Genocide lawsuit
UN court rejects claims against Germany
Pro-Palestinian (l) and pro-Israeli demonstrators (r) protest in front of the United Nations Supreme Court in The Hague (archive image). photo
© Peter Dejong/AP/dpa
The Gaza war is also being fought in the courts. Germany is accused by Nicaragua of aiding and abetting genocide because of arms deliveries to Israel. The highest UN court sees it differently.
However, the judges did not comply with Germany’s demand to completely dismiss Nicaragua’s lawsuit. They only decided on an urgent motion also submitted by Nicaragua, which called for immediate measures against Germany. The main proceedings can drag on for years. Decisions of the court are binding.
German legal representatives welcomed the decision. “We are pleased that our arguments were able to convince the court,” said Tania von Uslar-Gleichen, head of the German delegation.
Nicaragua had taken Germany to court for complicity in the genocide in the Gaza Strip and at the same time filed an urgent application. It called on Germany to stop arms deliveries. In Nicaragua’s view, German arms deliveries to Israel could enable genocide in the Gaza Strip. Germany rejected the lawsuit as baseless.
Israel: Right to self-defense
This is the second genocide trial on the Gaza war before the court. At the end of 2023, South Africa sued Israel and demanded an immediate ceasefire. The judges did not comply with this, but warned Israel to do everything possible to prevent genocide. Israel has repeatedly rejected allegations of genocide. The country invokes the right to self-defense after the massacres by the Islamist Hamas and other extremist Palestinian organizations on October 7, 2023.
Nicaragua had argued that Germany had approved arms deliveries to Israel worth 326.5 million euros last year, ten times as much as the previous year. But according to the judges, Germany had plausibly demonstrated that 98 percent of these were only general military equipment such as helmets or protective vests and not weapons of war. The court also did not accept the accusation that Germany had put aid to the UN Palestinian relief agency UNRWA in the Gaza Strip on hold and thereby violated humanitarian law.
The Central American country, which is itself under international scrutiny for human rights violations, invokes the Genocide Convention of 1948. Signatory states undertake to do everything possible to prevent genocide. This means that third countries can also hold others responsible.
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In the massacres on October 7, around 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 were taken hostage in the Gaza Strip. Israel’s subsequent attacks killed about 34,500 people, according to Hamas-controlled health authorities.