Israel’s violations of the Gaza Strip from the perspective of international humanitarian law – Jewish Issues

In recent times, the international community has witnessed fierce wars, but we have found that the most brutal and the most violating of international humanitarian law is the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip since October 7, 2023. The nature of the means used in this conflict is the use of demolition, injury and destruction.

Therefore, it is necessary for international humanitarian law to intervene and provide the necessary protection for the victims of war and armed conflict, including the dead, wounded, sick, prisoners, civilians and civilian objects. International humanitarian law combines two concepts: different in nature; one is legal and the other is moral.

International humanitarian law provides for special protection of civilians during armed conflicts. The parties concerned can establish safe zones to protect the wounded, sick, children and pregnant women, and neutral zones to protect the wounded, sick and civilians. Attacking non-military areas is also not allowed.

International humanitarian law also prohibits the use of starvation of civilians as a weapon of war. The strict siege and the denial of all means of life in the Gaza Strip – water, food, fuel and medicine – constitutes a war crime and a crime against humanity, since, under the Fourth Geneva Convention, international humanitarian law prohibits any form of collective punishment of the population. The 1949 Conventions recognize the need to protect an entire population from starvation, and depriving them of food and medicine, and hospitals of fuel, constitutes a crime of genocide and is therefore a clear violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which requires the occupying power to endeavor to provide the population with food and medical supplies to the best of its ability.

That is how the occupying forces infiltrated, blocked the entry of humanitarian aid, attacked the Rafah crossing on the Palestinian side and more than once blocked and restricted the entry of humanitarian aid on the Egyptian side.

• • •

According to UNRWA’s latest report No. (129) on the situation in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, at least 40,319 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip as of August 19, and another 92,743 Palestinians have been reported killed and injured since October 7, 2023.

According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the Israeli occupation completely destroyed more than 117 schools and universities and partially destroyed 332 schools and universities from October 2023 to August 2024. The Israeli aggression in the Gaza Strip has caused hundreds of deaths and injuries.

Residents of the Gaza Strip have sought shelter in schools, which they believe are protected under international humanitarian law, but the Israeli occupation has bombed schools, as well as hospitals and other civilian sites, even sites that Israel has declared a “safe zone” and called on residents to flee when they were bombed.

Every year on World Humanitarian Day, 19 August, 413 humanitarian organizations around the world, including UNRWA, other UN agencies, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies and non-governmental organizations, call on all States, parties to armed conflict and the wider international community to:

• Cease attacks on civilians and take effective measures to protect them and the critical civilian infrastructure on which they depend.

• Protect all relief workers, including local and national actors, as well as their buildings and assets, and facilitate their work, as required by United Nations Security Council Resolution (2730), which urges all parties to the armed conflict to allow and facilitate the provision of full, safe, prompt and unhindered humanitarian assistance by relief workers to all civilians in need, which the Israeli occupying Power has also violated, in violation of the most basic rules of international humanitarian law.

• Holding perpetrators accountable, as those who violate international humanitarian law cannot go unpunished.

• • •

All of the occupying Power’s crimes in the Gaza Strip are based on two important principles:

First: the principle of legitimate defense

The occupying power attributes the international crimes it has committed in the Gaza Strip to the principle of legitimate defence, since Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations guarantees the right of legitimate defence, and therefore legitimate defence is one of the grounds for abstention. For international responsibility to be met, several conditions must be met, which are:

Defense must be the only means of repelling an unlawful attack on oneself or others and must be directed at the source of the aggression or danger.

– An attack or danger is imminent or has already occurred.

– The proportionality between the severity of the defense and the attack or aggression when using force.

This does not apply to the Israeli aggression against the Gaza Strip. In the context of international crimes committed by the occupying power in the Gaza Strip, legal defense is unacceptable, because it is inconceivable that if these crimes were committed by criminals or individuals, there would be no responsibility. Contributing to this, because they are aware of the international crimes they are committing, otherwise it would be to establish the law of the jungle and violate human dignity and rights guaranteed by the law.

Second: Necessary State

We will refute below the claims made by the Israeli occupying Power under the guise of a state of emergency in violation of all international law and international humanitarian law and explain that a state of emergency is not consistent with the serious violations being committed by the Israeli occupying Power in Gaza. Article.

In order for a state of necessity to be enforced, several conditions must exist simultaneously, both in relation to the immediate danger and to the state of necessity itself.

The danger must exist and be present; that is, it threatens a person’s right to life or threatens the safety of his body and freedom. If the danger is serious, then serious danger is a danger that cannot be remedied and the harm caused by it is not understood.

Finally, the grave danger must not have been caused by the offender’s own conduct. If the danger was caused by him, he would not be entitled to invoke necessity.

When dangerous conditions are met, a person may take emergency action, which requires two conditions:

• Emergency action must be aimed at eliminating the hazard and getting out of imminent danger.

• Necessity is proportionate to the danger, meaning that the nature and impact of the crime committed by the person is commensurate with the danger to which he or she is exposed.

This also does not apply to the situation in the Gaza Strip, rather, these reasons apply to the Palestinian situation in response to aggression, not to what Israel is doing in the Gaza Strip. International crimes deny and eliminate the most important human right, the right to live.

Likewise, Israel’s violations and invasion of the Gaza Strip are not proportional to the act itself, because Israel is essentially an occupying power, which means that everything it does violates the rules of international law, so what is proportional to the act itself? The destruction of an entire strip, the displacement of its inhabitants and the killing of them?

The Israeli occupying power is a model of violation of all international laws and conventions. What is happening in Gaza is a clear violation of international legality resolutions under the rules of general international law, and in particular the rules of international humanitarian law. Criminal law is all that the Israeli occupying power has violated.

In conclusion, the reality on the international stage requires all parties to make an effort not to let the situation deteriorate, because the familiarity of the conflict does not prevent it from escalating and erupting, the harder the mediators try to reach a solution. The ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli occupying Power deliberately continuing to commit these massive crimes and deliberately killing large numbers of unarmed civilians, is conclusive evidence of the lack of political will on the part of Israel to end this war, and the Palestinians continue to suffer under the weight of an international humanitarian disaster that the world is powerless to end.

Mohammed Habib

Egyptian Center for Ideological and Strategic Studies