UN Office of the Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, International Criminal Court Prosecutor, International Court of Justice President: Investigate the Possibility that Israel is Committing the Crime of Genocide Against the Indigenous Palestinian People.
Many of us, here in this room, were in The Hague the last time, almost exactly one year ago, when South Africa brought its historic Genocide Convention case against the state of Israel for its acts in Gaza. We had already watched Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and the defense minister, Yoav Gallant, declare exactly what they intended to do in the Gaza Strip, repeatedly calling for its extermination. We had watched Israeli troops record themselves committing heinous crimes only for popular consumption, and we had also watched Western Nations cheer them on with brazen, brazen contempt. We watched the Israeli regime lie, denying the killings that were being live streamed to our phones and to our televisions.
And yet we thought and believed that within the world’s highest court, within the International Court of Justice, that these lies would not hold up. And they didn’t, as determined by thek provisional orders of the Court, deeming Israel’s actions genocidal. But immediately after the hearing, Then president of the United States, Joe Biden, issued a 335-word statement- many of you perhaps remember it- to mark the 100 days since October 7th. The words ‘Palestine’ and ‘Palestinians’ were absent and nowhere to be found in these 300 words.
Immediately after the hearings at the International Court of Justice, Prime Minister Nethanihu called for an emergency press conference. He came on to the television and declared “Nobody can stop us. Not even The Hague.” And that threat has only compounded since January of 2024, all the way until we meet now, in January of 2025.
For nearly 500 days, we’ve witnessed systematic violations of international law and international norms, in Gaza and in the region, but enabled by powerful nations, providing the diplomatic cover, military support, and political support for these actions. And that complicity isn’t just about Palestine alone. That complicity- that lethal complicity- has dealt a devastating blow to the very integrity of the United Nations Charter and its foundational principles, to the institutions of global governance, with the sanctions against the International Criminal Court, or the dismissal of the orders of the international court of justice by the countries in the West.
So for me the selection of countries seated at this table here today is no accident. The assault against the Palestinian people echoes for most of us, especially coming from the Global South, it echoes dark chapters of our own history. And these struggles remind us that Injustice anywhere is an injustice everywhere. So we may hail from different continents but we share the conviction that complacency is complicity, in such crimes.
No what is the he group? Why another group? What makes it different? This is a group for collective action. Collective action at the national level, collective action at the international level, and collective action at the multilateral level. Because we live in an interconnected world and, as we’ve seen clearly with Israel’s actions in Gaza, the mechanisms of injustice are found in the fabric of Global Supply chains. We know that advanced weaponry cannot be built without technology, without materials, without components, from factories that span across continents. We know that they can’t be shipped to be used against the Palestinian people without using ports and logistics networks that are on each of our own soils and each of our own territories. So by coordinating the commitments that many of these nations have already championed- across our ports, across our factories, across our courts- The Hague Group aims to build a bullwark to defend international law.
Just as the International Community once united to dismantl apartheid in South Africa, through similarly coordinated legal and diplomatic pressure, we must now unite to enforce international law and protect the inalienable right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. The alternative would be, it’s clear to all of us, is extremely stark. The alternative would be surrender to a world where might alone determines whether laws matter and when they can be violated at will. So, for that, I want to thank the members of The Hague Group, in this inaugural moment, for standing as a defense of humanity and the conscience of the world.
