Search: self-defense
30 Jul Guest Post: Israel’s Use of Law and Warnings in Gaza
...Janina, I completely agree that advance warning does not have any effect on the legality of an attack in terms of distinction and proportionality. The proposition that Israel is absolving itself from making the proportionality "calculus" in places where it gives advanced warning is something that should be looked into. However, like other commentators, I have some issues with the second part of your analysis: (a) when looking at motivations for giving warning, there is a spectrum between "selflessness" and malice, which seems to be absent from your analysis. States...
23 Dec Remedial Secession and the Responsibility to Protect: The Case of Nagorno-Karabakh
...beyond merely recalling that the world – guided by the principle of territorial integrity as reflected in the doctrine of uti possidetis juris – still officially considers Nagorno-Karabakh to be part of Azerbaijan, and that, accordingly, any realistic hope for the former to exercise its right to self-determination lies squarely within the framework of the latter. According to international legal scholars, self-determination does not automatically provided peoples with a unilateral right of secession beyond cases of decolonization. However, even the staunchest anti-secessionist will be hard-pressed to find any principled justification...17 May A Response to Dianne Otto by Gina Heathcote
security. If my domestic analogy is accepted as a useful tool to engage and explore the assumptions behind the discipline of international law, the self-defence analogy may lead to a requisite broadening of international self-defence to encompass preemptive self-defence in response to long term violence against a state by another actor. In my article in the MJIL, however, I use the domestic analogy to explore conceptual analogies between Western, common law legal structures and international law rather than in a prescriptive manner. This approach is enlarged on in my forthcoming...19 Feb Dershowitz Defends Israeli Assassinations in Dubai
far as we punish crimes because they are immoral acts. Killing generally is immoral, most people would agree, but self-defense may act as a moral defense to the killing. It just so happens that in domestic law, we have codified many of these moral defenses into legal defenses, but that doesn't deprive them of their moral underpinnings. What those defenses require, however, is a weighing of the culpability of the crime against the moral defense offered. Here, Dubai's domestic law has preemptively and presumptively already weighed these arguments in relation...11 Sep Is it Legal? No.
collective self-defense process (self-determination and self-determination assistance, if not also collective self-defense, would be more relevant with respect to the Free Syrian Army). Jordan p.s. I note that there is a significant difference between declaring war and launching it in terms of the allocation of constitutional power. By the way, Bush was at "war" with "terror" but Obama declared that we are at "war" with al Qaeda (even though a declaration of war is an exclusive congressional power in view of consistent U.S. cases regarding a "declaration" as such). p.s.p.s....15 May Bemba, et al. Sentencing Decision: A Victory with a Bitter Taste
...of causing fourteen Defense witnesses to falsely testify in the ICC war crimes trial against a former DRC vice-president Jean-Pierre Bemba Gombo (the “Main Case”). Judges found that the co-conspirators used fake testimony in order to have Bemba acquitted in the Main Case.. They consciously retained as witnesses people who had no knowledge of the facts relevant to Bemba’s trial and then scripted their evidence, including after they had been sworn in. Narcisse Arido, Defense intermediary in the Main Case, who was convicted as perpetrator of corruptly influencing four Defense...13 Jan The Israeli Defense Force’s Legal Defense — in Video
So this video is obviously intended to defend the actions of the Israeli Defense Forces during their action in Gaza. But it is fascinating in terms of its footage of precise IDF bombings, and its provision by provision discussion of certain relevant provisions of the Geneva Conventions. Obviously, it is a piece of advocacy, but it is effective. Anyone have a link to a video defending Hamas’ actions under international law? (Thanks to Eugene Kontorovich for the link)...03 Sep U.S. Soldiers Could Face the Death Penalty — Unfortunately
...an al-Qaida training camp. Hunsaker told investigators that he and Clagett were attacked by the three men, who were being handcuffed, and shot them in self-defense. Clagett said he was hit in the face, and Hunsaker claimed he was stabbed during the attack. Prosecutors argue the soldiers conspired to kill the men and then altered the scene to fit their story. They contend Girouard stabbed Hunsaker as part of the killing plot. Clagett, Girouard and Hunsaker also are accused of threatening to kill another soldier who witnessed the slayings. Girouard,...16 Jan The Military Commission: An Inauspicious beginning for a"Full and Fair " Process
be detailed to the case. Only after relentless assertions of this position did the Presiding Officer finally relent, but only after subjecting the defense counsel to extensive criticism. In the case of al Bahlul, the Commission rejected his request to represent himself and ordered his detailed military defense counsel to continue to perform in that capacity (which itself raises significant ethical concerns). This ironically inverse application of the customary standards related to selection of counsel raises serious questions about just how “full and fair” this process can be. It also...17 Nov Non-self-executing Treaties and Reverse Preemption
...indication of congressional intent to permit state law to preempt implemented, non-self-executing treaty provisions but not to preempt self-executing treaty provisions…. Because here the Convention, an implemented treaty, rather than the Convention Act, supersedes state law, the McCarran-Ferguson Act’s provision that “no Act of Congress” shall be construed to supersede state law regulating the business of insurance is inapplicable…. We find no indication from the text of the McCarran-Ferguson Act that Congress intended to signal a distinction between self-executing and non-self-executing-but-implemented treaties in the McCarran-Ferguson’s reverse-preemption clause. In other words,...