"The UN, Amnesty International – THEY ARE ALL WRONG" - Natasha Hausdorff

Natasha Housorf, welcome to my podcast. Thank you so much. It's my pleasure to be here. Thank you. You're uh to introduce you to my audience listening and watching now. You're a barristister. You're an expert on international law, including the law of armed conflict, foreign affairs, and national security policy. You hold law degrees from Oxford and Tel Aviv universities, and you've been a fellow in the national security Law program at Colombia Law School in New York. Right. so far. And you're also the legal director of UK Lawyers for Israel Charitable Trust. That's spot on. Yeah, that's

a proper curriculum. Good. Well, um well, thank you. I think uh there's been there's been a lot of learning along the way for sure. Yeah. And you're on some kind of uh like a tour here in Scandinavia now. You were in Copenhagen like 2 days ago and you were in Bergen here in Norway yesterday And now you're in Oslo. How has the experience been before we're we're going to dive into the deep stuff afterwards, but uh it's interesting to hear how your experience has been here in um in Scandinavia so far. Sure. Well, it's not

my first time in this part of the world. Uh and I'm always struck by the important differences cultural um and you know the differences between the peoples uh in each of these places and and in fact how they interact and how They discuss controversial issues. Um, so I I appreciate the approach uh in Denmark might be a little more reserved. Uh, but uh we were expecting a debate uh this evening in Oslo which will perhaps be a little more lively than Copenhagen, but it's been great. It's extremely warm and people have been especially welcoming to

me. That's great to hear. I saw your debate actually with um uh in Copenhagen which was uh led by Martin Krosnik the editor of weekend of the Weekend newspaper and uh two ladies from um one was from Amnesty International and the other was from um uh kind of a red green kind of party. I don't remember the name of it. And uh one was young a young guy from uh like a conservative party. Yes. And uh uh how how do you feel that debate went like in terms of I I think you were discussing genocide

in particular which is an appalling accusation and truly disappointing that a debate like That is necessary. Um I was disappointed certainly at the approach um in particular of the Amnesty International representative um where she sought to suggest that you know they weren't seeking to rewrite international law even though the report itself makes it perfectly clear that this this is what they're seeking to do. They acknowledge that the um accept the definition of genocide doesn't work even on the basis of their uh factual misrepresentations And so they make it clear that they're looking for an amendment

essentially to the way that genocide is treated uh in international law by international courts and tribunals. So um in some respects not surprising but it continues to be disappointing uh especially as there's been you know continual demands that that the recording be taken down if you can believe it. So, uh, it strikes me that they didn't think it went so well for them, but to seek to, um, cover Up exchanges like this when the whole purpose of course of the debate in Copenhagen was open debate, uh, and discussion of these very important issues and these

obscene allegations. So, all round quite a disappointing attitude from what used to be, of course, one of the leading lights of the NGO world, especially in this part of the world. Yeah, it's so sad that kind of development because I think that hurts that those kinds of organizations Their their um reputation because in essence and in principles those kinds of organizations are really important for highlighting when there are atrocities against people and then it's so unfortunate when they get in my view corrupted by blaming Israel for for genocide which we're going to dive into. But

I I just feel like they are um um smearing their own brand so to say and and destroying their own credibility by doing so. So, it used to be the case That these organizations upheld these values, but Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch uh now have for many many years been marked out as having an obsessional focus uh on the Jewish state and the fact that reports both on uh the allegation of apartheite and now on genocide uh by both of these organizations, for example, have been replete with falsehoods um and where these reports rely

on information as it transpired in the uh debate in Copenhagen essentially from Hamas sources uh in order to put forward these obscene allegations. It's a dire state of affairs, but the consequences of this cannot be understated. Uh and I said in the debate that amnesty and others ultimately have blood on their hands because the consequences of this misinformation and propagating these ancient blood labels in this case that you know Jews kill children or starve children. We've seen what that has led To. Jews uh and Israelis being executed in the street. Uh the abhorrent uh tragic

situation in DC outside the Jewish Museum is just the latest example of this. But there is a direct link between the misinformation that this uh NGO world, these civil society organizations have been propagating and what it leads to in terms of these practical consequences and this surge in violent anti-semitism that we've seen around the world. Yeah. And uh as you mentioned, they wanted to take it down actually from their website. And uh and I think that's so appalling also because I think that if it was the other way around, if they actually felt that as

they if they if they won the debate, then probably they would have wanted to share it and spread it everywhere. Well, it's pretty telling, isn't it? Yeah. Um we're going to talk I thought we were going to talk about some main points today just to Outline it. I I want to talk about this um argument that Israel is an occupying state which is just thrown around everywhere and I know that you have some different opinions about that in regards to like San Ramo resolution and these things. We're going to talk about of course genocide and

Amnesty International and also blood labels and anti-semitism I thought and I thought we could start with the whole thing about Israel being an occupying state because I feel like this is at the core of everything. Who has the right to the area of Israel? Do we need to go back to is it 1920 uh for the uh San Remo resolution? Look uh it depends who you ask. Some people like to go back to biblical times. Some people go back to the uh creation of the mandate San Remo. Um I believe that Israel should be treated

in the same way as any other state under the international legal system. And there is clear law about the Creation of states and their borders which uh if it applies to everyone else certainly should apply to Israel. So I would advocate starting at Israel's declaration of independence for a clear indication of you know what the status of the territory here is. And you're right that this is an important point to start with because this blood liable essentially of occupation uh just like all of these other legal terms that have been abused and inverted against Israel,

Ethnic cleansing, colonialism, apartheid, and genocide. All of these pseudo legal terms that are being weaponized and used for these political purposes have at their heart uh a focus on uh attacking the Jewish state through the pseudo international legal system. Um but this notion of illegal occupation for starters doesn't actually exist anywhere else. Occupation is seen as a recognized framework in international law which is applied uh where a Sovereign has been ousted from their territory. So as a starting point I would advocate you and listeners ask the question whom is it occupied from? And invariably no

one can answer that because the territory that we are speaking about in the context of East Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria what some people call the West Bank was in fact occupied by Jordan between 1949 and 1967 when Jordan attacked Israel uh the moment it declared independence. Uh and Then it was recovered by Israel in 1967. And the reason I say it was recovered by Israel is because of what international law tells us about Israel's borders at its declaration of independence. And this rule of uti posedus urus. It's a customary rule of international law. It's

universally applicable and it applies wherever there is no agreement to the contrary. It's a default rule. What does the words mean? What does uh the law and the the rule mean in itself? Uh as you possess under law essentially. Um so the words themselves are less significant than what the rule denotes which evolved uh it's fair to say over time. This is a rule that emerged over time as customary rules do. It began uh with the withdrawal of the Spanish from South America in the 19th century. So this is a rule that emerges from a

postc colonial context and the idea behind it was to prevent uh a vacuum uh arising. So uh to prevent what was called Terranalis no man's land when the colonial power leaves the territory there needed to be some sort of default mechanism that everyone knew what the lines were of the new states as they emerged. Uh so when the international court of justice recognized the emergence of this rule which from the 19th century was later applied in Asia in Africa at the dissolution of the former communist federations and essentially to all states that emerged From mandates

as Israel did and we'll come on to the specifics in a minute when the court talked about the emergence of this rule it talked about the reasons for it to provide stability certainty and to prevent fracticidal struggles. So it's important to understand in the context of international law more broadly all international law is looking to create order to limit chaos. Even the laws of war are seeking to regulate what is the Most chaotic state of affairs imaginable. And so everything pulls towards the direction of peace, peaceful interactions and stability and certainty. And it's therefore that

this rule states that a new state takes on whatever the lines were on the ground before the pre-existing administrative lines of whatever entity preceded the state. So when you're thinking about um the former communist federations breaking off into their uh contingent Parts, uh they followed the pre-existing administrative units of that larger entity. The same with respect to the mandate for Palestine, which of course when it was originally created included Trans Jordan. The British severed that to create later the Hasheite Kingdom of Jordan. But the administrative line that separated Trans Jordan from the rest of the

British mandate was the line that ran all the way down along the Jordan River to the Red Sea. Importantly, it Incorporates Jerusalem and the West Bank or Judea and Samaria. And that is the line. It's the only line in play uh that ultimately had to be Israel's border in 1948 on the 14th of May when David Benoron declared independence. Now, it's not required that Israel cite this rule. It's not required that Israel stake out this territory. In fact, the Declaration of Independence doesn't refer to borders at all. It refers to ET Israel, the land of

