ICJ declares Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories "unlawful"

The World Court on Friday, 19 July declared in a wide-ranging historic opinion that Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories is "unlawful" and said it should leave the area "rapidly".

The Hague-based International Court of Justice, as it is formally known, said in its advisory opinion that all countries are "under an obligation" to not recognise Israel’s take-over of the territories seized in the 1967 Six Day War and should not help it maintain the occupation.

This amounts to an endorsement of the recognition of Palestine by 145 of the 193 members of the UN element and gives an impetus for others to follow suit.

The opinion, sought by the General Assembly, also said that the UN and other international organisations should not recognise Israel’s occupation either.

It also said that Israel should stop building settlements in the occupied territories, withdraw the settlers who have moved there, and pay reparations for damages caused by it in the Palestinian territories.

The court’s opinion, historic in its sweeping range, comes as Israel is facing unprecedented international pressure following its invasion of the Gaza Strip causing over 30,000 deaths, most of them of civilians in retribution for the Hamas terrorist attack from that area in which nearly 1,200 people were killed and about 250 taken hostages.

Still pending before the court is a separate case brought by South Africa asking it to declare that Israel’s actions in Gaza amount to genocide. The opinion delivered by the court’s President, Nawaf Salam, cannot be enforced as it has no mechanism to ensure that its writs are carried out. The court said that the Assembly, which requested the opinion, and the Security Council should consider further action to end Israel’s occupation.

Ultimately it will be up to the Security Council to enforce it, but the divided body will be unable to act because the US could veto any action.

The powers that an occupying country exercises in the territory are based on the assumption that the takeover is a temporary measure caused by a military necessity and it does not transfer sovereignty to the occupier, according to the court.

"The fact that an occupation is prolonged does not in itself change its legal status under international humanitarian law," it added.

Palestine’s Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki, who was in the Hague, hailed the opinion and said there should be no support for Israel's occupation.

"No aid, no assistance, no complicity, no money, no arms, no trade," he said. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denounced the court’s opinion as "false" and a distortion of history.

Invoking the mandate in the Bible, a book followed by both Jews and Christians, he said: "The Jewish people are not conquerors in their own land — not in our eternal capital Jerusalem and not in the land of our ancestors in Judea and Samaria" – the biblical names for the occupied territories.