When conflicts remain unresolved, 'it empowers the most extremist in the conflict'
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00:00 A verdict on the charge that Israel's committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza is expected
00:05 later on Friday. The case was brought before the International Criminal Court by South Africa,
00:10 a panel of 17 judges in The Hague will decide. The case includes a call for an immediate ceasefire.
00:16 Hamas has stated this evening it would honour such a ruling if Israel does the same.
00:22 Let's bring in for more analysis of this story Yossi Mecklenburg, Associate Fellow
00:27 at the Middle East North Africa Program at Chatham House joining us live from London.
00:32 Yossi, always a pleasure having you with us. Nobody, let's get this out and plain,
00:37 nobody can condone or justify the terror act of Hamas on October the 7th. Okay, what is your
00:42 sense about this case, about where this case goes, this genocide case at the International Criminal
00:47 Court? Good evening, yes 7th of October can be of course forgotten but we are three and a half
00:56 months later and the goalposts in many ways shifted quite a lot. And now we have this case and by
01:05 tomorrow around noon time we'll hear what the ICJ has to say. Now the question for the ICJ is to
01:13 decide, first it's not a verdict as such because this might take years, it's just the beginning,
01:19 it's whether there is evidence enough to ask or for the ICJ to actually call for a ceasefire.
01:27 Now we might tell you that there is a reason to call for a ceasefire regardless if the ICJ
01:34 actually thinks that there might be a case of genocide or not. Israel said it's not the case,
01:41 it's even released today apparently 30 orders for its defense team to use in this case to show that
01:50 there were no intention. And of course it will stand or fall in the case of intention because
01:55 as you said there are already more than 25,000 Palestinians killed in this war,
02:00 most of them are civilians. So what will happen tomorrow we'll decide. But it's by the way there
02:07 is a range of measures that the ICJ can decide from actually call for a ceasefire all the way
02:14 to more rebuke in Israel, call Israel to allow more humanitarian aid, ask Israel to stop incitement
02:23 to genocide as was the case in some politicians. So this is the question what is going to decide.
02:31 One important point here is that it will be decided by a majority, you don't need a consensus
02:38 of all of the judges. So out of the 17 judges assessing this it's about a majority. This whole
02:47 question Yossi brings great passions out whichever side of the equation you find yourself on and very
02:53 few people it seems find themselves right in the middle. But if you read the history of what has
02:58 gone on in the Middle East going back over 100 years one could make the case that it's been an
03:05 aim to push out the Palestinians even going back before the say the Balfour Declaration in 1917
03:10 there's been this idea which some people say is an example of a kind of planned genocide.
03:16 I think at the end of the day there was a decision in 1947 for the partition plan resolution 181
03:24 which should have established two states, the Jewish state and the Palestinian state. This
03:32 never happened and I think at the end of the day it's this conflict moving different direction,
03:38 most of them not in a good right direction sometimes like in the case of the Oslo Accords
03:44 an attempt to bring peace. At the end of the day yeah we can go to the history
03:49 all the way back to the Balfour Declaration even before with the rise of the Zionist movement.
03:54 But the question that we're actually facing right now whether a two-state solution the one that
04:00 recognized the right of both people for self-determination is going to be respected.
04:07 There is a Jewish state, this is Israel, but there is no Palestinian state and this is the missing
04:12 part in this jigsaw. In the meantime the result of the failure to deal with the root causes of
04:22 the conflict brings again and again this kind of situation we see now. My fear must admit that the
04:28 ICJ might be a distraction actually from the very fact that the ceasefire is needed urgently
04:35 because of the level of destruction and deaths we see right now in Gaza with probably no aim
04:42 and can go on for months no end. And the thing is also destructive actually the need to concentrate
04:48 on a political solution which whatever is the history to ensure that it doesn't repeat itself
04:54 and what we see now will never happen again. Completely hearing what you're saying and it's
04:58 worth pointing out as well of course that the Jewish people, the Jewish people were victims of
05:03 an actual genocide at the hands of the Nazi Germans during the Second World War, just reminding people
05:07 that we're trying to keep this as balanced as we can in terms of how we're looking at this whole
05:11 argument. You mentioned there about the feeling of this being a distraction, there is a policy of
05:16 course with the current government in Israel that there is no idea and no concept of a two-state
05:21 solution now, this being the most far-right Israeli government since the creation of the state
05:25 post-Second World War. Is that the problem do you think? Israel today is too extreme?
05:31 There is no doubt about it. I think one of the main problem is actually Netanyahu being for way
05:38 too long in power and actually the entire Israeli society became almost hijacked, willingly hijacked
05:46 by Netanyahu's greed to stay in power for so long and also to stay in power in order to possibly
05:53 stay out of jail because of his corruption trial that is still actually being deliberated. Now,
06:01 in order to do that, he is the one that legitimized the very far-right in Israel,
06:07 those messianic, religious, ultra-nationalistic parties that are part of the government now,
06:14 and Israel was in a crisis, political crisis, social crisis even before 7th of October.
06:21 I think at the end of the day, the failure again to resolve the conflict with the Palestinians,
06:26 the building of the settlements, the harshness of the occupation, the blockade of Gaza,
06:34 no vision of a two-state solution to a large extent brought us into this place. Again,
06:39 as you said at the beginning, by no means this justified what Hamas did, but at the same time,
06:47 when conflicts are not resolved in a way that is satisfactory to anyone, it empowers the most
06:53 extremist in the conflict. Indeed, just echoing the words of Antony Guterres of the UN, he said
06:59 that it didn't happen in a bubble. There are reasons why it happened and all these things
07:03 kind of roll up into this whole big effect which exploded into the horrific things that
07:07 happened on October 7th. I'm left with a question, Yossi, I'm sure you can't answer it. How long
07:13 can the killing continue? There were 25,900 or more who've been killed so far on the Palestinian
07:19 side. How much longer can this be allowed to continue? In my mind, it shouldn't take place
07:25 even one day longer. I think we need to go into a political solution when Israel needs to recognize
07:33 that its unrealistic military objective are not going to be achieved in the stem of destroying
07:39 Hamas, whatever it means. Actually, it's on a losing path in terms of the sympathy and empathy
07:49 that the world sensed back in October 7th. I think the key is in the international community. The key
07:56 for stopping the war is with the United States, to part also with the Israeli society to recognize
08:04 that there is no victory in the sense that Netanyahu is rhetorically is claiming time and
08:11 again. It says to go into making sure that the hostages are released. This should be part of a
08:19 victory, ensuring that Hamas is not in control of Gaza and moving into a political process.
08:26 But again, I think to a large extent, we need to look at the international community. This is
08:30 Washington. I think the Europeans, not only to put pressure, but also passing a resolution in
08:38 the Security Council forces. Yossi Markkelberg, Associate Fellow of the Middle East and North
08:43 Africa Program at Chatham House. Thank you as always for your time and your analysis.
08:47 We appreciate it. Thank you very much, Yossi.