Having a defense budget as big as the next ten nations (including Russia, China, Iran, and others) allows us to say that the charges brought by South Africa were meritless and that the ICJ’s ruling was unfounded. Who has the guns and the world’s reserve currency, if no longer the gold, makes – or ignores – the rules.
It raises the questions as old as Plato’s Republic, with the debate between Thrasymachus and Socrates about power, goodness, and justice. Or the debate about power and justice between the Athenians and Melians in Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War.
The preamble to our constitution says that we want domestic tranquility. This would seem to include avoiding civil war. To do that, it establishes, among much else, a judicial system and electoral procedures. Both assume that there will be differences and disputes between people. We want electoral campaigns rather than military ones to settle who governs. Denying electoral results and supporters of the losing candidates becoming well-armed rather than concentrating on how to run a better campaign next time is a big yellow flag.
Trump makes every effort to find our electoral and judicial processes to be unfounded. If he succeeds, our domestic tranquility is in trouble.
From Wilson’s support for a League of Nations to the founding of the UN, many looked to institutionalize a process of open, reasonable debate, the principle of one nation – one vote – and judicial mechanisms rather than the first use of force to resolve disputes. Joining the UN meant accepting the rules that we largely wrote.
A question long asked is if those who write the rules apply them primarily to those whom they rule, rather to themselves and their allies. Woodrow Wilson’s principle of national self-determination was applied to the German empire and its allies after WWI, not to the British and French ones.
Many of us and other of Israel’s supporters have been crowing that the ICJ did not find that Israel has committed genocide or that there should be a cease fire. These folks needed to finish their homework assignment. At this stage in the process, the ICJ would not make a final ruling on the merits of the question. They could only decide if there is a dispute and if there is enough reason to begin the process on the merits of the case.
Hamas is not a state nor a signatory to the Genocide convention. The ICJ has no authority over them. A ceasefire ruling would only apply to Israel. But in the ruling, the ICJ calls on Israel to carry out its use of force in virtually wholesale different ways than it has. It has found South Africa’s charge of genocide to be plausible enough to warrant the full procedure.
It is remarkable that the headline in the Jerusalem Post is, “ICJ badmouths Israel for 35 minutes, then Israel wins.” Being told that the way you have fought in Gaza is plausibly genocidal is an odd form of winning a court case.
Netanyahu says that “”the very claim that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians is not just false, it is outrageous, and the court’s willingness to discuss it at all is a mark of disgrace that will not be erased for generations.” He added that Israel will continue the war until “absolute victory,” until all hostages are returned and Gaza is no longer a threat to Israel.
Netanyahu is free to say that the ICJ’s finding of plausibility to be false since he has the backing of the country with the world’s largest military budget. His call for absolute victory and claim that Israel does follow international law does not bode well for changes in previous and on-going tactics.
Right now, Biden, Blinken, and Netanyahu seem to be in the Thrasymachus camp. Or the Athenian delegation in Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War who said that the strong do what they will and the weak suffer what they must, followed immediately by the Athenian massacre of their Melian enemies. Have we adopted the view of the ancient home of democracy?
Lowell Gustafson 