Israel. And it's in the absence of There being any agreement that dictates what Israel's borders were between it and its neighbors that this rule of utiposetus applies. And in fact, the agreements that do exist, importantly, the armistice agreements between Israel and Egypt and Israel in Jordan, underscore the importance of the administrative lines of the British mandate because they refer back to the mandatory lines while they make clear that they don't recognize Israel in any Borders because at the time neither Egypt nor Jordan uh recognized the legitimacy of the existence of the state of Israel. And

it's very important to recognize that the the pseudo language that has arisen which has been quoted me to me in Copenhagen uh the Danish position is we believe in the 1967 borders. Now that's ludicrous on several levels uh because there's no such thing. These are not borders. This is a reference to the 1949 armistice lines. They do not date from 1967. And these are the very lines that Israel's neighbors said would never be considered borders and are illegitimate. It essentially simply designated where the two armies had reached when the ceasefire was agreed. Uh so it

was you know demarcating the the the lines of the troops. Um it has no significance in international law. So we have to go back to the default rule and the importance of of international law if it's going to Be respected uh has to be in its equal application. I can give a parallel example of utiposidetus urus and how the international community engages with it in relation to Ukraine. There's a general consensus that Russia has occupied Crimea from Ukraine. And the reason for that is that Ukraine's borders followed Utiposetus Urus. It doesn't matter about the um

makeup of the population there. It is about clean lines. It is about what the Administrative lines uh before the creation of of Ukraine were. So this general consensus on the basis of utiposidetus holds and if Ukraine were to recover Crimea from Russia in the context of this war in the same way that Israel recovered Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem from Jordan from that Jordanian occupation that I mentioned uh after uh 1949. Israel recovered that in 1967. I mean let's think about that parallel. Do you think anyone other than Russia, do you think anyone would

accuse Ukraine of occupying Crimea from Russia when it's recovered in this hypothetical scenario, uh, its territory? I very much doubt it. And yet, it is this cannard of illegal occupation that is at the center of so much of the vitrial against Israel. And it also stems, I have to say, from a uh misinformation campaign about the historical narrative. uh this idea that there was a state of Palestine uh or That the creation of Israel was illegitimate because it ousted people from their territory. Uh this is all a pack of lies. The fact of the matter

is that the only reason Israel was able to declare independence and successfully defend itself in a war of annihilation in 1948 that was launched upon it by all of its neighbors is because the Jewish Yeshu, the community uh pre-state had been building state institutions ready to declare independence the moment the British left. And that is exactly what they did. They were Palestinian Jews. There was no concept of uh exclusively Arab Palestinian national identity at the time. My grandparents were Palestinians. They were issued with identity cards by the British that said race, Jewish, nationality, Palestinian. So

this concept of exclusively Arab Palestinian national identity only emerged much later in the 1960s with the creation of the Palestinian flag and the Palestinian national movement under Yasa Arafat. Uh it's desperately sad that at the heart of that national movement is essentially the singular aim of the destruction of the state of Israel unlike the kind of positive national aspirations that the Jewish community uh espoused and put into action in order to create their state and declare independence. We've got the complete inverse of that in the movement that the uh so-called Palestine Liberation Organization which of

course was a terrorist organization uh that Yasa Arafat uh was uh was was heading uh before ultimately the international community and and Israel included gave him and that movement legitimacy and credibility. But this rewriting of the historical narrative goes handin glove with the inversion and the uh abuse of international law in order to create this received wisdom in order to create this notion of well everybody says Everybody says Israel is an occupier. Everybody says is not how you run a legal system. It's how you run a lynch. And we have seen that lynch mob embrace

this false narrative, embrace this inversion of international law. And we've seen the desperate consequences of it, not just for Israel's ability to defend itself against unspeakable atrocities and terror. Uh these are the proxies of course of the Islamic Republic uh in Iran. Uh but also of Course the appalling consequences for Jews around the world stem from this rewriting of history and this rewriting of law. When Israel declared itself a state in 1948, how important was the Sanreo resolution then? Is is that a like a keystone? It's a is an important thing for everything to be

built upon. So I see it as important uh historical and legal context. I mean this is an an important uh international commitment if you will and and we shouldn't overlook The purpose of the mandate for Palestine which had at its core the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people. I mean that was a commitment that was continually betrayed by the British when they uh refused Jewish immigrants in the course of the Holocaust. Uh in fact turned away migrants that were later to meet their deaths in uh concentration camps. Um and there there were

many other instances in terms of the the treatment of of the Jewish communal institutions uh pre-state institutions uh and unfortunately the uh tensions between uh British forces uh while they remained in that area the dwindling years of the British mandate uh and the uh resistance some say also terror uh organizations uh that were seeking to get uh the British to leave. Um so those commitments uh that the Brits and the international community had made uh prior to the establishment of a Jewish home were um Were betrayed. you had confiscation of uh of arms from uh

the Jewish community just before the Declaration of Independence which made uh it even harder for them to defend themselves against the the onslaught the genocidal war of annihilation which was immediately declared upon them. Um but I see it as historical and legally significant context. Uh I completely accept the legal arguments through advance by others. I don't even think we Need to go there. uh the starting point of Israel's declaration of independence and equal treatment for Israel to all other states and the way that they are established uh and the way that their territorial integrity is

thereafter respected. I mean it it is appalling to see uh pseudo declaration after declaration recognizing a so-called state of Palestine which is essentially an attack on the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the state of Israel And a complete upending of international agreements, the Oslo Accords included, which have been endorsed by so many of these states that have made uh increasingly problematic um public declarations visa v Israel and uh the prospects of a future state of Palestine. And um the reason I say that it's upending them, it's it's tearing them up is because you know the

Oslo Accords made it clear that borders that uh all of this was a matter for final Status negotiation. Uh those negotiations have failed because Israel is faced with uh essentially a Palestinian leadership that has embraced terrorism. Not of course just Hamas Palestinian Islamic Jihad Fatak and and the rest of them but the so-called moderates in the Palestinian Authority. They have been funding terrorism through their pay for sllay scheme and they paid terrorists of every uh denomination. It doesn't matter what Banner they coales under. uh the Hamas terrorists that planned the 7th of October attacks, the

heads of the NOBA force so-called were um many of them were collecting stipens, payments, pay for slave salaries from the Palestinian Authority, which by all accounts enabled them uh to uh sit back and plan these attacks without having to go out and work for a living. Uh a criticism of the San Ramo is that yeah, they they did that declaration, but it never de Demarcated any lines. It didn't have any they didn't talk about any borders. It never like defined where the land of Israel should be. How do we respond to that or how do

you respond to that when people criticize that? Yeah, but yeah, they declared the the Israeli state, but they never really really like defined it on the map where it's supposed to be. Well, so Sano didn't declare a state of Israel. Israel did this. And and that's where utiposis comes in because in the Absence of any agreement on borders, this is the default rule. And I think it's so important just to stress the fact that Israel has not been created by the international community either under San Remo or by the United Nations. Yeah. Because a lot

of people think that when when you speak to people on the street, they think that yeah, UN actually created the state of Israel in 1947. They think and it's like no, they actually declared themselves in 1948. Why do people walk around thinking that? It's it's part of the misinformation. And I think it's it's put forward because of this notion that well, if the UN created it, it can decreed. It can um and and there is an increasing movement, right, to have Israel wiped off the map. One which was, you know, I hope you're sitting down,

endorsed by the International Court of Justice in the non-legally binding, of course, advisory opinion that it gave last year. uh Essentially calling for the ethnic cleansing of Jews from Judea and Samaria and from East Jerusalem and wiping Israel off the map when it talked about the contiguous nature of Palestinian territory. So that you know sentiment on the street of the UN created it, maybe the UN can uh take Israel away has filtered through through UN bodies but even up to the you know the highest judicial body of the United Nations, the International Court of Justice

and it's Desperately concerning that we're seeing um you know ctologology being thrown out of the window, law being thrown out of the window and and the history of the matter. I think the reason that people focus incorrectly on 1947 is of course this was the partition resolution. This was the United Nations General Assembly putting forward a proposal, a recommendation. Now general assembly resolutions are not legally binding. They are political resolutions and this Political resolution put forward a recommendation which was never implemented. You know unlike partition in the case of India Pakistan which was followed through.

