Lawmakers and officials have sought to punish Pretoria for taking the case to the ICJ.

▲ South African Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola stressed the importance of the international community showing solidarity with the Palestinian people.Photo taken from X

Jim Cason and David Brooks

Correspondents

The newspaper La Jornada
Thursday, September 19, 2024, p. 25

Washington and New York. South Africa’s new foreign minister, Ronald Lamola, arrived in Washington this week to respond to attempts by Congress and some U.S. officials to punish his country for daring to bring a case to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) accusing Israel of genocide.

The ICJ has already issued a ruling in which it declared that it is plausible that Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza and issued an order to Tel Aviv to cease certain military operations, but both the Israeli and US governments have condemned the case and called the resolutions without merit and have even threatened several governments that support these measures. South Africa faces an October 28 deadline to submit its next legal arguments to keep the case alive.

This week, Lamola made clear that his government will proceed with the case. Shortly before being appointed foreign minister, Lamola was in charge of the Justice Ministry, and in that capacity he headed the South African delegation to The Hague when his country first brought the case against Israel. We had a moral obligation, more than any other country in the West, to declare that what Israel is doing is illegal in light of the Genocide Convention.Lamola said Tuesday at a public forum organized by the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.

State apartheid

He noted that the ICJ has determined that the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza is illegal and has issued a preliminary ruling that there is plausible evidence of genocide. South Africa, he said, considers Israel to be a state of apartheid and that ending arms shipments to this country is an appropriate first step. If they still have the means to do so, they have no incentive not to do so.he noted.

In a speech before the caucus A Congressional Black member of Congress, Lamola stressed the importance of the international community showing solidarity with the Palestinian people, even if it comes at a cost, as is the case in his country. We will continue to do so, despite the threats coming from around the planet, because we believe we are doing it on principle.he said.

In his comments on Tuesday, Lamola noted that the United States and South Africa have disagreements over the ICJ case as well as the war in Ukraine, an issue on which the South Africans have insisted that Russia be invited to peace talks that the United States and Ukraine have held in Switzerland this year (see https://www.jornada.com.mx/notas/2022/08/24/politica/sudafrica-palestina-tan-importante-como-ukrania/).

There is little doubt that American pressure will continue. Last year, several federal lawmakers and senior U.S. officials threatened to revoke the preferential trade agreement with South Africa, known as the African Growth and Opportunity Act, as punishment for that nation’s stance on Gaza and Ukraine and its relations with Russia and China as part of the grouping of countries known as BRICS.

This year, lawmakers from both parties have pushed a bill that explicitly states that South Africa will no longer be considered a non-aligned country, but instead stands on the side of Hamas, Iran, China and Russia. These relationships, the lawmakers claim in that bill, undermine the national security of the United States and therefore provide that the President of the United States initiates a full assessment of the bilateral relationship with South Africa.

In public, Lamola, who now represents a coalition government that Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress put together after this year’s election that lost its monopoly on power, says he is seeking to meet with sections of the US Congress to “persuade lawmakers that our decision to take the case to the ICJ is based on international law, that we are accepting international law. We are acting within the institutions of the United Nations… There should be no conflict over the fact that we are going to the court and we are using these platforms that we were told democracies are for resolving disputes.” He added: We continue to defend human rights in Gaza; we stand with the people of Palestine.

Impact of the tour

How much of an impact his U.S. tour will have remains to be seen. Lamola’s public agenda this week does not include a meeting with his American counterpart, Secretary of State Tony Blinken. Israel’s government, which has enormous influence in the U.S. capital, has been lobbying Congress and the White House hard to demand that South Africa withdraw its cases from the ICJ, Axios reported. But Lamola made clear that won’t happen and that his country is committed to promoting the issue.

However, the Joe Biden administration has no problem with a double standard around international law. Although Biden issued a formal statement giving the welcome Following the decision by the prosecutor at another global court, the International Criminal Court (ICC, which prosecutes individuals), to issue arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin for war crimes his country committed in Ukraine, the White House has strongly condemned the arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas leader in Gaza, Yaya Sinwar. It has not yet explained what the difference is.

In fact, the United States is not a member of the ICC or the ICJ. Moreover, a law enacted in 2002 authorizes the American president to use all necessary means –which here is, in code words, the use of military force– to rescue any American military personnel who might be brought before that court. Informally dubbed the Hague Invasion Actwas approved by overwhelming majorities in both chambers of the United States Congress.