The deafening silence emitting from the United Nations Security Council (UNSG), the United States, the European Union and so called “independent” international organisations such as the International Criminal Court (ICC) regarding the disproportionate use of force in Gaza, Palestine, allegations of war crimes, is a harbinger that the so called “rules-based order” which the collective Global North, and in particular the West keeps drumming on about is as robust as candy floss, when it comes to holding an ally accountable.
The utter urgency of a ceasefire, even a temporary one to open safe passage for the wounded, medicine and for essential aid to pour into the Gaza strip should be acceptable to any rational mind. However, the delays by the US, the EU and other western nations in seeking a ceasefire and compelling Israel to agree to one, even if it was for a few days, is telling of the logic which is being employed. It is after all a political calculation. The West is giving Israel the time and space it needs to pulverise the densely populated Gaza strip and achieve their military objectives, at the expense of the thousands of Palestinians lives, including several thousand children. The message that such inaction will leave engraved in generations of Palestinians and other Arab communities, will likely impact US and EU influence in the region for years to come.
The inaction and disregard for the very values European nations claim to champion, in relation to what is going on in Israel and Palestine today, will likely see a new brand of extremism and political violence spring up in its aftermath by a generation who will now be convinced that violence is the answer – and the only answer. It may also have revitalised global extremist movements which were relatively well contained after much bloodshed. EU countries continue to demonstrate a distressing inability to meet their international and domestic obligations when it comes to holding Israel accountable. The EU's failure to press Israel on an immediate ceasefire makes a mockery of the political bloc's repeated claims to be a defender of international rules including the so-called rules of war.
The hypocrisy of how the International humanitarian law (IHL) and norms are practised by the West has always been evident, but today it is undeniable. So called “Independent” institutions such as the International Criminal Court (ICC), who were quick to issue a warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin for alleged war crimes in Ukraine, are today, five weeks after 7 October, yet to issue a warrant on the Israeli Prime Minister, any state or military official for what’s happening in Gaza. They are also yet to call for action against any member of Hamas. ICC’s action against alleged war crimes has in the past been criticised for being targeted at actors in Africa and the Global South. The ICC issued warrants against Putin and Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova on 17 March.
Reports indicates that multiple groups from Palestine have made representations before the ICC urging it to investigate Israel for the crimes of genocide and apartheid. The petition also calls for arrest warrants to be issued for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Isaac Herzog and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant. One of the academics involved in the efforts to bring Israel before the ICC stated that “International inaction against Israeli aggression is part of ‘a systematic failure to hold Israel to account for decades," as well as the "absolute double standard" applied to war crimes committed against people of the Global South. "This is not just a crisis of international legal institutions, but also a crisis of democratic — or so-called democratic — institutions in the countries in which we live." With the rapid attrition of the ‘Moral high-ground’ the collective Global North keeps reminding, us in the South, another victim of the ongoing Israel – Hamas war may well become a hardening of stance by some of the governments in the Global South, who would now argue that the UN, the EU and the rest of the “West” has no moral standing to question, probe or effect IHL in the South.
What will become of the pressure for “truth seeking”, “accountability”, and “reconciliation?” How can the “West” continue to push for such a Human Rights agenda and “rules-based order” when it stands stark naked before what’s happening in Gaza, where aid and ammunition flows into Israel, while the densely populated Gaza strip gets pummelling.