This was a proposal that was rejected by uh the local Arab population by because Israel actually signed it, didn't they? But the other part didn't sign it. It wasn't a case of signing it, but Israel welcomed it. They welcomed it because it was an endorsement by the United Nations on the Creation of the state of Israel. Um but ultimately because there's no buyin from you know the other parties here uh because they refused to accept Israel in any borders when Israel finally declared independence there's no agreement on boundaries there's no internationally binding proposal on what

the state of Israel is going to look like and so you have to fall back into those default rules and you know I've seen especially as I've started to speak a lot more About utiposetas because it's remarkable to me that it's just not been part even of the academic debate on this. It's been squashed. Um it was raised in the context of the ICC uh jurisdictional question already back in 2020 and the prosecutor at the time Fatu Ben Suda responded uh seeking to justify her position that utiposetasurus didn't apply. Um she failed. She she didn't

engage with the application of this rule. Uh we've seen a similar state of Affairs at the international court of justice where the vice president of the court raises as part of her descent and says look the the majority of the court failed to engage with fundamental parts of international law fundamental rules of international law and their application to uh this situation. How can they be taken seriously in this context? But um as I've been speaking more and more about it, some people have Have profered alternative views. I have failed in the last 10 years of

having these discussions with sometimes with leading academics in this field. I have failed to receive a single explanation as to why uniquely in this case utiposeturus ought to be disapplied. I've heard references to the partition resolution and we've already talked about why this political resolution which was never implemented doesn't take us any further. I've also heard References to well the Palestinians have a right of self-determination which I think is worth unpacking for a moment. Um because in the context of international law and where we've moved to in the in the in the on the issue

of self-determination absolutely I don't think anyone would argue with that self-determination does not give one a right to a state. But if it did, the Kurds would have a state for sure. There would be hundreds more states in the World. Self-determination does not trump territorial integrity of existing states, that existing framework. And that's clear. I mean the Supreme Court of Canada in the case for the secession of Quebec talks about this in in great detail which has been taken to be a um a a such an authoritative statement on international law on this point that

it's almost just said to become part of customary law. Um this explanation of how peoples are expected to Self-determine within existing territorial frameworks. And of course the Palestinians have an autonomy. They have self-governance in the West Bank in areas A and B. They had self-governance from 2005 in Gaza. And we've seen what's happened there with the violent takeover of Kamas in 2007. Um so all of these arguments that have been profered, I'm afraid don't cut the mustard. Nothing uh in this vein other than kind of wishful thinking and I don't particularly like Israel. I have

some ideological political opposition to it. Therefore, I want to disapp fundamental international law so far as its borders are concerned. That that's what these arguments essentially amount to and that's just not an acceptable position in my respectful opinion. But how is the international courts able to just look away from these and just not apply it as applicable law? How how are they able to Get away with that? So, in the context of the IC, we saw a series of legal acrobatics. Thank you. um in terms of the decision of the pre-trial chamber in 2021 to

seek to justify jurisdiction for the court to investigate Israelis where the court has no jurisdiction and and a big part of this uh is to do with understanding the territory of the state of Israel and the fact that the Palestinian Authority is not a state. Um and in seeking to Overcome these issues there there are a number of arguments that were put forward. Um, one line of argumentation, if I can paraphrase, essentially said that the reason the Palestinians aren't a state is because of the conduct of Israel and therefore that shouldn't be held against them.

I mean, again, that's not an argument that resonates in international law, but it's also um factually incorrect. Uh the um reason that the Palestinians don't have a state Today is as a result of every offer uh that would lead to, you know, either statehood or or let's say statehood minus, right? A Palestinian autonomy that has everything except the ability to threaten Israel on its border. This has been rejected by the Palestinian leadership over and over again. Just listen to the American presidents that presided over some of those negotiations. um they they don't have skin in

this game in terms of uh blaming Yasa Arafat uh for example for having refused um essentially everything that he was offered except one thing which was uh the so-called right of return which is a euphemism for the destruction of the state of Israel. So um in seeking to overcome this position in fundamental customary international law, we've had these sort of political arguments. We've also had reliance on UN resolutions which are political instruments and we've had this fudging uh both at the ICC and now uh also at the ICJ of law and politics and that's the

way that in each case the majority and it has been the majority because there was a very powerful descent from judge Kovac at the ICC in 2021 and a very powerful descent from judge seat in uh the ICJ uh across the last year and essentially in every um uh opinion and uh preliminary measures ruling that has been issued by the court in respect of Israel, she has been dissenting and calling out the Failure of the court to engage with this fundamental international law in favor of the political arguments that they have endorsed. I feel like

I thought that you know like international law it was a professional field that that um people would actually follow the law and and um people are professionals that it would have kind of a um mutual understanding of the law but it seems like when I when I look at this from the outside it seems like there are Wildly different interpretations of everything is like how how are you able to square that that everybody in this able to have that much of a difference of opinion what is applicable law or not. So there are a couple

of points here. Um first is that there has been a capture of the academy and in particular the international legal academy for many many years unless you have drunk the Kool-Aid on Israel. You will not advance as an academic. You will not get tenure. And that's particularly important in the field of international law because there is such a crossover between the academy and international legal practice and international legal tribunals. So I'll give you an example. When I was a fellow at Colombia Law School in 2018 in the national security law program at the law school

uh was Sarah Cleveland who is now America's judge on the ICJ. And having attended some of her lectures, I was in no doubt as to what her political Leanings were on some of these issues that has of course been confirmed in uh some of the opinions that she has rendered so far. While a judge on behalf of America at the International Court of Justice and there's this backwards and forwards the former president of the ICJ uh Joan Donahghue uh is now, you know, a member of a chambers in London. So there's this cyclical uh movement

between practice and academia uh which um essentially has this kind of Self-fulfilling uh anti-Israel unfortunately um political um input into the way that international law is being developed. You also have a very very important cyclical framework in the context of civil society organizations. Now we began our discussion with talking about Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, um you know, Oxfam, and it's imperative that people understand how it is that you can get to a position where Well, everybody says the UN, Amnesty International, the International Court of Justice, but the reason that everybody says uh Israel is,

you know, a pariah state is because they're all reinforcing the other. And ultimately they base their assessments on information that is coming from prescribed terrorist organizations. You know the only information coming out of the Gaza Strip at the moment is controlled by Hamas. That is the Information that is being fed into NGO reports. That is the information that is then being fed into UN special raper reports. That is the information that is then fed into UN resolutions. That is the information that is then fed into the International Court of Justice or the ICC. when they're

relying on those UN resolutions and then the civil society organizations in turn rely on what the ICJ or the ICC have said to uh inform the next round of anti-Israel uh Reports that include uh extremely problematic, misleading and I would say even false information uh about Israel and international law. So that's why you get this vicious cycle. And you know when Medi Hassan and others have said to me, is the UN wrong then? Is Amnesty International wrong then? Are they all wrong? The answer is yes. And it's yes for the same reason because they're all

relying on the same false information. This is not a new uh cyclical circle of Uh disinformation. This has been going for decades and it is also in many many respects uh reflective of something far more sinister I think underlying where international law is being pushed to, where it is being manipulated to. And it is a battle between rule of law countries like Norway, the UK, Israel, the US and the despots and the dictatorships in the world like Russia, China and Iran. Rule of law countries View law as a curtailment on government power. Non- rule of

law countries view law as a means of wielding power. And you can see that tension in the context of certainly UN resolutions and debates, but also in the drafting of certain international conventions. And for so long, rule of law countries have essentially been on the back foot in pushing back against this manipulation of international law to suit the interests of the despots and Dictatorships and their terror proxies. And that in so many respects has informed but also been supported by because there's this back and forth uh symbiotic relationship there also by these civil society organizations.

And a big big question that we need to be asking is where's the funding for so many of these NOS's coming from? Because I think if you follow the money, you'll also uh start to see an awful lot of these puzzle pieces fall into place About why it is that these once respected organizations are now doing the bidding of uh dictatorships, terror proxies, and those forces that really want to see the destruction of Western civilization. Do you know if there's any evidence out there of uh like amnesty or other NOS's being actually funded by you

know Qatar or Iran or Russia or like any of these states? Do you know if there's anything out there? Not off the top of my head but I do know that there are Organizations very much looking into this. I imagine FDD Foundation for Defense of Democracies I know they do a lot of uh investigation of terror financing. uh NGO monitor is a is another um excellent resource on you know following the money and understanding where these NOS's are often getting their funding from. So I would certainly advocate more investigation into this phenomenon because I'm thinking

like the question That pops into my mind is like for amnesty what's in it for them is like why are they out before the courts concluding that Israel is um committing genocide before the court has even ruled like what's in it for them? Why would they do that? Is it follow the money? Is it like It strikes me that there are probably a number of factors. Um, you know, following the financials is is very important here. Um, but there's also this sort of um movement and Received wisdom that one um needs to adhere to a

particular catechism to be acknowledged as a good decent person. And increasingly that has included uh a vitriolic hatred of the Jewish state and an acknowledgement that Israel is responsible for if not all the world's evils than at least the world the evils in the Middle East. Um and we can see and again that there were many books that have been written on this. Um Uh Jake Wallace Simons's uh Israelophobia is a is a recent one that tracks uh a misinformation campaign, but how this has fit together uh with woke culture. Douglas Murray, of course, is

