[News] What Will Happen After The ICJ Delegitimizes Israel’s Occupation?

[Anti-Imperialist News]

popularresistance.org
<https://popularresistance.org/what-will-happen-after-the-icj-delegitimizes-israels-occupation-of-palestine/>
What Will Happen After The ICJ Delegitimizes Israel’s Occupation?
By Ramzy Baroud, Mintpress News.- January 12, 2023
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[image: image.png]

Above Photo: An elderly man waves Palestinian flag while he confronts an
Israeli soldier during a protest against Israeli settlements in the village
of Beit Dajan near the West Bank city of Nablus. Nasser Ishtayeh | Sipa via
AP Images.
Once more, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) will offer a legal
opinion on the consequences of the Israeli Occupation of Palestine.

A historic United Nations vote on December 31 called
<https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20221231-un-asks-icj-to-consider-consequences-for-israeli-occupation-of-palestinian-territories>
 on the ICJ to look at the Israeli Occupation in terms of legal
consequences, the rights of the Palestinian people to self-determination
and the responsibility of all UN Member States in bringing the protracted
Israeli Occupation to an end. A special emphasis will be placed on the
“demographic composition, character and status” of Occupied Jerusalem.

The last time the ICJ was asked to offer a legal opinion on the matter was
in 2004. However, back then, the opinion
<https://www.icj-cij.org/en/case/131> was largely centered around the
“legal consequences arising from the construction of the (Israeli
Apartheid) wall.”

While it is true that the ICJ concluded that the totality of the Israeli
actions in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are unlawful under
international law – the Fourth Geneva Convention
<https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.33_GC-IV-EN.pdf>,
the relevant provision of the earlier Hague Regulations
<https://www.eccpalestine.org/israels-obligations-as-an-occupying-power-under-international-law-its-violations-and-implications-for-eu-policy/>
 and, of course, the numerous UN General Assembly and Security Council
Resolutions <https://press.un.org/en/2016/sc12657.doc.htm>  – this time
around the ICJ is offering its view on Israel’s attempt at making what is
meant to be a temporary military Occupation, a permanent one.

In other words, the ICJ could – and most likely will – delegitimize every
single Israeli action taken in Occupied Palestine since 1967. This time
around, the consequences will not be symbolic, as is often the case in
UN-related decisions on Palestine.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has done more than any other
Israeli leader to ‘normalize’ the Israeli Occupation of Palestine, was
understandably angry following the UN vote, describing
<https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/israel-s-netanyahu-says-un-vote-for-icj-opinion-despicable-/2777117>
 it as ‘despicable’.

His other coalition partners were equally intransigent.

The Israeli “Occupation of (the) West Bank is permanent and Israel has the
right to annex it,” said Knesset Member Zvika Fogel, during an interview
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20230102-occupation-of-west-bank-is-permanent-israeli-mk-says/>
 on January 1 with Israeli Radio 103FM.

More than anything else, Fogel’s words encapsulate the new reality in
Israel and Palestine. Gone are the days of political ambiguity regarding
Israel’s ultimate motives in the Occupied Territories.

Indeed, Israel is now trying to manage a whole new phase of its colonial
project in Palestine, an endeavor that began in earnest in 1947-48 and, in
Israel’s own calculation, is about to end with the total colonization of
Palestine – Israel’s version of a ‘one-state solution’ that is predicated
on apartheid and racial discrimination.

Fogel, whose party, Otzma Yehudit, is an important member of Netanyahu’s
new rightwing coalition, does not reflect his personal views or those of
his ideological camp alone.

The new government, packed with extremists, the likes of Bezalel Smotrich,
Itamar Ben-Gvir and Yoav Galant, among others, is now committed to an
anti-peace agenda as a matter of policy. As soon as the new government
was sworn
in
<https://www.brusselstimes.com/345407/new-israeli-government-sworn-in-after-power-grab-by-far-right-parties>
 on December 28, it announced
<https://www.dw.com/en/israel-new-netanyahu-government-vows-to-expand-settlements/a-64228466>
 that “the government will advance and develop settlements in all parts of
Israel”.

