Israel denies allegations of genocide against Palestinians at UN's top court

Accused of committing genocide against Palestinians, Israel insisted at the United Nations’ highest court Friday that its war in Gaza was a legitimate defence of its people and said instead that Hamas was guilty of genocide.

Israel described the allegations levelled by South Africa as hypocritical and said that one of the biggest cases ever to come before an international court reflected a world turned upside down. Israeli leaders defend their air and ground offensive in Gaza as a legitimate response to Hamas' Oct. 7 attack, when militants stormed through Israeli communities, killed some 1,200 people and took around 250 hostage.

Israeli legal advisor Tal Becker told a packed auditorium at the ornate Palace of Peace in The Hague that the country is fighting a “war it did not start and did not want.”

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“In these circumstances, there can hardly be a charge more false and more malevolent than the allegation against Israel of genocide,” he added, noting that the horrible suffering of civilians in war was not enough to level a charge of genocide.

South African lawyers asked the court Thursday to order an immediate halt to Israeli military operations in the besieged coastal territory that is home to 2.3 million Palestinians. A decision on that request will probably take weeks, and the full case is likely to last years — though it's unclear if Israel would follow any court orders.

On Friday, Israel focused on the brutality of the Oct. 7 attacks, presenting chilling video and audio to a hushed audience to highlight what happened that day.

“They tortured children in front of parents and parents in front of children, burned people, including infants alive, and systematically raped and mutilated scores of women, men and children,” Becker said.

South Africa’s request, he said, amounts to an attempt to prevent Israel from defending against that assault.

Even when acting in self-defence, countries are required by international law to follow the rules of war, and the court must decide if Israel has.

Israel often boycotts international tribunals and U.N. investigations, saying they are unfair and biased. But this time, Israeli leaders have taken the rare step of sending a high-level legal team — a sign of how seriously they regard the case and likely their fear that any court order to halt operations would be a major blow to the country's international standing.

Still, Becker dismissed the accusations as crude and attention-seeking.

“We live at a time when words are cheap in an age of social media and identity politics. The temptation to reach for the most outrageous term to vilify and demonize has become, for many, irresistible," he said.

He said charges of genocide should be targeted at Hamas.

“If there have been acts that may be characterized as genocidal, then they have been perpetrated against Israel," Becker said. Hamas has, he said, a "proudly declared agenda of annihilation, which is not a secret and is not in doubt.”

More than 23,000 people in Gaza have been killed during Israel's military campaign. Nearly 85 per cent of Gaza’s people have been driven out of their homes, a quarter of the enclave's residents face starvation, and much of northern Gaza has been reduced to rubble.

South Africa says this amounts to genocide and is part of decades of Israeli oppression of Palestinians.

“The scale of destruction in Gaza, the targeting of family homes and civilians, the war being a war on children, all make clear that genocidal intent is both understood and has been put into practice. The articulated intent is the destruction of Palestinian life,” said lawyer Tembeka Ngcukaitobi.

If the court issued an order to halt the fighting and Israel didn't comply, it could face U.N. sanctions, although those may be blocked by a veto from the United States, Israel's staunch ally.

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