Search: palestine icc

...negotiations will be hampered by the lack of a really representative Palestinian government. “That is the point,” agreed Cohen, the director of the Institute for Middle East Peace and Development and author of a new book, Beyond America’s Grasp: A Century of Failed Diplomacy in the Middle East. The United States is “acting as if there is a strong state” among the Arab states, he said. “But there is no leader who can make a decision who can carry the day. [Similarly], there is no strong leader in Palestine who...

...organ of the Court, is critical for its success (for example by approving its budget), and as seen in the situation of Palestine, to afford legitimacy to the judicial process. Departing from the fact that multilateral treaties are governed by its parties, it is worth recalling the history and ideas that shaped the creation of the Assembly of States Parties. Looking back to bring forwards the issues and challenges facing the Assembly and the Court, three key moments in the history of international criminal law can help identify the forces...

Interesting summary of a recent speech by Colin Powell addressing Iraq, Palestine, China, Russia, Europe, globalization, and immigration. Best line: “My favorite [Powell joke] was about buying all State Department employees Blackberries (when he arrived the State Dept. still had Wang Computers so he wired every desk and bought them all Blackberries), but that one employee was using it as a ‘chick magnet’ by meeting women and then making a big deal of saying ‘Oh, the Secretary needs me.'”...

...up to it.” As I said, stunning stuff. And utterly damning of the IDF — the “most moral army in the world.” It’s just a shame the US government won’t be more open with what it really thinks about the IDF’s actions. Perhaps then Israel wouldn’t feel free to use force against Palestine with impunity. NOTE: After reading the article in Al Jazeera America, make sure to read Shane Darcy’s important post at EJIL: Talk! discussing a recent decision by Israel’s Supreme Court that upholds the legality of collective punishment....

...including in and around East Jerusalem; […] All States are under an obligation not to recognize the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall and not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by such construction […] In the Wall advisory opinion, the fact that there was no jurisdictional basis for the ICJ to decide a dispute between Israel and Palestine did not prevent the ICJ from setting out an unequivocal finding that Israel violated the law, accompanied by extensive clarifications on what Israel should...

...was not adopted, however, because of a veto by a permanent member.  In 1977-78, then External Affairs Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee spoke to the UNSC regarding Namibia’s independence in 1978. In 1984-85, India was a leading voice at the UNSC for the resolution of conflicts in the Middle East, especially Palestine and Lebanon. In 1991-92, Indian Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao participated in the first ever summit-level meeting of the UNSC and spoke on its role in maintenance of peace and security. India again joined the UNSC after a...

...would still be murder under Israeli law, because Hamas does not qualify as the armed forces of Palestine and thus does not have the combatants’ privilege to kill. That was obviously too “legal” for Winstanley, because…] “Complicated” — yea right. Wasn’t so complicated for you to declare Israeli attacks on civilians “potentially legal”. [Not what I said, of course. I said Israeli attacks on military targets that incidentally kill civilians — the kind of attacks Ya’alon was discussing — were potentially legal, depending on their proportionality.] And yet you use...

...her mission had gone to Palestine, “I imagine that the discussion here would be amazingly different.” Regarding the challenges to the credibility of the report, she told Council members that the issue on credibility is “not about ours, it’s about yours.” (Williams begins speaking at 5:35). UN Watch addressed the Council on Friday afternoon: “If the Council cannot endorse the recommendations of this report, it will cast a shadow upon the reputation of the UN as a whole…” Watch our UN speech. Singling Out Israel Special Agenda Item Returning: The...

[Valentina Azarov is a Lecturer in International Law and Human Rights, Al-Quds Bard College, Al-Quds University, Palestine (on leave)] This is the third post of our Symposium on the Functional Approach to the Law of Occupation. Earlier posts can be found in the Related Links at the end of this post. By far one of the most challenging questions for the international law of belligerent occupation pertains to the termination of occupation. The law states that “occupation comes to an end when an occupant withdraws from a territory, or is...

...report is that she does not jettison human rights or international criminal law, but instead reworks them so that they can begin to address genocide and other serious harms as the result of a public-private partnership. One of the ways she does this is by refocusing corporate accountability efforts on how corporations’ ‘specific human rights violations may also be constitutive of more structural and systemic violations of international law’. In the case of Palestine, this means that corporate due diligence is not satisfied simply by muddying the evidentiary waters over...

...by the ICRC in February 1945, Dresden was being burned to ashes by Allied incendiary bombs. Equally, the drafting parties were shaping the conventions against the backdrop of the ongoing violence in Palestine, Indochina, Indonesia and Greece around 1947. Van Dijk’s challenging of this master narrative is timely, particularly when read against the backdrop of current armed conflicts in so many countries, including Ukraine, Syria, Yemen and Ethiopia. The book encourages a train of critical thought that is helpful, when reflecting on where we are, and how we got here....

...Jordan has visited the West Bank to congratulate Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas on the UN General Assembly resolution from last week upgrading Palestine’s observer status. Hamas’ exiled leader Khaled Meshaal plans to visit the Gaza Strip for the first time in 45 years. Human Rights Watch has filed a report alleging violations of international humanitarian law by Israel in a shelling that killed 12 Palestinian civilians in last month’s clashes. Geographical Imaginations blog has a post up about the politics of drone wars. A judge in New Zealand has ordered...