Almost two years since Israel started its current campaign in the Gaza Strip, many governments are reluctant to call it what it is – genocide – simply because acknowledging it as such would incur legal obligations. However, they have legal obligations whether they acknowledge it as genocide or not. International law is clear: all states are obliged not only to punish genocide when it has occurred, but to prevent it from happening.
On Tuesday, the United Nations Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, on which I was one of the commissioners, released its report on Israel’s genocide in its military operations in Gaza. The report is based on our investigations begun within days of the Hamas attacks in southern Israel on October 7, 2023. We have now issued seven reports since then.
Displaced Palestinians flee Gaza City along the coastal road towards southern Gaza on Wednesday.Credit: AP
We began with what is still the most comprehensive report on the events of October 7, which found that the Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fighters had committed war crimes.
We have reported on the killings in Gaza, especially of children and women, the destruction of the territory’s housing, its healthcare system and its education system, sex and gender-based violence, attacks on mosques, churches, archaeological sites and museums. Based on its own extensive investigations and the findings of those seven reports, the commission has now found that Israel is responsible for genocide in Gaza.
The legal obligation for states to punish genocide is activated when it has been committed. The obligation to prevent it arises when there is a serious risk of genocide.
On January 26, 2024, about 20 months ago, the International Court of Justice put states on notice that there was an existing plausible risk of genocide in Gaza, thus triggering the obligation to prevent genocide. The alarms of genocide have been blaring since then. Nothing further from the court is required. States are obliged to act. Some have taken action. Most have not.
Deciding to take all possible action to prevent Israel’s genocide should not be complicated, especially when, as our reports have found, the majority of victims are children, women and the elderly, when children are intentionally targeted and sexual violence is weaponised to terrorise all Palestinians and undermine their right to self-determination, and when starvation is used as a weapon to destroy the group.
There are many actions Australia can take in fulfilment of its obligation to prevent genocide. It has already announced its intention to recognise the State of Palestine next week. I can list another eight actions that could and should be taken immediately:
