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Why is the EU silent on South Africa's genocide case against Israel?

https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2024/01/12/where-do-eu-countries-stand-on-south-africas-genocide-case-against-israel

The first hearing in a landmark lawsuit against Israel enters its second day on Friday at the Hague-based International Court of Justice (ICJ). #EuropeDecoded

Why is the EU silent on South Africa's genocide case against Israel?

The first hearing in a landmark lawsuit against Israel enters its second day on Friday at the Hague-based International Court of Justice (ICJ).

16 comments

bartolomeo

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Are we still pretending this all started Oct 7, and that Gaza has been a normal place to live for the last 50 years? With all the modern luxuries like, you know, drinking water? Electricity?

NoneOfUrBusiness

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Oh no that's an exaggeration. They've only not had drinking water and electricity for 17 years. Before that they were only being subjected to a slow-burn genocide like the West Bank. Smh ungrateful brown people.

bartolomeo

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And that's so weird when people say "Hamas-run Gaza" but it's Israel that cuts power, water, controls the border, has a blockade on the territory (an act of war), controls the population database and ID cards, and even sells rights to extract natural gas from Gaza.

sylver_dragon

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It's popular in the social consciousness right now. So, governments and international organizations are scrambling to look like they are "doing something". Once the incredibly short attention span of the masses moves on to the Next Big Thing™, the Israeli Government can get back to building some Lebensraum for it's settlers, without the rest of the world throwing a performative fit about it.

bartolomeo

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Holy shit it's unreal how similar Israel is to Nazis. I'd never heard of lebensraum.

It stipulated that Germany required a Lebensraum necessary for its survival and that most of the populations of Central and Eastern Europe would have to be removed permanently (either through mass deportation to Siberia, extermination, or enslavement), including Polish, Ukrainian, Russian, Czech, and other Slavic nations considered non-Aryan. The Nazi government aimed at repopulating these lands with Germanic colonists in the name of Lebensraum during and following World War II.[6][7][8][9] Entire populations were ravaged by starvation; any agricultural surplus was used to feed Germany.[6] The Jewish population was exterminated outright.

NoneOfUrBusiness

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Yeah; we're not calling Israel a Nazi state for nothing.

FluffyPotato

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Because the EU has a ton of countries and some have been silent and some haven't. The EU doesn't really speak for its member states. Like Germany has been both vocal and wrong on the topic. The baltics and Poland doesn't care much since Ukraine is a more important topic currently due to their border with Russia and never having much of a relationship with Israel.

roastedDeflator

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EU staff members express fury over von der Leyen stance on Israel-Hamas conflict - Fri Oct 20 2023

Letter with 842 signatures accuses European Commission of giving ‘a free hand to the acceleration and the legitimacy of a war crime’ in Gaza

Staff members of EU institutions have written to European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen expressing fury over her stance on the Israel-Hamas conflict, in a letter that accumulated 841 signatures.
...
It begins by condemning the Hamas attack on Israel before continuing: “We equally strongly condemn the disproportionate reaction by the Israeli government against 2.3 million Palestinian civilians trapped in the Gaza Strip”.

“We hardly recognise the values of the EU in the seeming indifference demonstrated over the past few days by our Institution toward the ongoing massacre of civilians in the Gaza Strip,” it continues.

“As an EU diplomat I feel embarrassed by the stand taken by the institution in external communications since the start of the crisis,” one wrote.

“We observe the death of diplomacy unfolding in front of our eyes and we do not see any expression or action being taken rooted in the values on which the EU was built.”

“It is surely imperative that the EU uses its influence as a global actor to put pressure on Israel to take the first steps towards a peaceful settlement of this long ongoing conflict, by ending the continuous gross violations of basic human rights and international law in the Occupied Palestinian Territories,” one signatory wrote.

FluffyPotato

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Yea, seems about right. Like the only other thing the EU can even do, other than the strongly worded letter, is an embargo I guess but I don't think the EU does much business with Israel anyways so it would be symbolic anyways and Germany would veto it the first chance it got.

roastedDeflator

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You honestly don’t think the EU does much business with Israel?
Well, they do.

Check out this link from the EU for more details: https://www.eeas.europa.eu/israel/european-union-and-israel_en?s=200

The European Union and Israel share a long common history, marked by growing interdependence and cooperation. Both share the same values of democracy, respect for freedom and rule of law and are committed to an open international economic system based on market principles. Over five decades of trade, cultural exchanges, political cooperation and a developed system of agreements have cemented these relations.

The EU is Israel's largest trade market and accounts for about a third of Israel's total trade. In 2020, Israel was ranked the EU's 24th trade partner. The most traded goods are chemicals and related products, machinery and transport equipment, and manufactured goods.

FluffyPotato

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Huh, 1/3 of Israel's total trade, that is a surprise for sure. Must be more western European countries then. Well I hope the Hague finds them guilty and the EU does some heavy sanctions then.

queermunist

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Because they're good doggies and know to stay quiet when the US says so

TheBat

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WW2 guilt?

SinningStromgald

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It's the only reason I could think of for Germany deciding to back Israel and their treatment of Palestinians. That or Germany got a taste of genocide in WWII and decided it liked it.

OurToothbrush

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Theyre still a power that benefits from colonialism. There is a material component to it.

autotldr

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This is the best summary I could come up with:

As ICJ cases traditionally take years before a ruling is reached, South Africa has asked the Court to provisionally call for a ceasefire to appease suffering in the besieged Gaza Strip, where, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, more than 23,000 people have been killed since October.

By contrast, other nations, including Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Jordan, Malaysia, the Maldives, Turkey, Venezuela as well as the 57-country Organization of Islamic Countries (OIC), have formally backed the move.

The tight-lipped response follows the EU's efforts to tread a neutral line on the conflict, endorsing Israel's right to self-defence while calling for the protection of civilian life in Gaza and unhindered provisions of humanitarian aid.

Speaking from Israel on Thursday as the hearing took place in the Hague, Germany's Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck said: "You can criticise the Israeli army for acting too harshly in the Gaza strip, but that is not genocide."

Hungary is the only country that has explicitly condemned South Africa's ICJ case, with foreign minister Péter Szijjártó denouncing the "legal attack launched against Israel" on social media platform Facebook.

Spain, also an outspoken critic of Israel's war campaign in Gaza, has also refrained from commenting despite 250 legal experts submitting a petition calling for the government's backing on Wednesday.

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Prootje

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@roastedDeflator