Ireland says it is going to “intervene” in a genocide case that was initiated late last year by South Africa at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) against the Israeli regime, over the latter’s months-long genocidal war on the Gaza Strip.
Irish Foreign Minister Micheál Martin made the announcement on Wednesday, saying the decision had followed analysis of legal and policy issues pertaining to the case, as well as consultation with South Africa, Irish online paper TheJournal.ie reported.
“That analysis and consultation has now concluded. Ireland will be intervening,” he said.
South Africa filed the lawsuit against Israel at the end of December, after nearly three months of Israeli aggression against Palestinians in Gaza.
Before filing the lawsuit, the country stated that the occupying regime had failed to uphold its commitments under the 1948 Genocide Convention.
In its interim ruling on January 26, the top UN court ruled that Pretoria’s claims were plausible, ordering provisional measures. The Hague-based court also said that the Israeli regime had to implement steps to prevent genocidal acts and allow humanitarian aid to flow into Gaza.
Martin did not say what form Dublin’s intervention would take or outline any argument the country planned to advance, but lashed out at Tel Aviv over its ongoing campaign of bloodletting in Gaza.
“…I want to be clear in reiterating what I have said many times in the last few months,” he said, adding, “What we are seeing in Gaza now, represents the blatant violation of international humanitarian law on a mass scale.”
He pointed to the withholding of aid, targeting of civilians and infrastructure, the “indiscriminate use of explosive weapons in populated areas” and the “collective punishment of an entire population.”
“The list goes on,” said Martin. “It has to stop. The view of the international community is clear. Enough is enough.”
Israel launched the war on the coastal sliver on October 7 after Palestinian resistance groups carried out a surprise retaliatory operation into the occupied territories.
Concomitantly with the war, the regime has been enforcing a near-total siege on Gaza, which has reduced the flow of foodstuffs, medicine, electricity, and water into the Palestinian territory into a trickle. Earlier this month, the United Nations warned that in the absence of any changes in the war, the coastal sliver was on course to experience all-out famine.
So far during the military onslaught, the regime has killed more than 32,000 Gazans, most of them women, children, and adolescents.
