[News] US Court Concludes Israel's Assault is Plausible Case of Genocide but dismisses it on jurisdictional grounds

[Anti-Imperialist News]

ccrjustice.org 
<https://ccrjustice.org/home/press-center/press-releases/us-court-concludes-israel-s-assault-gaza-plausible-case-genocide> 



  U.S. Court Concludes Israel’s Assault on Gaza Is Plausible Case of
  Genocide

Jan 31, 2023
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    While Dismissing Case on Jurisdictional Grounds, U.S. Judge
    “Implores” Biden Administration to Stop its “Unflagging Support” for
    Israel’s Ongoing Siege of the Palestinian People in Gaza


January 31, 2024, Oakland, CA – After a federal court heard arguments 
and testimony in the case /Defense for Children International – 
Palestine v. Biden/ 
<https://ccrjustice.org/home/what-we-do/our-cases/defense-children-international-palestine-v-biden>on 
Friday, January 26, charging the Biden administration with failing in 
its duty to prevent, and otherwise aiding and abetting, the unfolding 
genocide in Gaza, a federal judge found that Israel is plausibly 
engaging in genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza and that the 
United States is providing “unflagging support” for the massive attacks 
on Palestinian civilians in contravention of international law. The 
court’s decision follows a historic ruling by the International Court of 
Justice last Friday, which also found the Israeli government was 
plausibly engaged in a genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza, and 
which issued a series of emergency measures Israel must take to end its 
genocidal campaign.

The U.S. court based its assessment on the “uncontroverted” live 
testimony of seven Palestinian witnesses, including one from Gaza and 
one from Ramallah, who testified firsthand to Israel’s killing of their 
nieces, cousins, aunts, uncles, elders, and members of their community, 
to the mass displacement of their families reminiscent of the 1948 
Nakba, and to the devastating conditions of life in their homeland as 
the siege leads to mass starvation. The court also relied on the expert 
opinion 
<https://ccrjustice.org/sites/default/files/attach/2023/11/Declaration%20Expert%20Historians_w.pdf>of 
genocide and Holocaust scholars who confirmed that Israel’s military 
assault and totalizing humanitarian destruction bears the hallmarks of a 
genocide based on legal and historical precedent. Nevertheless, the 
court reluctantly dismissed the case 
<https://ccrjustice.org/sites/default/files/attach/2024/01/91_1-31-24_Order-granting-MTD_w.pdf>on 
jurisdictional grounds. While the court recognized that the prohibitions 
on genocide are fundamental and binding international law, this was a 
“rare” instance where “the preferred outcome is inaccessible to the 
Court” and it found it lacked power to resolve the case because it 
implicated executive decision-making in the area of foreign policy.

Delivering a historic rebuke of Israel and the United States for its 
flouting of the Genocide Convention, the court wrote:

Both the uncontroverted testimony of the Plaintiffs and the expert 
opinion proffered at the hearing on these motions as well as statements 
made by various officers of the Israeli government indicate that the 
ongoing military siege in Gaza is intended to eradicate a whole people 
and therefore plausibly falls within the international prohibition 
against genocide.

The court recognized the substantial role of the United States in 
furthering the genocide and noted that “as the ICJ has found, it is 
plausible that Israel’s conduct amounts to genocide” and, therefore, the 
“Court implores Defendants to examine the results of their unflagging 
support of the military siege against the Palestinians in Gaza.”

The court stated, “It is every individual’s obligation to confront the 
current siege in Gaza.”

According to *Katherine Gallagher* 
<https://ccrjustice.org/home/who-we-are/staff/gallagher-katherine>, 
Senior Staff Attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights who argued 
the genocide case before the court, “The court affirmed that what the 
Palestinian population in Gaza is enduring is a campaign to eradicate a 
whole people – genocide – and that the United States’ unflagging support 
for Israel is enabling the killing of tens of thousands of Palestinians 
and the famine facing millions. While we strongly disagree with the 
court’s ultimate jurisdictional ruling, we urge the Biden administration 
to heed the judge’s call to examine and end its deadly course of action. 
Together with our plaintiffs, we will pursue all legal avenues to stop 
the genocide and save Palestinian lives.”

According to plaintiff *Waeil Elbhassi*, “My family lived through and 
was displaced by the first Nakba (catastrophe) in 1948, which the world 
has barely acknowledged. Yet in court on Friday, I testified to make a 
record of Israel’s horrific slaughter of my family, and the destruction 
of my homeland and Palestinian heritage, and to demand that the United 
States stop giving the Israeli government its total financial and 
diplomatic support for this ongoing genocide, a second Nakba.”

Plaintiff *Mohammed* *Monadel Herzallah *said, “It is important that the 
court recognized the United States is providing unconditional support to 
Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza and that a federal court heard 
Palestinian voices for the first time, but we are still devastated that 
the court would not take the important step to stop the Biden 
administration from continuing to support the slaughter of the 
Palestinian people. Currently, my family lacks food, medicine, and the 
most basic necessities for survival. As Palestinians, we know this is a 
hard struggle, and as plaintiffs we will continue to do everything in 
our power to save our people’s lives.”

“To be clear, this is far from a win for the U.S. government. It is 
unprecedented and damning that a federal court has all but affirmed that 
Israel is committing a genocide while criticizing defendants Biden, 
Blinken, and Austin’s ‘unflagging’ support for the acts that constitute 
that genocide,” said Center for Constitutional Rights Senior Staff 
Attorney *Diala Shamas* 
<https://ccrjustice.org/home/who-we-are/staff/shamas-diala>*.*

The Palestinian plaintiffs, represented by the Center for Constitutional 
Rights, together with co-counsel from Van Der Hout LLP, are the 
Palestinian human rights organizations Defense for Children 
International – Palestine and Al-Haq; and the individuals Dr. Omar 
Al-Najjar, Ahmed Abu Artema, and Mohammed Ahmed Abu Rokbeh, who are in 
Gaza; and Mohammad Monadel Herzallah, Laila Elhaddad, Waeil Elbhassi, 
Basim Elkarra, and Ayman Nijim, who are U.S. residents with family in Gaza.

To watch a recording of the hearing, visit the court’s website 
<https://www.uscourts.gov/cameras-courts/defense-children-international-palestine-v-biden>.

To watch a recording of the plaintiffs’ press conference following the 
hearing, visit the Center for Constitutional Rights YouTube page 
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JF9qBh83ul8&t=160s>.For more 
information, see the Center for Constitutional Rights’ case page 
<https://ccrjustice.org/home/what-we-do/our-cases/defense-children-international-palestine-v-biden>. 


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