By Enyichukwu Enemanna
In apparent show of solidarity, Turkey will join in South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has announced.
“Upon completion of the legal text of our work, we will submit the declaration of official intervention before the ICJ with the objective of implementing this political decision,” Fidan said on Wednesday at a joint news conference with Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi in the Turkish capital, Ankara.
He added, “Turkey will continue to support the Palestinian people in all circumstances.”
In response to a suit instituted by South Africa before ICJ, accusing Israel of state-led genocide in Gaza, the international court ordered Israel to refrain from any acts that could fall under the Genocide Convention and to ensure its troops commit no genocidal acts against Palestinians.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in January that Turkey was providing documents for the case at the top United Nations court, also known as the World Court.
Turkey will join Colombia in formally requesting to join the case against Israel. Last month, the South American country called on the ICJ to allow it to join the case and to ensure “the safety and, indeed, the very existence of the Palestinian people”.
The ICJ may allow states to intervene in cases and give their views.
In a separate case on Tuesday, the ICJ ruled against issuing emergency measures over German arms sales to Israel as requested by Nicaragua, which had argued that there was a serious risk of genocide in Gaza during Israel’s assault.
In the emergency measures issued in March, judges at the ICJ also ordered Israel to take all necessary and effective action to ensure basic food supplies arrive without delay to the Palestinian population in Gaza as a famine loomed in some parts of the territory.
Heritage Times recalls that since the start of the war October last year, at least 34,568 people in Gaza, mostly women and children have been killed, according to Palestinian authorities.
More than 80 percent of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents have been displaced, and entire neighbourhoods have been levelled in Israel’s bombardment and ground invasion.
South Africa in its suit before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), had alleged that Israel is responsible for violations of the Genocide Convention in respect of its actions taken in Gaza.
The court in its Order of 26 January, 2024, recalled the attack of 7 October, 2023, on Israel with hostage taking and loss of life, as well as the human suffering, loss of life, displacement of civilians and damage to the infrastructure in Gaza caused by Israel.
It ordered that Israel must, in accordance with its obligations under the Genocide Convention and in relation to Palestinians in Gaza, ‘take all measures within its power’ to prevent the commission of acts prohibited in the Convention, in particular killings, causing serious physical or mental harm, the deliberate infliction of conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of the population in whole or in part, and the imposition of measures intended to prevent births.
