‘Gaza had been transformed into an environment that is no longer suitable for human life due to widespread, systematic, and intentional ecological destruction.’
An international people’s court on Monday unanimously found Israel and its backers guilty of genocide and ecocide in its occupation of Palestine.
Jurors of The Right to Resist: International People’s Tribunal on Palestine said Israel and its backers — including the US, UK, France, and Germany — guilty of “genocidal use of ecocide and forced starvation against the people of Palestine.”
Convened on Saturday at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Barcelona in Spain, the quasi-judicial forum was endorsed by 240 organizations worldwide and attended by 150 representatives from different countries, including the Philippines.
“On the final determination on responsibility, the Court concludes that Israel bears the primary and final responsibility of genocide and forced starvation,” the tribunal said.
“The United States, United Kingdom, France and Germany bears responsibility for having provided indispensible cooperation that enabled and politically protected the commission of these crimes,” it added.
The tribunal said the named Western powers’s actions and commissions substantially contributed to the continuation, escalation and impunity of the genocidal and ecocidal Israeli campaign against Palestinians.
“The defendants named in the indictment are therefore guilty, individually and collectively, in accordance with the charge brought before this court,” the court added.
In their opening remarks to the trial, key convening and endorsing organizations of the tribunal said it is an inviolable right of the Palestinian people to resist the ongoing Zionist occupation and to protect their land and environment.
Among these organizations were the International League of Peoples’ Struggle (ILPS), Arab Group for the Protection of Nature (APN), People’s Coalition on Food Sovereignty (PCFS), International Association of Democratic Lawyers, Palestine Land Studies Centre, and Global Movement to Gaza.
Gaza no longer habitable
The two day trial heard testimonies from 11 experts and witnesses, including survivors from Gaza and the West Bank.
The witnesses said Israel targeted civilians through mass bombings, wiping out entire families and generations, including from one who testified to losing over 280 family members over the last two years.
The experts meanwhile pointed out that the bombs used to try to obliterate the Palestinians from their land were manufactured, given and delivered by the US, UK, France and Germany.
Other testimonies focused on the blockade of aid flotillas to Gaza, such as the recent Global Sumud Flotilla, as well as Palestinian fisherfolk violently prevented from their livelihood.
The testimonies also revealed that 100,000 tons of explosives were dropped on Gaza in recent years, equivalent to nine times the size of nuclear weapons dropped in Japan at the end of the last world war.
The massive amount of explosives generated hazardous chemical reactions, they said, sparking fears of health impact consequences in the near future.
They further revealed that 80% of the water infrastructure was compromised and only 17% of the 162 municipal wells in Gaza remain functional while about 70% of the agricultural sector was totally wiped out.
“Gaza had been transformed into an environment that is no longer suitable for human life due to widespread, systematic, and intentional ecological destruction,” witnesses said.
Liberation, solidarity
In his closing remarks at the tribunal, lead prosecutor Jan Fermon said the liberation of Palestine from Israeli occupation is the work of the Palestinians.
“The work of the rest of us is solidarity. Nazism was brought down by the resistance of the people of the world. The US intervention in Vietnam was ended by the struggle of the Vietnamese people and the solidarity of the people of the world. Apartheid was brought down by the struggle of the South African people and the solidarity of the people of the world,” Fermon said.
“With all these initiatives around the world of international solidarity, this Tribunal is part of this struggle for the right of the Palestinian people to the right of self-determination,” he concluded.
While not a formal trial court in the manner of the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice that were formed through international agreements and signed by participating governments, international people’s tribunals have been convened by non-government organizations and people’s movements as an alternative forum.
People’s tribunals have a strong tradition of forming public and global opinion on repressive regimes, including the South African Apartheid and Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs in the Philippines. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)