is another great author on on reading his latest book now. That's a great book. People should read it um on death cults and democracies. Uh absolutely. Um and that certainly tracks the phenomenon post the 7th of October, but this has been um many many decades in the making. Um in fact, Jake tracks it from the Soviet anti-ionist propaganda and how so much of that has permeated through left-wing thinking. So that we have this, you know, seemingly unholy alliance between the extreme left and the Islamists. But of course, increasingly, we've heard so many Iranian dissidents warning

that this is how Iran fell. It was that exact alliance between the left and the Islamists and so much of this began at The universities and took over the political sphere that led to the downfall of Iran and the uh Islamist takeover and those warnings need to be heeded because I'm afraid to say this is exactly what we are witnessing play out in the west and it's part and parcel of this badge of honor that so many of these you know I I saw it I I saw saw it in the uh amnesty representative that

attended the debate yesterday. We had a cordial exchange before the debate Began. She seemed to me to be a good person. I'm sure she absolutely believes in what she is doing. It's just that the arguments and the pseudo facts that are contained in Amnesty's genocide reports don't hold water. And it's baffling to me that so many people have been taken in by this uh pseudo fight for justice and human rights which is in fact doing the exact opposite of what it is that these goodwilled, goodnatured, good- intentioned people seek to achieve. Yeah. Brings to mind

a quote from Jordan Peterson who said that uh I don't think that people hold ideologies. It's ideologies that hold people in its grip. Right. That's very powerful. Yeah, I think so because people aren't even aware of what they're consumed by and persuaded by and what lens that makes you look at the world through. Um, in regards to like the UN and amnesty, what is uh in the West and in particular here in Norway, What you're up against if you have a a dissenting opinion about what is going on in Israel is that it's like almost

a David and Goliath situation because people hold these NOS's in such high esteem, in such high regard, like in here in Norway, it's like UN is almost like God in our secular society. Yeah, absolutely. Especially in this part of the world, they're sacred. They have a godlike status. Um, you know, and I was warned about this before going into the Debate in Copenhagen, you know, and and almost told to just to try and moderate my message to to to put it gently, which is very difficult. I mean, this is not a message that one can

easily deliver with a cup of tea and a biscuit. Uh, it it's it's diabolical. It is necessary to say that the emperor has no clothes. That these organizations that have this sacred god-like status here are ultimately fueling the worst hatred against the Jewish people that we have seen since the Holocaust and violent anti-semitism on the streets of the free world. And they need to be held to account for this. Now, that's the macro level, but what I and and others at UK lawyers for Israel and NGO Monitor and other organizations have done is is demonstrate

in detail why each of these reports put out by these organizations. And it's the same for the famine reports of the IPC and the FRC that have been Consistently shown to be wrong. We have provided a detailed review, detailed analysis that demonstrates why it is that they get to these false predictions that enable this cannot of starvation to be spread around the world. how it is that they have relied on false data on incomplete data um or uh reached what uh in fact even UN bodies have called implausible conclusions and how that misinformation has basically

been built up and spun into you know Tom Fletcher 14,000 babies will die in 48 hours I mean that ludicrous allegation should have collapsed under the weight of its own absurdity right but it is embraced and endorsed Because and and this is the critical thing here. People seem to be so ready to believe the most heinous false allegations against the Jewish state and the Jewish people. And this is why I link it to the modern blood liable. You know, the ancient blood liable was that Jews were killing Christian children to use their blood for religious

ritual or even to make matzah for Passover, right? Ridiculous we think today, but they were really widely believed at the time. The modern blood labels are as ridiculous. Israel's targeting children. Israel's starving children. Babies are being starved by the evil state of Israel. They are as ridiculous. But they are now as widely believed as the ancient blood liables were in their time. And these Godlike organizations are at the center of spreading this very dangerous misinformation. It's almost as if these blood labels are passed down through the generations in the zeitgeist. then subconsciously because it's exactly

the same as in the medievalss and in these blood labels. It's just that I thought we were done with them. I thought that they belong to the past to that part of history that were no longer associated with. But I'm starting to feel like this Is actually subconsciously passed down through generations almost in our DNA that kind of tendency to so easily believe these liables against Jews. What can I say? Uh history repeats itself, doesn't it? Yes. Yeah. Um let's see where we are here. We have to talk about obviously genocide in itself. The topic

of that uh I think the most telling thing if people go in and watch the debate that was in Copenhagen is that Amnesty International, they were so Eager and so bombastically and easily concluded in the report that Israel is committing genocide. But when they were pressed and asked, "Did Hamas commit genocide on the 7th of October?" No, there's no evidence to suggest that. We wouldn't we wouldn't like Well, I think one of the responses was, "We're still working on that." Oh, really? I I I seem to recall that. Um, obviously, there was a lot of

back and forth. Yeah, they're still working on whether or not uh the Atrocities of Hamas that they documented on GoPros and celebrated and sent around the world and were perfectly clear what their genocidal intent was and threatened to do this over and over again. That's not evident to them. but in the middle of a war where uh they're relying on information from Hamas and deliberately ignoring all of the material that is put out publicly by the state of Israel and the forces that actually know what's happening like how Much aid is going into the Gaza

Strip which is documented by Kogat on a weekly basis. They update the totals uh on their website. Uh they entirely ignore that. I mean the the double standards and the hypocrisy are just mind-blowing. I think that is one of the main parts of why they didn't want that video spread everywhere because there's no logical consistency there. Well, hopefully you can include a link to the debate with uh with this podcast. Definitely because That would at least give them a little bit more credibility if they were like absolutely crystal clear that 7th October was a genocide.

Like that would give them a little bit tiny more credibility. But when they're not even able to say that, it's like it's like they just fall through. And uh let's start with uh beginning with genocide. What are the actual legal criteria for for a court to actually sentence a state for committing genocide? Isn't the legal Criteria rather high? The threshold is rather high to do that. So I think the starting point has to be the definition of genocide under the convention for the prevention and punishment and it's in two parts. Um the most important part

is intention. I'll come back to you that because the second part is the acts that it references and it gives a a short list of the sorts of acts that would be um part of genocidal conduct including killing members of a group and uh Creating circumstances that make life impossible for them. So that's the list of acts but they are superseded by the most important part of the definition which is the intention to commit genocide. It's called uh the specific intent of this crime and it is um at the essence of what genocide is about.

Of course, this was a a term that was coined after the Jewish experience of the Holocaust to provide a legal terminology to that experience of being Targeted for extermination because you are Jewish. That intention to eradicate a group in whole or in part an ethnic, racial, religious or national group. That is at the core of what genocide is. And that is what separates it out from other crimes against humanity. Because a Holocaust was so horrible that there was not even legal language to describe it. And and specifically this idea of trying to wipe out a

group of people Uh genocide, that's that's where the war word comes from. Um there was actually a a a battle, if you will, uh between Raphael Lmin and Hersh Laapact after the war as to whether or not this should be the way to define that those crimes against the Jewish people, whether crimes against humanity was broad enough to incorporate it. But ultimately genocide won out because it recognizes something that is uh even more in in some respects than a crime against Humanity because you are seeking to annihilate a people and that was I think rightly

recognized as something the heenousness of which needed to be separately catered for separately defined. Uh so that is the origin of genocide, the definition of genocide which focuses on that intent to eradicate a people. Now I talked about occupation, ethnic cleansing, colonialism, apartheid and genocide as each being an inversion and a Weaponization of international law. But I think there's something even more heinenous happening here which is in each of these uh contexts what was done to the Jewish people is what the Jewish people are being accused of. Um psychologists refer to this as projection right

um Douglas Murray of course um in in quoting Vaseli Gman talks about it in the context of uh uh tell me what you are guilty of and I'll tell you what you accuse the Jews of. So There are lots of different ways of analyzing this phenomenon but it is a phenomenon that exists across each of these terms. You know Jews existed through hundreds of years of occupation. Um some would say that my grandparents lived under British occupation in the context of the mandate. Uh ethnic cleansing that has been the Jewish experience for thousands of years.

