and
(10) calls upon the government to make representations to the International Criminal Court to investigate the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and key decision makers in his cabinet for violations of international criminal law and crimes against humanity. https://countercurrents.org/2023/11/south-african-parliament-votes-to-close-the-israeli-embassy-and-suspend-diplomatic-relations-248-91/
2023-11-21 South African Lawmakers Vote to Cut Diplomatic Ties With Israel South Africa’s Parliament on Tuesday voted overwhelmingly for a suspension of diplomatic ties with Israel over what numerous lawmakers called its “genocidal” war on Gaza, a move that came a day after the country’s government urged the International Criminal Court to issue an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Lawmakers voted 248-91 for the resolution calling on South Africa to cut ties with Israel until it agrees to a cease-fire in Gaza, where authorities say that 46 days of relentless bombardment by air, land, and sea has left more than 14,000 Palestinians—including more than 3,900 women and 5,800 children— dead, with tens of thousands more wounded, thousands missing beneath the rubble, and nearly 1.7 million people, or about 70% of the population, forcibly displaced. https://www.commondreams.org/news/israel-south-africa-2666327494
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