Israel on Friday rejected as false and grossly distorted accusations brought by South Africa at the UN’s top court that its military operation in Gaza is a state-led genocide campaign against the Palestinian population.
It called on judges to dismiss South Africa’s request to halt its offensive, saying to do so would leave it defenceless.
Arguing it was acting to defend itself and was fighting Hamas, not the Palestinian population, Israel called on the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to dismiss the case as groundless and reject South Africa’s request to order it to halt the offensive.
The Israeli foreign ministry’s legal adviser, Tal Becker, told the court that South Africa’s interpretation of events was grossly distorted.
“If there were acts of genocide, they have been perpetrated against Israel,” he said. “Hamas seeks genocide against Israel.”
South Africa, which filed the lawsuit at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in December, asked judges to impose emergency measures ordering Israel to immediately halt the offensive. It claimed Israel’s aerial and ground offensive – which has laid waste to much of the enclave and killed more than 23,000 people, according to Gaza health authorities – aimed to bring about “the destruction of the population” of Gaza.