Um latally of course we've seen the ethnic cleansing of Jews from the Arab world. Uh those that fled to Israel. We also saw the ethnic cleansing of Jews from East Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria during Jordan's occupation. Right? That is the real ethnic cleansing here. There's been ethnic cleansing of Jews in areas A and B of the West Bank, which are Palestinian Authority controlled. Jews can't go there for their safety. I mean, there are big red signs that warn any Israelis from going in. But let's be frank here. Arab Israelis don't have a Problem with

going in and out. It's Jewish Israelis that need to fear for their lives there. Gaza was ethnically cleansed of Jews in 2005 with Israel's withdrawal. Even graveyards were dug up. Not even dead Jews could remain because of what would be done to them. The feared desecration of these bodies in these graveyards, which is in fact exactly what happened in East Jerusalem. You know, my ancestors gravestone was taken and used to pave a nearby road by The Jordanians. So, um, this this is in no way a one-off and in no way unusual, but that ethnic cleansing

is exactly what the Jews have been accused of perpetrating. And also a digression here is that they always talk about the Nakba of 700,000 Palestinians um, losing their homes after 1948, but nobody's talking about the 900,000 or so Jewish people who were expelled or had to leave because of persecution in the Arabic states surrounding them. There's There's another um false narrative around what happened in 1948 which has been embraced and endorsed um in particular by the the so-called revisionist historians. Uh I would advocate very strongly um looking at the facts uh and looking at histories

in particular published by Elza Talba on the myth of Dear Yasim um and actually understanding that this this myth of of the Nakba of ethnic cleansing is disproven on many levels. first on the Level that many Arabs stayed and in fact 20% of Israel's population is is com comprises uh Israeli Arabs today. Um second the uh even Benny Morris who has been consistently misrepresented in what he has written uh was clear that there was never any policy of expulsion by uh the Israeli authorities. Uh on the contrary, Tnit Dallet was all about civily administering Arab

villages that didn't engage in the fighting. And those that did, those that were part of the Conflict, of course, they needed to be fighted uh fought and defeated. Um, and then we've got individual instances of these alleged massacres like Dear Yasine, which have now been entirely debunked. Not only because the eyewitnesses there have said, you know, given interviews even on the BBC 27 years ago making it clear that there was no rape and no slaughter, but also and and actually this is worth dwelling on for a moment. We have heard an Explanation as to what

happened and why many many Arabs chose to flee totally independently of Israeli action or Israeli messaging. There was an interview with Hassim Naba comes from a very prominent Jordanian family uh prominent in fact in East Jerusalem and and then he was uh an ambassador of Jordan. He has no reason to lie about this. he has no incentive to uh seek to put Israel's case or anything like that. And he talks about taking down a false Press release from an individual called Dr. Kardi, well known at the time, a false press release of what happened in

Dear Yasine to say that there was a slaughter that women were raped. In fact, I think that pregnant mothers had their bellies cut open. This was one of the myths that had come out of deine. And he challenged this false press release. He says, why would we be saying this? essentially it didn't happen and he was told we have to put this out in Order to engender a uh an uprising against the Jews from amongst the local Arab population. He was very honest in this interview on the BBC 27 years ago and he said this

was our biggest mistake. The moment that the Arab population heard women had been raped which was false the moment they heard this they fled. It had the opposite of the intended effect. Rather than rising up and joining the fight, the war of Annihilation against the Jews, they fled independent of what Israel was doing and fighting for its existence at the time. Now, it's extremely striking to me that history repeats itself because we saw this whole scenario play out all over again. Do you remember reports on Al Jazzer alleging instances of rape at Alshifa hospital in

the context of the Gaza war? Yeah, maybe. Yeah. They were around for about a week. Mhm. And then Al Jazzer walked them back. Now, my understanding of this is that Hamas told them to deny those reports. These were reports that were false. There had been no rape at Alshifa, but they were put out seemingly with the notion that it would encourage some of the local uh Gaza population to either engage with uh Israeli forces or as part of this general propaganda of demonizing Israel to the world. This is an allegation that is frequently made against

Israeli soldiers which has uh Repeatedly been shown to have been false. The reason it was walked back at the request of Hamas is that it caused Palestinians to flee the area. They were losing their human shields. And it's just extraordinary to think that the same mistake that was recognized by Hassima 77 years ago replayed in the context of Al Jazzer's false reports and Hamas immediately seeking to retract that false information because of the impact that it was having on Palestinians fleeing these areas the moment that they heard that women had been raped. The they believed

it. They believed this false information. So, um I just think it's important for the just to to expand on that point and I know we're going on several tangents because um the the reality of what happened in 1948 has been manipulated uh and has been weaponized. uh we hear it in marches on the street and we hear it uh even in in classrooms and in University lectures and that false uh false position that you know the Jews ethnically cleansed people is an inversion of what happened uh and as you say completely um uh ignores the

ethnic cleansing of Jews from Arab lands as well as the history of of ethnic cleansing that the Jewish people have suffered in the land of Israel itself. Um, colonialism of course is is another important uh inversion that the Jews are the decolonization success story Reestablishing the state of Israel. They were the uh victims of colonialism for uh so many hundreds of years. Apartheite is an appalling accusation. Anyone just needs to go to Israel to see that that's not the case. But it's part and parcel of finding, you know, the worst crimes that you can accuse

a state of and attaching that to the Jewish state, attaching that to Israel. There is an apartheid that exists in that area. Uh and that is in the Palestinian Controlled territories where you don't have Jews. They have been cleansed of their Jews. They are yudine if you will. That is that is the real apartheid. But then we come on to genocide and this is a grotesque inversion not just of the Jewish experience and the Holocaust but of course also of what happened on the 7th of October which were real acts of genocide by Hamas and

other Palestinian terrorist groups with the intention of Killing Jews because they are Jews. And let's not forget that so much of this is rooted in one of the core drivers of this conflict which is the indoctrination to terror. Many of the Palestinian terrorists that crossed the border on the 7th of October had never seen a Jew before. The first Jews were they encountered were those that they raped, slaughtered, burned, mutilated, tortured, and abducted because Jews had been ethnically cleansed from Gaza. Many Of those occasionally they're interviewed, they they still talk about Jews in the context

of having horns and tails because this is the propaganda that they are subject to. From kindergarten up in UNR run schools, these Palestinians are taught that the highest calling in life is to become a martyr and to slaughter as many Jews as possible. And and this is why it shouldn't be hard for Amnesty International and others to recognize The acts of genocide that were conducted because uh Yaya Sinwa had been calling for many years before to pull down the border and turn out the livers, tear out their livers and their hearts. Now that that actually

that imagery is very powerful in the Arab world and it has been repeated over and over again. I don't know if you recall the lynching of two reservists in 2000. Yeah. Yeah. Where the symbolism of the red hands are from. Right. That's absolutely right. So These were two uh Israeli reservists that lost their way. They ended up in Ramla in the West Bank. They went to a local police station looking for help and they were lynched. And as part of this lynching, this mob tore out their endrails. And there are photographs of of uh the

attackers eating their livers. And you're absolutely right that one of the attackers, one of the lynchers held up his bloodied hands to the window. And Below outside of this police station is this baying mob that go wild at this site. And this is exactly the red hand symbol that so many Hollywood actors have endorsed. I imagine through ignorance as opposed to malice. But still that symbol is recognizable across the Arab world for what it stands for which is the lynching of Jews. This is what happens unfortunately and this is the inversion. This is what Yaya

called for. This is what happened on the 7th of October. It wasn't the first time that this sort of massacre and and medieval barbarism has been meed out by Arabs to Jews in that part of the world. And this is what is being inverted. That is where do you think that comes from? That extreme hate that causes people to rip out the the intri of of people and eat their livers. Like how do you get to that level of hate? What is the I don't know the Arabic or The Islamic anti-semitism? Where where does it

stem from? Pure indoctrination. Yeah. from you know from from your mother's cradle uh through kindergarten through school where you're learning arithmetic on the basis of how many marts you're counting or you're learning physics on the basis of uh how to use a slingshot or you're watching Palestinian uh kids TV where a bumblebee tells you the trees will come to life and reveal the Jews hiding behind them and tell you To come and slaughter them or you revere martyrs because your football club is named after one or you celebrate and reenact terror attacks as part of

school plays. It comes from this relentless abuse of children. Now, we've seen reforms to some of that in other parts of the Middle East. The UAE uh completely reformed its textbooks and its education system. Uh Saudi has done something similar. But until we grapple with what is at the heart of this Genocidal war against the Jews, until we grapple with this indoctrination to terror, there's never going to be any progress here. Until we do that, and we also need to grapple with the incentivization to terror. I I talked about the pay for slave policy, I

think earlier. Um that is being funded by the international community. It's crazy. And uh and it's that incentivization and indoctrination to terror which is ultimately what is pushing peace further And further away. But the fact that kids are taught this in school, where does that again stem from originally? Does a lot of this lead back to Iran for the ayatollah's hate for you know they call Israel for little Satan and the US for big Satan. Is it is that the original place where this is coming from do you think? Or I think it actually predates

