[News] "Neutral" Switzerland cancels UN conference after Israeli pressure

[Anti-Imperialist News]

electronicintifada.net
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/neutral-switzerland-cancels-un-conference-after-israeli-pressure>
"Neutral" Switzerland cancels UN conference after Israeli pressure

Ali Abunimah <https://electronicintifada.net/people/ali-abunimah> Rights
and Accountability
<https://electronicintifada.net/blog/rights-and-accountability> 7 March 2025
------------------------------
[image: People march in a street holding a large banner and signs]

Demonstrators in Geneva denounce Israel’s genocide in Gaza, October 2024. A
UN-mandated conference on Palestinian rights set to be held in the city on
7 March 2025 was canceled abruptly by the Swiss government after Israeli
pressure.
ZUMAPRESS/Newscom

Switzerland abruptly canceled a conference it was mandated to hold by the
United Nations General Assembly on the rights of Palestinians under Israeli
military occupation. The move this week came after pressure from Israel and
apparently due to fear of retribution from the United States.

Ostensibly neutral, Switzerland is the depositary of the 1949 Fourth Geneva
Convention, a key international treaty that protects civilians under
military occupation.

Last September, 124 UN member states voted
<https://press.un.org/en/2024/ga12626.doc.htm> for a landmark resolution
<https://www.un.org/unispal/document/ga-10th-ess-resolution-18sep24/>
endorsing the historic ruling
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/landmark-icj-ruling-says-world-must-act-end-israels-illegal-occupation>
by the International Court of Justice that Israel’s occupation of
Palestinian land is inherently illegal and must end within 12 months.

The resolution also tasked Switzerland
<https://www.admin.ch/gov/en/start/documentation/media-releases.msg-id-103146.html>
with convening a conference of states that have signed the Fourth Geneva
Convention – so-called high contracting parties – in order “to enforce the
Convention in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem,
and to ensure respect thereof.”

Russia, China, Brazil, South Africa and even such close Israeli allies as
France <https://electronicintifada.net/tags/france>, Spain
<https://electronicintifada.net/tags/spain> and Belgium
<https://electronicintifada.net/tags/belgium> were part of the massive
global majority supporting the measure.

Just 14 governments voted against
<https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/4061432> the resolution, including
Israel and the United States. Forty-three states abstained.
“Lack of consensus”

But despite the overwhelming global support for the conference, Switzerland
canceled
<https://www.admin.ch/gov/en/start/documentation/media-releases.msg-id-104408.html>
it on Thursday, a day before it was supposed to convene in Geneva, claiming
a “lack of consensus.”

The Swiss government asserted that after it submitted a “draft final
declaration” to be adopted by the conference it “became clear that the
divergent positions of the high contracting parties meant there would not
be sufficient support from the international community to hold the
conference and adopt a final declaration.”

This excuse cut no ice with observers including Craig Mokhiber, a UN human
rights official who resigned
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/why-un-refusing-call-israel-killer>
in October 2023 over the world body’s inaction in the face of Israel’s
unfolding genocide in Gaza.
“Switzerland’s watering down of the declaration to accommodate perpetrator
states and their complicit allies, rather than sticking to the letter of
the requirements of international humanitarian law, as defined in [the
Fourth Geneva Convention], and then canceling the conference for alleged
lack of agreement, constitutes a clear act of politicization, a breach of
neutrality, an abdication of its duties as depositary and a clear effort to
sabotage the process,” Mokhiber wrote
<https://x.com/CraigMokhiber/status/1898055307697570312> on Friday.

Mokhiber noted <https://x.com/CraigMokhiber/status/1897738445725786322> the
huge global majority that voted in favor of the conference, adding, “And
yet Switzerland refuses to convene the conference, breaching its duties as
depository of the Geneva Conventions and signaling that the historic Swiss
tradition of neutrality is dead.”

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation – a grouping of dozens of
Muslim-majority countries – said it regretted that the conference would not
go ahead and implicitly blamed Switzerland for the failure as well.

The OIC mission in Geneva said
<https://x.com/OICinGeneva/status/1897964696742810081> that “the draft
declaration neither appeared to fulfill the agreed mandate, nor was it
commensurate with the gravity of [the] situation.”

As a result, “it could not muster necessary cross-regional support,
including from OIC member states.”
Israeli pressure, fear of Washington

Israel’s foreign ministry hailed
<https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-hails-cancellation-of-biased-geneva-conventions-meeting-on-palestinians/>
the cancellation as a “significant diplomatic achievement” and credited its
foreign minister Gideon Sa’ar for working “intensively … under the radar”
to prevent the conference.

But even before apparently succumbing to Israeli bullying and pressure and
canceling the conference altogether, Switzerland was already trying to
evade its obligations and turn the meeting into an empty charade.

“The Swiss foreign ministry has become increasingly nervous in recent
weeks,” Switzerland’s public broadcaster SWI swissinfo.ch reported
<https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/foreign-affairs/the-international-conference-that-switzerland-doesnt-want-but-must-organise/88970600>
on Thursday, before the cancellation had been announced.

“Israel has condemned Switzerland for hosting the event, which it sees as
‘part of the legal warfare against Israel,’” SWI swissinfo.ch reported.

And although the September 2024 UN resolution specified that the conference
was to focus on implementation of the Fourth Geneva Convention in the
occupied Palestinian territories, SWI swissinfo.ch noted that “In the
run-up to the meeting, it’s been reported that no specific examples or
current conflicts will be discussed or even mentioned in Geneva.”

“Such political maneuvering by Switzerland is typical when it comes to the
Middle East conflict, which is full of legal and political pitfalls,” the
public broadcaster added.

The Alpine nation appears to have been motivated not just by fear of
criticism from Israel, but also from Washington, Israel’s main political
sponsor, arms supplier and accomplice in the genocide.

The planned conference “comes at a time when Israel enjoys close ties with
the new Trump administration in the United States,” SWI swissinfo.ch
observed.

“This is another reason for Switzerland’s cautious approach – right now, on
the international stage, everything has the potential to become a
diplomatic bargaining chip. In Bern, the main worry is American tariffs on
Swiss exports.”

Mokhiber places Switzerland’s cave-in in the context of the broader assault
on international institutions, aiming to shield Israel.

“Block by block, Western governments are tearing down the modern edifice of
international law in order to protect a single, oppressive foreign regime –
one currently on trial for genocide in the [International Court of Justice]
and the leaders of which are wanted by the [International Criminal Court]
for crimes against humanity,” Mokhiber wrote
<https://x.com/CraigMokhiber/status/1897736419810197968>.

“Switzerland has joined this vandalistic project, arresting journalists who
criticize the Israeli regime, and now blocking the Geneva conference called
for by a clear majority of countries to hold the regime accountable.”
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