Ben-Gvir, whose raid
<https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israeli-far-right-minister-visits-contested-jerusalem-holy-site-media-reports-2023-01-03/>
 of Al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied East Jerusalem raised much criticism
worldwide, is sending clear messages to Palestinians and the international
community at large: as far as Israel is concerned, no international law is
relevant, nothing is sacred and no inch of Palestine is off limits.

This time, however, it is not business as usual.

Yes, Israel’s territorial expansion at the expense of Occupied Palestine
has been the common denominator among all Israeli governments in the last
75 years; but various Israeli governments, including that of Netanyahu’s
early cabinets, found indirect ways to justify illegal settlement
constructions. So-called ‘natural expansion’ and ‘security’ needs were some
of the many pretexts furnished by Israel to justify its constant push for
land acquisition by force.

Practically, none of this would have been possible if it were not for the
inexhaustible United States support of Israel – financially, militarily and
politically. Moreover, US vetoes
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/5/19/a-history-of-the-us-blocking-un-resolutions-against-israel>
 at the UNSC and the relentless pressure on UNGA members allowed Israel to
circumvent international law unscathed. The outcome is today’s tragic
reality.

According to the official UN news website, there are currently nearly
700,000 illegal Jewish settlers
<https://news.un.org/en/story/2021/11/1104792>. The Israeli NGO ‘Peace Now’
says that these Jewish settlers live
<https://www.aa.com.tr/en/world/un-passes-resolution-to-seek-icj-opinion-on-israel-s-occupation-of-palestine/2776989>
 in 145 illegal colonies in the Occupied West Bank, in addition to 140
settlement outposts, many of which are likely to be made official by the
new government.

In fact, the Netanyahu-led alliance has been formulated with the
understanding that the outposts would be legalized in the future, thus
receiving official government funding. This should not pose a major
political problem for Netanyahu, who, in 2020, had succeeded in selling the
idea to the Israeli Knesset of annexing
<https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2020/07/israelopt-10-things-you-need-to-know-about-annexation/>
 much of the West Bank and is now Determined
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20221124-reneging-on-abraham-accords-netanyahu-authorises-soft-annexation-of-west-bank/>
 to carry out a process of ‘soft annexation’ – a de-facto annexation that
is likely to become legalized as a de jure annexation later on.

Nor would the full colonization of Palestine prove to be a legal problem.
Israel’s Nation-State Law of 2018 has already provided the legal cover for
Tel Aviv to flaunt international law and to do as it pleases in terms of
colonizing all of Palestine and marginalizing all of the Palestinian
rights. According to Israel’s new Basic Law, “the State of Israel is the
nation-state of the Jewish People in which it realizes its natural,
cultural, religious and historical right to self-determination”. It was
this particular reference that was cited
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20230103-jewish-supremacy-is-state-policy-says-netanyahu/>
 in the new government’s statement on December 29.

And there are not many in Israel who are protesting this. In a recent
article
<https://www.palestinechronicle.com/ilan-pappe-on-the-socio-political-formations-behind-israels-neo-zionist-government/>
 in the Palestine Chronicle, Israeli historian Ilan Pappe explains how the
current socio-political formations of Israeli society make it nearly
impossible for alternative mainstream politics to emerge, aside from the
three dominant rightwing and extremist currents at work in the Netanyahu
coalition: Ultra-Orthodox Jews, National Religious Jews and Likud’s secular
Jews.

This means that change in Israel could never come from Israel itself. While
Palestinians continue to resist, Arab and Muslim governments, and the
international community at large must confront Israel, using all means
available to end this travesty.

The ICJ’s opinion is very important, but without meaningful action, a legal
opinion alone will not reverse the sinister reality on the ground in
Palestine, especially when this reality is bankrolled, supported and
sustained by Washington and Israel’s other western allies.
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