Iran. Uh because if you think about the creation of ENRA in 1949 and really its activities that began uh In earnest in 1950, the whole notion of the creation of this unique Palestinian refugee status that is passed down generation to generation, right? That doesn't exist anywhere else in the world, right? Refugees are settled and they take on usually the citizenship of the place where they uh arrive. And at least in Israel, the refugees that fled to Israel from the Arab world were embraced and became productive members of society. Only the Palestinian Arabs Have been uniquely

kept in this limbo for generations in so-called refugee camps in Syria, in Lebanon, in Jordan, in Egypt, and even in uh in, you know, Palestinian controlled areas. Now, in Gaza and in uh the Palestinian Authority controlled areas of Judea and Samaria, you have what are referred to as refugee camps uh supposedly in in Palestinian territory. But why are they refugees? Because this whole notion of the creation of UNRA and the creation of This Palestinian refugee status was to hold in obeyance this population for when Israel was annihilated. Once they'd pushed the Jews into the sea,

there would be space in Hyifa, in Jerusalem, in Tel Aviv, Yafo. And this is where, and it's you see it throughout uh the education process in UNR run schools. Where are you from? They say, and they'll they'll give you uh a town in Israel. Where are you going back to going back to that town when we kill the Jews? This is the the the standard refrain. and it is um strategic and it is carefully orchestrated and it is supported by the United Nations and ultimately it was part and parcel of the uh very idea of

setting up UNRA to keep alive the war of annihilation against Israel and the uh so-called Palestinian refugee problem or crisis is the lynch pin uh for that perpetual war of annihilation against the Jews. But with the UN supporting UNRA this way, how do How do countries and states keep their memberships in the UN? Why don't they like retract and and pull out of the UN and in uh and protest against this stuff? Who's going to go first? Yeah, Israel. Uh who's going to go first when this is the world club? You know, this is where

everyone comes to be important, to give their speeches. Um it's one of the reasons, you know, one of the driving forces behind the Palestinian Authorities's uh so-called foreign policy was to become a member of the UN, not to actually in um engage in state building. Uh you know, to organize bing collections, uh sorry, garbage collections, I don't I don't know what the what what the terminology is here. Uh to to set up the kind of state institutions that I mentioned the the Jewish community pre the state of Israel had up and running already, ready to

go. Yes, Arafat Mahmud Abbas have no Interest in actual state building. They just want to come to the podium of the United Nations, slam their fist on the table and blame Israel for all of their problems. But it's significant that they want to come and do that at the UN because for all of its faults and and deep deep faults and I don't just mean you know all of these stories of of cover up at the UN of corruption of true evil um the way that uh UN organizations have behaved in in some parts of

Africa And the developing world uh and the allegations surrounding abuse of children um and uh sexual abuse of children in exchange for boot, you know, just as low as one can possibly imagine. And of course, its involvement in terror and the complicity of UNRA, not just in the 7th of October atrocities and the UNRA employees that were directly involved, but also subsequently in supporting Hamas and in keeping hostages. Emily Deari, the British Hostage, explained to Karma, the British prime minister, that she was held in an UNRA facility in Gaza and the UK's increased its funding

to UNRA, it's remarkable, but ultimately when faced with being part of the United Nations and this pretense of what the UN was intended to stand for, you know, promotion of world peace and taking on the very very difficult reality of what the United Nations is, what it has become, and all of the harm it is Doing. Nobody wants to face that. So, I can entirely understand. But until we do, until the the the League of Democracies, the rule of law countries actually stand up for real justice, real human rights, real international law. This macab very

concerning, devastating development is simply going to continue. I think I read yesterday actually last night that the UN is actually almost running out of money that by September They might be bankrupt and well America I I say who's going to start right okay so I I think it's fair to say that America has already taken under this administration um a very significant step uh in terms of its funding of the UN in terms of you know its recent demand that Franchesca Albanesi be uh thrown out of her position uh as UN UN special raper in

light of the appalling blood labels that she is spreading against the Jewish people. Um so America Has certainly taken a a significant step in in a a very positive direction I would suggest in terms of holding the United Nations to account. One might think in fact that uh a congressional inquiry into the United Nations that separates out the good from the bad and I would believe there's an awful lot more bad unfortunately than good. But I'm sure there are aspects of the United Nations that are worth saving. So a congressional inquiry that actually Looks in

detail at the UN's operations and starts to map that out would be I think an extremely useful step in the right direction either of United Nations reform or of just you know abolishing the whole thing and working out a route forward that incorporates some of the positives and I would say actually bringing the world's nations together in one place for the purpose of discussion and most of the important conversations frankly happen in the corridor or Outside of the UN General Assembly. Um, but even having the opportunity of a of a public discussion in the General

Assembly is not necessarily a bad thing. But the moment votes happen, what on earth is the point when uh, you know, the the new leader of Syria has the same voice or the same vote as the whole of Germany? This is not a democratic organization. Who are we kidding here? So discussion is one thing. the minute you introduce voting, I think you're Already into serious difficulties at the United Nations. But also um it means if you if you take that out of the equation you you lose the need for the security council because ultimately the

UN wouldn't have any law making possibility law makingaking power and this absurd sort of historical situation of the P5 and and the the elevated status that even the UK enjoys despite the fact that it seems to have reneged any uh responsibility that it might have for International uh you know peace and and and order uh and really That's a very outdated um setup for the current state of affairs. But how does one explain that Israel has been condemned by the UN like more times in total than all the other countries combined? H how does one

explain that? Firstly because there's an inbuilt majority at the United Nations against Israel amongst the states that either you know have no diplomatic relations with Israel or have as part And parcel of their foreign policy to demonize Israel at every opportunity and that that's a given but also because of everything that we have discussed already so far in terms of the cyclical approach of civil society UN international courts and tribunals and the narrative that is developed. It's just very easy if you are stuck for material and you have a speech to give at the UN,

you know, do the dirty on Israel and everyone will cheer for you. It's a it's a very easy way of being part of the club and being accepted and being lorded. And it gets to the point, I mean, I've spoken at the UN Human Rights Council calling out these practices, including the standing agenda item, agenda item seven, that exists only for the purpose of condemning Israel. And on one of the occasions I was there, I recall hearing a speech before me that accused Israeli soldiers of Rape on the basis of no information. I mean, this

this I looked into this subsequently and they were fabricated reports, but it was very interesting to me because very shortly before that, there had been a contradictory report that in fact accused the Israeli army of racism because it did not rape Palestinians. Oh my god, how is that possible? So this is the absurdity of the situation that Israel is dealing with not just at the UN but The UN is part and parcel of where this circus plays out. Oh my god. Uh we have to get back to genocide in itself. Uh we were at the

legal criteria before we went uh on some detours. Um yeah the legal criteria for the definition we were on I think and then the legal criteria. Uh right. So the key the key issue here is intention. Uh and I think it's worth highlighting that what amnesty and what South Africa and its application at the ICJ have sought to do is misrepresent statements from Israeli uh government representatives, Israeli officials is saying look this is genocidal intent. Um you may recall Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyao referring to Amalech biblical reference um which which essentially uh evokes the need

to destroy entirely an enemy. He was talking about Hamas. Yeah. He was not talking about the Palestinian people. So they have quoted out of context and misrepresented these Statements in order to say look look this is genocidal intent. And the reason it's important to call this nonsense out is because of course all of the evidence points to the contrary. Where do we start? First of all the population has been increasing because these allegations of genocide didn't just start now. Right? I remember doing an interview in 2014 during suketan protective edge, a previous operation in Gaza,

where my counterpart Was alleging genocide against the Palestinians. Look at the population figures. Some people say, and I think it's a little um dismissive, but some people say if Israel's seeking to commit genocide, it's the most incompetent um you know, entity and seeking to do this. Uh I think that rather cheapens the the topic of of discussion, but maybe it's a valid point. The fact of the matter is that consistently Israel has done everything within its power to reduce Civilian casualties while Hamas has been increasing them or doing everything in its power to increase them,

including by shooting its own civilians, including from Palestinian Islamic Jiad Hamas rockets that fall short in the Gaza Strip intended for Israeli civilians. But when they fall short, they kill indiscriminately. They fall without warning. They fall without a proportionality assessment and they kill Palestinians that are included in this Allegation of you know Israeli strikes. We have a perfect example in the context of the Alley hospital on the 23rd of October 2023 where immediately the world and his wife were saying this was an Israeli air strike on a hospital 500 casualties. Within 5 minutes of the

strike Hamas was putting out this absurd figure of 500 casualties. later transpired. This was a Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket that fell in the car park, not the hospital. The hospital Was intact. Um, but this is part and parcel of this readiness to believe these genocidal lies, you know, about Israel. But looking to intention, we also have to take into account this this issue of food, aid, humanitarian assistance which Israel has been facilitating throughout this war actually in not just not not quite in breach but in uh complete overcompliance with its international obligations. The reason I

say that is article 23 of the Third of the fourth Geneva Convention is very clear uh about um facilitating aid being caveed that obligation to facilitate aid does not apply where this aid is being diverted by enemy forces. We know Kamas has been diverting this aid from the very beginning you know before we even had videos of them commandeering the aid delivery trucks. It was clear that Hamas controls Gaza and therefore aid going in is being diverted by Hamas and this is How they've been fueling their war machine for the last year and a half

