[The following is a guest-post by Lt. Col. Jenks, the Chief of the International Law Branch in the Army's Office of the Judge Advocate General -- KJH] At a workshop held in Beirut earlier this month, officials from the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) attempted to explain the basis for the tribunal's in absentia provisions. At the same time, Judge...
At the recent Northwestern Law School conference on the Israeli-Arab Dispute and International Law I had the good fortune to address one of the few bright spots in current Arab-Israeli relations. Most international law scholars of the Arab-Israeli conflict seem to know little about international trade, and focus almost exclusively on the laws of war in their discussion of Middle East...
So, Alan Dershowitz has decided that international law needs to be "delegitimized," because it is unfair to Israel. It is reasonable to consider, therefore, what Dershowitz believes a "fair" international law would allow Israel to do. Here is one of his suggestions, from a 2002 Jerusalem Post editorial entitled "New Response to Palestinian Terrorism" (emphasis mine): In light of the...
As the smear campaign against Richard Goldstone gets ever more desperate, it seems opportune to provide a bit more information about Israel's support for apartheid, to which Goldstone's pales in comparison. Here is Sasha Polokow-Suransky again, this time responding to attacks on Goldstone by the Speaker of the Knesset and Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister: Goldstone's apartheid-era judicial rulings are undoubtedly a...
Ken has already flagged the editorial, in which Schuck -- a superb scholar who teaches at Yale -- argues that it would be constitutionally permissible to strip Faisal Shahzad's US citizenship because of his attempt to set off a car-bomb in Times Square. I'm skeptical of Schuck's argument, so I thought I'd explain why. Here are the key paragraphs: Revoking the...
I was going to wait until the book -- entitled The Unspoken Alliance: Israel's Secret Relationship with Apartheid South Africa -- came out to mention it, but now seems like an opportune time. You can pre-order the book from Amazon here, and here is the description: A revealing account of how Israel’s booming arms industry and apartheid South Africa’s international...
I will write in more detail when I have a bit more time, but I can't let Dershowitz's ridiculously slanted and ahistorical attack on Richard Goldstone pass without comment. Sasha Polakow-Suransky, a Senior Editor at Foreign Affairs who is an expert on Israel-South Africa relations, has responded to the allegations made in the Yediot Ahronoth story Dershowitz cites, allegations that...
Michael Kearney at the University of York has written a long and interesting response to Julian's post, which I have posted below to make sure people see it. I'm far from expert about the law of statehood, so I'm reluctant to comment on the international-law debate. I continue to believe, though, that accepting the Palestinian declaration would be disastrous for...
So, it turns out that the US military was lying through its teeth when it claimed that the three Afghan women murdered during a "bungled" Special Operations attack in Afghanistan six weeks ago were not killed by NATO -- read: American -- forces: NATO military officials had already admitted killing two innocent civilians — a district prosecutor and local police...
David Bernstein links today to an article in The Times -- a right-wing British newspaper published by Rupert Murdoch -- attacking Human Rights Watch. The article is breathlessly entitled "Nazi Scandal Engulfs Human Rights Watch," which I have to admit piqued my curiousity -- until I realized that the "Nazi scandal" concerned Marc Gelasco, a research analyst who resigned from...
The following is a guest post by Lt. Col. Chris Jenks, the Chief of the International Law Branch in the U.S. Army's Office of the Judge Advocate General. Lt. Col. Jenks is posting in his personal capacity. On March 8th, the Supreme Court "invited" the Solicitor General to file a brief in Carmichael v. Kellogg, Brown & Root...
The BBC reports: The European Court of Justice has ruled that Israeli goods made in Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank cannot be considered Israeli. This means goods made by Israelis or Jews in the West Bank cannot benefit from a trade deal giving Israel preferential access to EU markets. At first glance, this seems like the correct result, especially given the...
