The Hague, Netherlands:

The United Nations’ prime courtroom on Monday opens per week of hearings on the authorized penalties of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories, with greater than 50 states resulting from deal with the judges.

Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki will converse first within the authorized proceedings on the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague.

In 2022, the U.N. General Assembly requested the courtroom for an advisory, or non-binding, opinion on the occupation.

While Israel has ignored such opinions previously, it may pile on political strain over its ongoing conflict in Gaza, which has killed about 29,000 Palestinians, in response to Gaza well being officers, since Oct.7.

Among international locations scheduled to take part within the hearings are the United States – Israel’s strongest supporter, China, Russia, South Africa and Egypt. Israel won’t, though it has despatched written observations.

The hearings are a part of a Palestinian push to get worldwide authorized establishments to look at Israel’s conduct, which has develop into extra pressing because the Oct. 7 assaults by Hamas in Israel, which killed 1,200 individuals, and Israel’s army response.

They additionally come amid mounting issues about an Israeli floor offensive in opposition to the Gaza metropolis of Rafah, a final refuge for greater than 1,000,000 Palestinians after they fled to the south of the enclave to keep away from Israeli assaults.

Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem – areas of historic Palestine which the Palestinians need for a state – within the 1967 conflict. It withdrew from Gaza in 2005, however, together with neighbouring Egypt, nonetheless controls its borders.

It is the second time the U.N. General Assembly has requested the ICJ, often known as the World Court, for an advisory opinion associated to the occupied Palestinian territory.

In July 2004, the courtroom discovered that Israel’s separation wall within the West Bank violated worldwide legislation and must be dismantled, although it nonetheless stands to today.

Judges have now been requested to assessment Israel’s “occupation, settlement and annexation…including measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem, and from its adoption of related discriminatory legislation and measures.”

Since 1967, Israel has enormously expanded Jewish settlements within the West Bank – an motion Palestinians say compromises the creation of a viable Palestinian state. It has additionally annexed East Jerusalem in a transfer not recognised by most international locations.

The General Assembly additionally requested the ICJ’s 15-judge panel to advise on how these insurance policies and practices “affect the legal status of the occupation” and what authorized penalties come up for all international locations and the United Nations from this standing.

The advisory opinion proceedings are separate from the genocide case that South Africa filed on the World Court in opposition to Israel for its alleged violations in Gaza of the 1948 Genocide Convention. In late January the ICJ in that case ordered Israel to do the whole lot in its energy to stop acts of genocide in Gaza.

The end result of the advisory opinion wouldn’t be legally binding however would carry “great legal weight and moral authority,” in response to the ICJ.

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