despite the fact that Isra has no obligation under international law to facilitate aid. It has been doing so because it doesn't want Palestinian civilians to starve. And now it has created this separate uh aid delivery mechanism through the centers that it has established with American contractors and with the support of the Americans. And the most bizarre aspect Of this is that the UN and and civil society organizations and the international community are saying oh no no no this is terrible because Hamas is upset about it. Hamas doesn't want aid delivery mechanisms to happen that exclude

its ability to divert the aid and the international community have been supporting Hamas in decrying this new initiative to provide aid to Palestinian civilians. Not only that, Hamas have been telling Palestinian Civilians not to go to these aid distribution centers. This is this is a famine. This is starvation. when Kamas is telling people not to go and collect aid from this distribution points, it's um it it makes a mockery of of certainly of the international reporting. But coming back to the intention aspect of this, all of the evidence is in the complete opposite direction. Israel

is doing everything to protect civilian life, to provide humanitarian assistance To Palestinians in Gaza, and the Palestinians in Gaza recognize this. I saw in November interviews by Ohado, an Israeli journalist, who went into Gaza and he was just holding out a microphone as Palestinians were leaving Jabalia, I think it was at the time, and they were grabbing the microphone from him and they were criticizing Hamas. They were blaming Hamas for having brought this destruction onto their heads and they were thanking Israel. Thank you for Providing humanitarian corridors. Thank you for protecting us. Thank you for

providing humanitarian aid. You are helping us while Hamas is killing us. This is what they said. Now, these interviews didn't feature at all on the international media. Why? They break the narrative. They break the narrative. They don't fit with the agenda. I feel like it's so surreal. It's like we're living in this upside down world. It's like it's so it's so Strange. And and as you say also, I remember seeing these few like these brave souls of these Palestinians who were brave enough to actually hold demonstrations in Gaza and they weren't demonstrating against Israel or

IDF as the world media is telling us uh that they would probably do. they are demonstrating against kamas and and how does one square that because it it would be so much less uh it would be so much less of a risk For them to actually demonstrate against Israel that would be in in tune with the Hamas narrative but they are actually brave enough to demonstrate against Hamas that we know is probably leading to their deaths uh and you know what's truly unacceptable is the way the international community have completely abandoned these people. Yeah. Worse

than that, uniquely, Palestinian civilians are now prevented from leaving a war zone. Contrary to its international war Obligations, Egypt sealed that border that it has with Gaza to anyone who um reportedly cannot pay $10,000 to be able to leave. That is a breach of Isra of of Egypt's obligations that it signed itself up to under the African Union Convention of Refugees, which has a much broader definition of refugee than um the international convention. It includes civilians fleeing civil disorder. What happened to Egypt's obligations here Towards those Palestinian civilians? And why has the international community decided

that these Palestinians need to be used as political pawns against Israel to make its war against Hamas so much harder to maintain Hamas's uh use of civilian shields rather than evacuating these Palestinians the other side of the border with Egypt into Egyptian Rafa where there is more space than you know what to do with it's part of the Sinai desert to set up a Humanitarian zone there where they can be provided with humanitarian assistance without limit without diversion by Hamas where Hamas cannot abuse humanitarian zones to fire missiles onto Israel as it has done with

Al- Masi and with other areas in Gaza. Why has no one in the international community been calling for this? In fact, the first person who did, President Trump, who said Palestinians should be allowed to leave this war zone, just like any other civilians in a War zone if they so choose, he was resoundingly criticized. He was accused of of ethnic cleansing, of uh forcible transfer of people, which of course it was was never part of what he said. He said if Palestinians want to leave, they should be permitted. And again, this inversion that we're looking

at, the so-called supporters of human rights of decency, the so-called people who claim to be concerned for the lives of ordinary Palestinians are the very ones That are abusing them and that are endorsing and assisting Kamas's continued abuse of these people, too. It's as if uh in order to maintain the blood libels against the Jewish state and the Jews, you need to keep the Palestinians in a perpetual state of being uh victims and being refugees and being slaughtered and being exposed to crimes against humanity, crimes against uh violent crimes from from Hamas to be able

to keep that frame, to be able to Keep that narrative of what's going on. Um but the ICJ case from South Africa, why what's in it for South Africa in particular to bring this before the court? Why why them? So there have been all sorts of uh media reports into potential funding that they've received uh from Iran. I don't know the veracity of those, but I do know from having been in South Africa a couple of years ago um on on a speaking tour, I remember going into I had I had a couple of hours

off In the afternoon. And I thought I'll go and do something cultural. And I went into the Museum of Contemporary African Art. And the first room that I walked into, the first exhibit, Yas Arafat was staring down at me from every war. And it was an exhibit, artists against apar tide, artists against Zionism. And I started to understand how baked in this anti-ionist narrative was in so much of of South Africa's culture as well as its political discourse. And so I think that that ultimately fed in to you know the willingness of South Africa to

advance what is an absolutely heinenous blood label. I also don't think that South Africa thought it was going to be ultimately successful on the merits here and of course the sands are shifting and the received wisdom is changing and now it's acceptable to accuse Israel of genocide and that was ultimately their aim. I was on uh South Africa's version of the BBC, SABC, Immediately after the first provisional measures order was uh handed down in that case and my counterpart said, "Isn't it marvelous? Now we can finally use Israel and genocide in the same sentence and

nobody can tell us otherwise." And so ultimately this was part of the motivation to shift the Overton window to shift the acceptable parameters of the debate and and the language that one is allowed to to deploy. And I feel like just the fact That there is a case from South Africa against Israel, I feel like the the media and NOS's are so abusing this fact and say using it as you know there's a there's there's a legal case against Israel on u on uh genocide. So we have to take that into account and that's it's

like almost as if they saying that that says a lot just there being a case and as I understand that's not the same but because I think people draw parallels from that to saying that like If there was like a legal case towards an individual for like murder or something then no smoke without fire. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. which is which which is actually even worse in this case because um even the provisional measures orders that the court has issued have been utterly misrepresented in the press and also by legal professionals which is utterly inexcusable and

one key example of that is this notion that that the court found that there was plausible Genocide or a plausible risk of genocide and the court found no such thing. The court talks about plausible rights, which is an assessment of whether the rights that South Africa is claiming on behalf of the Palestinians ultimately fall under the genocide convention. Is this a case that falls for the court's consideration? That was what was considered as part of the provisional measures process. Uh it did not consider the merits. It did not consider Israel's Case at all. But even

after the former president of the ICJ, Joan Donghue, came out on BBC on Hard Talk to correct the record on this and to say actually we never we never talked about plausible risk of genocide. We talked about plausible rights. Even after she did that, people are still misrepresenting this provisional measures order. Uh and I saw, you know, evidence that was being given by the the PLO representative in the UK Zumlot, uh to the foreign affairs Committee in parliament saying this and nobody was calling him out on it. So, you know, the reality, the actual legal

processes, all of that is is thrown out of the window uh in favor of the misrepresentations of this in in the international media and elsewhere because I think a lot of people, the normal ordinary people on the street think that there's like a parallel there and in saying that, you know, there wouldn't be a case against an individual For murder if there wasn't like substantial evidence. It would be thrown out by the court system if there wasn't something. But as I understand the the international law system doesn't work like that. It's not the same thing

to say that. It doesn't mean that there is any plausibility for Israel in fact committing genocide just because it's a court case against him. Yeah, that's absolutely right. But also just bear in mind the makeup of this court uh Throughout much of of these proceedings. So Joan Donahghue um left as president and was replaced by Judge Salam who was formerly Lebanon's ambassador to the United Nations where he accused Israel of being a terrorist state to accuse it of war crimes in any other legal institution legal in any other court of course he would have been

required to recuse himself not here he was a driving factor a driving force in in um so we understand uh pursuing Many of these proceedings uh against Israel and and in fact getting to them sooner than the court might otherwise have. Uh and since he's left, one only needs to look at his Twitter. He's gone back into Lebanese politics now. One only needs to look at his Twitter feed to understand what his position is. Um so I think everything that's coming out of the International Court of Justice really needs to be taken with that significant

helping of salt and that Context to be properly understood. you know, a Norwegian law expert that you're going to meet uh later today at the debate at Yong's down in the city center here in Oslo, Cecilia Helis Twight. I talked to her also about this stuff and and she says that when I ask, you know, do you think Israel will actually be sentenced by the courts for um for genocide? And she says that objectively that will depend a lot about uh depend a lot on the pending outcome from the 2019 ICJ Myanmar case regarding the

