Israel responds to genocide charges at UN court

Israel told the United Nations' top court on Friday that a case brought by South Africa about its military operation in Gaza "makes a mockery of the heinous charge of genocide."

The International Court of Justice is holding a third round of hearings on emergency measures requested by South Africa, which wants the court, based in The Hague in the Netherlands, to order a cease-fire in the enclave.

The allegations were "completely divorced from the facts and circumstances," Israel's deputy attorney general Gilad Noam told a panel of 15 international judges.

South Africa told the court on Thursday that the situation in Gaza has reached "a new and horrific stage" and urged judges to order Israel to halt its military operations. Israel must "totally and unconditionally withdraw" from the Gaza Strip, said Vusimuzi Madonsela, South Africa's ambassador to the Netherlands.

Israel has strongly denied committing genocide in Gaza, saying it does all it can to spare civilians and is only targeting Hamas militants.

"We do not wish harm to these civilians as Hamas does," Noam said, accusing the organization of using human shields.

South Africa has submitted four requests for the ICJ to investigate Israel. According to the latest request, the country says Israel's military incursion in Rafah threatens the "very survival of Palestinians in Gaza."

In January, judges ordered Israel to do all it can to prevent death, destruction and any acts of genocide in Gaza, but the panel stopped short of ordering an end to the military offensive.

The court has already found that there is a "real and imminent risk" to the Palestinian people in Gaza by Israel's military operations.

ICJ judges have broad powers to order a cease-fire and other measures, though the court doesn't have its own enforcement apparatus. A 2022 order by the court demanding that Russia halt its full-scale invasion of Ukraine has so far gone unheeded.

Most of Gaza's population of 2.3 million people have been displaced since fighting began.

The war began with a Hamas attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7 in which Palestinian militants killed around 1,200 people and took about 250 hostages. More than 35,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war, Gaza's Health Ministry says, without distinguishing between civilians and combatants in its count.

South Africa initiated proceedings in December 2023 and sees the legal campaign as rooted in issues central to its identity. Its governing party, the African National Congress, has long compared Israel's policies in Gaza and the occupied West Bank to its own history under the apartheid regime of white minority rule, which restricted most Blacks to "homelands." Apartheid ended in 1994.