Thread by @Alonso_GD

I think it's important to situate the Genocide Convention and South Africa's case within socio-legal context in which they operate. I think it will help explain the dissonance between people's excitement at South Africa's arguments and my more cautious view🧵

For starters, we talk about how difficult it is to prove "intent". This is not "natural". It is the result of political processes that made genocide difficult to prove. I've said before: genocide is common; findings of genocide are not. That's not "good"

https://x.com/Alonso_GD/status/1724839406295519464?s=20

Genocide is how the world order was (is) created. Most national foundational myths involve genocide. US's "Wild West", Argentina's "Conquest of the Dessert", European "mission civilisatrice" - all genocide. (And all would be hard to prove under the Genocide Convention)

This is bc when the term "genocide" was created states were careful to make sure it would cover the Holocaust (and now Rwanda), but not Jim Crow, and not colonialism in Africa, etc. Only the most obvious genocides could be genocide, not my national mythos!

https://twitter.com/ntinatzouvala/status/1742135796029592019

So this brings us to South Africa's case. It needs to prove that genocide is the "only reasonable inference" from Israel's actions. This is difficult no matter what, because, like South Africa said in its presentation, most genocides are not pre-announced and advertised

This is why Israel made sure today to argue that 1) its genocidal statements were misconstrued and 2) it is taking measures to safeguard civilian wellbeing. It specifically asked "would a genocidal state would go to these lenghts if what it wanted was to destroy the group?"

So, South Africa's job is more difficult than just saying "look, just *look* at what's happening". It needs to convince the Court to deduce this intent from the overall context of the operation. That even these humanitarian measures are part of the genocide

In essence that if you know that 2 million people are starving and you knowingly give them insufficient food/water, while your soldiers kill them on sight and bomb them in "safe places", then you should conclude that your intent is to destroy them despite these measures

But is that the "only reasonable inference"? Israel will argue it is not. At some point, if it gets desperate, it may even concede that the other reasonable inference is an intent to comit war crimes, but not genocide - that is enough: there is no jurisdiction for war crimes...

This is why South Africa has also claimed Israel is not trying to prevent its soldiers from comitting genocide or punishing its officials who incite genocide. Because Israel winning the main claim sort of means Israel will lose the other two

Of course, there is a scenario where South Africa prevails. But it is not a scenario a colonial and Eurocentric international law was created for. South Africa's case is sort of subversive of the sysem in this way

To be clear: this is not bc ICJ Judges are just realpolitik agents of their states. They are serious competent jurists. But they do operate within the socio-legal context of an int'l law that conceives genocide a "once in a lifetime" crime that ought to be very difficult to prove

Int'l law is not an "even playing field", not because there is any kind of conspiracy, but because it was born out of colonialist principles, not to enable liberation. South Africa is challenging this, and they may succeed, but they don't have it "in the bag"

So I guess, don't be pessimistic, but be cautiously hopeful rather than confident