threshold of genocide and that the courts will use that. Do you have a comment to that? Um I'm not so sure that I believe the assessment now will ultimately be made on the application of law. I see the narrative around Israel and genocide becoming so divorced from the application of law and the facts that ultimately the ICJ is becoming a political body as opposed to a court. And so I I don't unfortunately share the Same faith that it will it will necessarily I thought when South Africa originally brought this application even the South Africans didn't

have much faith in uh in getting home on the merits but now I think with the shifting sands that that might in fact be changing. One of the key issues in terms of assessing genocide is to do with the intention to commit genocide being the only reasonable inference. um of of the activity. So the difficulty With a situation of armed conflict where Israel is legitimately fighting Hamas terrorists and it is killing people that of course is the overriding the the the not just the only reasonable inference. But that is that is the stated war aim

of Israel and that is reflective of its conduct here. It's also reflective of its conduct in seeking to prevent civilian casualties, providing warnings of those strikes and also preventing uh hunger by facilitating aid, providing Medical assistance. You know, it took medical teams into Alshifa when it went in to root out Hamas terrorists to treat civilians. It set up field hospitals in Gaza to treat civilians. Um so one thing I would say and the reason that case law of of the ICC and and also of the ICJ to certain extent is is significant is that there

has been this requirement of special intent and it is a high threshold that needs to be crossed that to prove genocide that you Need to be sure that this is the the only real reasonable inference and there are lots of uh efforts now to amend that to broaden the definition of genoc genocide to to to widen it. Um, and some of the reports that we've seen uh in the Amnesty International report on genocide is is explicit that it is seeking that amendment to international law. So, we'll have to see how how that case law develops.

I think the fact that this case is pending at the ICGJ in relation To to Israel has an enormous impact on the academic discourse and the kind of general manipulation and movement on international law in in this direction too. Do you what's your gut feeling telling you? Do you think that the courts will actually be corrupt enough to actually land on and sentence Israel for genocide? Do you think that could happen? Um so it just be slightly careful in terms of conflating obviously the ICJ which is a court that deals with Um states rather than

the kind of sentencing uh language that one applies with respect to individuals which is the preserve of the ICC um which we haven't really talked about very much but is a whole another mad situation. Um what what are the odds? There are so many moving parts. It's very difficult also you know the memorials of of South Africa and and Israel's response are not in the public domain um and ultimately uh the court itself is going through Certain changes um you know the bench the makeup of the bench where there's a new president things have changed

so I think it's very very difficult to predict but ultimately I think the credibility of the ICJ is hanging in the balance and what the ultimate outcome on this um absurd genocide allegation is will necessarily be a determining factor I think in whether this this body has any longevity as a court or whether it is simply recognized as a political body That has been completely overtaken by political agenda what would be the correct terminology instead of sentencing what would you say like if they landed on genocide the enforcement mechanism under international law is is essentially

the preserve of states so it's likely that if um you know the the ICJ came out and this will a few years from now. This is going to take quite a lot of time. Um then there would be uh a movement for uh UN resolutions that Address what the consequences of that should be. I mean the fact is that there are already um moves at the UN to seek to sanction Israel and to seek to to impose all sorts of um of uh penalties on the Jewish state. For the most part, these are political resolutions.

It's only UN Security Council resolutions under chapter 7 of the UN charter that actually have binding effect. These are few and far between and again to a certain extent ultimately the ability Even to make law in that case is influenced by politics because uh each of the the veto members can uh can can stop something like that from taking place. So instead like of a sentencing it would be like a conclusion or something. The court concludes that so it would be a finding. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And the ICC on their part they're trying to arrest

Netanyahu and uh from this uh guy who was just uh assumably did this to shift the focus Away from himself and the sexual allegations against himself. So there have been reports this is uh Kareem Khn the current prosecutor who's been suspended for for that reason this investigation. The timing of this application for arrest warrants is um is I think deeply problematic in light of of what we have been reading in the press. But far more important than that I think are the fundamental failings. Uh I'd say there three significant ones. The absence of jurisdiction. Israel

is not a party to the ICC. the Palestinians are not a state or some of the reasons that we were discussing earlier. This is a court that gets its jurisdiction from member states. Member states delegate their jurisdiction to the court. The court has no jurisdiction to investigate Israelis here and certainly not to apply for arrest warrants. Then there's this breach of the court's rule of complimentarity. This is a court that was instituted to compleimement domestic jurisdictions, not to replace them. There is an expectation that Israel be afforded the opportunity to investigate and prosecute any credible

allegations and that has not been permitted. In fact, the timing of the application that Kareem Khan put forward uh is said to have been the very day that Israeli officials were meant to meet court officials to discuss their concerns. So, that's been thrown out of The window. But the third major problem here is that these arrest warrants have been based on entirely false information. and my organization, UK Lawyers for Israel, conducted a a thorough analysis of Karim Khan's public statement, summarizing his application and demonstrated that every phrase of every sentence of that statement was false.

This is the information that has gone to pre pre-trial chamber one that has misled this court and this is the False basis upon which these warrants have been issued. And how would you ever enforce that uh that kind of arrest warrant because isn't it so that heads of states enjoy diplomatic immunity when they travel to different countries? How would you be able to breach that immunity? That's absolutely right and I think it's one of the reasons that many states have been equivocal as to whether or not they would enforce these warrants. So the United Kingdom

for Instance when it was asked the uh whether they would uh arrest Netono if he attended the response from number 10 was the UK will comply with international law. Now I see uh within that and an acknowledgement that the international law on official and diplomatic immunity is uh important here the UK's responsibility state-to-state to Israel. It is only member states of the ICC that wave that immunity on behalf of their officials and diplomats In the context of you know ICC proceedings. Israel has not done so. So um seeking to enforce uh a a an arrest

warrant which is not valid, which is made by a court without jurisdiction in breach of its own rules and on the basis of false information would also be a breach of customary obligations by uh these states towards Israel on the basis of these uh provisions on immunity. That's absolutely right. I wonder what would happen then if if that was Actually to happen like say like hypothetically Netanyao was to travel to Norway for some weird reason and um yeah uh and um like he would land here and he would be arrested by Norwegian police. Wouldn't that

cause like a huge uh international crisis in diplomatic relations like everything? What would happen? Which is why I don't think it's going to happen. I think it's important to recognize that the issuance of these warrants in such a fashion is Unprecedented. Usually warrants at the ICC are issued in secret so that the individuals subject to them do not know about them and can they can be picked up if they travel internationally. Not so here. This was a public circus campaign, right? There was a press conference, a public statement, a an interview on Christian Armenpor that

Kareem Khan gave. This could not have been more public and I think it's one of the reasons that it's indicative that this Is not part of a proper legal process. This is part of a PR campaign to seek to rehabilitate this court. Don't forget the ICC has come under vicious criticism in its first 10 years of operation. It successfully uh obtained one conviction at a cost of nearly a billion US dollars. It has subsequently been criticized by all in Sunundry for focusing essentially on African defendants. So what better way to seek to rehabilitate yourself as

an International legal institution and win favor and friends and then by going after the world's punching bag, the only Jewish state? Yeah. Um, also I'm wondering what do you think anti-semitism is at its core? It's known as the oldest hatred, isn't it? And it takes many different forms. Um some of it is projection as we've discussed but some of it is hating Jews uh for whatever um it is that is considered to be the ill of society at the time. You Know they can be the capitalists or the communists. They can uh be um the

kind of superior overlords or the degenerate scum. It's in every different time, place, culture, and societal context that hatred can manifest itself differently. Um, but ultimately the um the the singular consistent factor is that it is not based on a a real issue. It is based on some imagined evil. And the late great Rabbi Lord Jonathan Saxs talked um tremendously convincingly I think of the evolving nature of anti-semitism as a mutating virus where Jews are hated for whatever society considers to be uh the ill of the time in the context of whatever the presiding order

of the day is. So in the middle ages it was that Jews were hated because of their religion and the blood liable had a kind of religious context element to it in those times. In the Um uh Nazi era Jews were hated because of their race and the Nazis used eugenics uh to seek to justify that. But the Rabbi Sax explained today the the order of the day had become international law and human rights taken over even from science. And so the hatred of the Jewish state has manifested well the hatred of the Jewish people

I should say has manifested itself as the hatred of the Jewish state and international law and Human rights is the medium through which Israel is being attacked. That is the modern manifestation of antise-semitism. And I think looking at it like that through that lens also helps understand this issue that we were grappling with at the beginning. You know how can these goodwilled goodnatured people that want to stand up for international law and human rights how can they get it so badly wrong? where Israel is concerned, it starts to fall into place and make Sense when

you realize that that is the exact mechanism which is being used to deploy this modern manifestation of anti-semitism. Natasha House, thank you so much for coming to my podcast here today and thank you for your time, your work, and your dedication to this. It's been my pleasure. It's great to have had the conversation with you. Thank you.