On August 25, our government submitted a new dossier to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) panel of judges to verify compliance by Israel on the three provisionally binding measures the court ruled on in 2024.
The urgency of the new dossier lies in the fact that over the 300 days of the so-called ceasefire, 300 children have been killed since last October by the so-called most moral army in the world, the Israeli Defence Force (IDF). Yes, one child for each day of the ceasefire. This is according to the UN, which is monitoring the genocide in Gaza.
The three binding orders:
• The court told Israel to prevent any genocidal acts, stop incitement and preserve evidence.
• In March, the court ordered that without delay, the unhindered delivery at scale of food, water, fuel and medicines.
• In May, the court ruled that all military actions in Rafa area be halted and that Israel must cease all other measures which could result in the imposition of living conditions that might lead to the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza.
South Africa says Israel has not adhered to any of the orders.
On preserving evidence, I’m reading the book Ungrounding: The architecture of genocide by Eyal Weizman, who is a forensic architect operating from an office at the University of London.
Weizman is director of the research agency, Forensic Architecture, at Goldsmiths and professor of spatial and visual cultures. He is also the founding director of the Centre for Research Architecture in the Department of Visual Cultures.
His research agency has also been helping the South Africa’s case at the ICJ, providing strong evidence of how the Israeli state is deliberately getting rid of all evidence in Gaza. Weizman contends that the new tool of ethnic cleansing is the bulldozer which the IDF put to great use in Gaza to commit acts of “ungrounding”.
In his book, “ungrounding refers to the deliberate destruction, destabilisation, and rewriting of the physical, geological and built environment to make a territory unliveable and erase the conditions of existence for its population”.
As for the second order, Israel allowed “piecemeal” amounts of aid to enter the strip before again denying “on scale” deliveries. Palestinians are dying of starvation, malnutrition, diseases and famine.
Instead of complying with the third order which, by the way, the Israelis stated they did, they flattened parts of Rafa and killed more Palestinian children.
Since this is a legal challenge forwarded by the South Africans, it does make sense to then also look at other illegalities on the part of those governments that enable such illegality by Israel. We all know that Israel relies on other countries for weapons, trade, intelligence and all the diplomatic protection it keeps getting. How complicit are other countries?
Now, before many of you argue that South Africa’s entire exercise is pointless because it will never amount to any accountability on the part of Israel, what SA is doing is documenting all the conducts against the binding orders of the court. The more pressure falls on the governments providing all that illegal support, the more they too will have a case to answer one day.
Similarly, the landmark ruling in which the ICJ declared that the occupation of the Occupied Palestinian Territories is illegal, also means that all countries who adhere to international law and do not do everything in their power to prevent or stop such illegality by Israel may be deemed complicit.
This is something our government and South African companies doing business with Israel should seriously ponder on.
Israel’s abusive treatment of the Palestinian people, the violations of the prohibition of torture and the inhumane degrading treatment, racial discrimination and apartheid in particular remain crimes against humanity and are characterised as genocide.
South Africa’s dossier doesn’t put Trump or Western governments in the dock tomorrow but it certainly demonstrates illegal complicity in the genocide in Gaza, the West Bank and Southern Lebanon.
And even if there will be no Palestinian left by the time the ICJ ruling comes, history will correctly reflect who were responsible for the genocide and who was on the right side of history.
And yes, it matters. One only has to observe the guilt of the Europeans to this day, all because they allowed a similar genocide to happen before.
• Dr Van Heerden is a senior research fellow at the Centre for African Diplomacy and Leadership at UJ.
- On August 25, the South African government submitted a dossier to the ICJ panel to verify Israel's compliance with three provisional binding measures issued in 2024.
- The measures require Israel to prevent genocidal acts, allow unhindered delivery of aid, and halt military actions in the Rafa area, which South Africa says Israel has not complied with.
- Forensic architect Eyal Weizman and his agency, Forensic Architecture, are providing evidence that Israel is destroying evidence in Gaza through "ungrounding," involving deliberate destruction of the physical environment.
- Despite the ICJ orders, Israel has allowed only limited aid into Gaza, continued military actions, and caused high Palestinian child fatalities during the ceasefire period.
- South Africa's legal challenge highlights illegal complicity by countries supporting Israel, stressing that ongoing documentation may hold these states accountable for aiding genocide and apartheid crimes against Palestinians.
On August 25, our government submitted a new dossier to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) panel of judges to verify compliance by Israel on the three provisionally binding measures the court ruled on in 2024.
•
• In March, the court ordered that without delay, the unhindered delivery at scale of food, water, fuel and medicines.
• In May, the court ruled that all military actions in Rafa area be halted and that Israel must cease all other measures which could result in the imposition of living conditions that might lead to the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza.
On preserving evidence, I’m reading the book
Weizman is director of the research agency, Forensic Architecture, at
His research agency has also been helping the
In his book, “ungrounding refers to the deliberate destruction, destabilisation, and rewriting of the physical, geological and built environment to make a territory unliveable and erase the conditions of existence for its population”.
As for the second order, Israel allowed “piecemeal” amounts of aid to enter the strip before again denying “on scale” deliveries. Palestinians are dying of starvation, malnutrition, diseases and famine.
Instead of complying with the third order which, by the way, the Israelis stated they did, they flattened parts of Rafa and killed more Palestinian children.
Since this is a legal challenge forwarded by the
Now, before many of you argue that
Similarly, the landmark ruling in which the ICJ declared that the occupation of the Occupied Palestinian Territories is illegal, also means that all countries who adhere to international law and do not do everything in their power to prevent or stop such illegality by Israel may be deemed complicit.
Israel’s abusive treatment of the Palestinian people, the violations of the prohibition of torture and the inhumane degrading treatment, racial discrimination and apartheid in particular remain crimes against humanity and are characterised as genocide.
• Dr Van Heerden is a senior research fellow at the Centre for African Diplomacy and
