Israel has selected a judge who “legitimized occupation” and defended the killing of children in Gaza, to represent it in the genocide case filed by South Africa against the occupying regime at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over its ongoing war in the besieged strip.
Aharon Barak’s appointment to the ICJ panel was personally approved by prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to a report by Israel’s Channel 12.
Israeli rights group B’Tselem said the appointment of Barak, who is known for his strong opposition to Netanyahu’s controversial “judicial overhaul” plan, comes as an attempt to “whitewash” its crimes in Gaza.
“For many, many years, and particularly since the massive demonstrations against the judicial coup alone, Barak has become the symbol of liberal democracy in Israel,” Orly Noy, chair of B’Tselem, told Middle East Eye on Monday.
“Now, Israel is sending that symbol of the so-called democratic Israel to whitewash its crimes against Palestinians in Gaza.”
Researchers and commentators have already questioned Barak’s alleged liberal and democratic credentials, citing his decades-long approach to cases involving abuses against Palestinians.
Nimer Sultany, an academic in public law at Soas University in London, said “Barak’s record as a former chief justice of Israel’s Supreme Court is not liberal in any convincing way when one considers his rulings regarding Palestinians, whether Israeli citizens or residents in the occupied territories.”
“His rulings compromised equality, affirmed the ethnocratic character of [Isarel], and perpetuated the inferiority of non-Jewish citizens,” Sultany told MEE.
“[Barak] is the most suitable man for the job because this is exactly the thing to which he dedicated his entire professional life: legitimizing the crimes of Israel and the occupation…while preserving the facade of the Israeli democracy,” Noy said.
Noy was referring to the legitimization of constructing a separation wall through the occupied West Bank, seizing land in the West Bank to serve Israeli settlers, and targeted assassinations carried out by the Israeli military.
Barak has also defended the killing of children in Israel’s ongoing genocidal war on Gaza.
“It may be proportional to kill five innocent kids in order to target their leader,” Barak told The Globe and Mail in November.
He also defended the cutting of fuel to the besieged Strip, saying that it may have been used by Palestinian resistance fighters.
“I agree totally with what the government is doing,” he said.
Sultany said the comments suggested that Barak had “formed an opinion that denies that Israel has violated international law despite the abundance of evidence to the contrary.”
According to South Africa’s application, Israel’s actions in Gaza were “genocidal in character because they are intended to bring about the destruction of a substantial part of the Palestinian national, racial and ethnical group.”
The two parties to the case are allowed to nominate a judge to take part in the hearings that will begin later this week, in addition to the 15 judges on the permanent panel at the Hague-based court.
“It remains to be seen if he chooses to act as an attorney for Israel or as an impartial judge who considers the facts and the relevant law,” Sultany said.
Israel launched the war on Gaza on October 7 after the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas waged the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the occupying entity in response to the Israeli regime’s decades-long campaign of violence against Palestinians.
Since the start of the offensive, the Tel Aviv regime has killed at least 23,084 Palestinians and injured more than 58,926 others.
Thousands more are also missing and presumed dead under the rubble in Gaza, which is under “complete siege” by Israel.
