Gaza, the Gaza Tribunal & Sarajevo Declaration

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GPM # 97

Israel’s war on Gaza is about to enter its twentieth month.

Widely described as genocidal by legal scholars and human rights experts, Israel and its conjoined twin (‘Israel-USA’) say it’s nothing of the sort.

One would hardly expect genocide perpetrators to acknowledge committing the crime of crimes. 

Israel’s ability to commit the highest of crimes with impunity — aided, assisted, and shielded by Israel-USA — makes the world a more dangerous place, Norway’s international development minister said the other day.

“Genocide is the worst crime a country can do and the worst crime that politicians can do and this should not be polarised,” Åsmund Aukrust said, according to The Guardian, without indicating when or where.

Western politicians shouldn’t be aiding and abetting Israeli genocide, Aukrust might have said. 

Alongside Israel-USA, the UK and Germany are Israel’s most generous arms suppliers.

The Netherlands sends Israel spare parts for the F-35 bombers it’s been using to lay Gaza to waste.

Turkey – not really a Western power, but a member of NATO – happily funnels jet fuel to Israel, all the while condemning Israel for its crimes.

Back on May 19, the UK, France and Canada suggested they may hold Israel to account — at some point. No sign of that yet.

“The Israeli government’s denial of essential humanitarian assistance to the civilian population [of Gaza] is unacceptable, and risks breaching International Humanitarian Law,” the British, French and Canadians said in their joint press release [emphasis added].

The Brits, French and Canadians are hedging their bets. So are the most powerful Arab states, who’ve yet to lift a finger to halt the mass murder of their Palestinian confreres.

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For his views on this sorry international affair, the GPM reached out to Christopher Gunness, former UN director for Strategic Communications & Advocacy in the Middle East, and chief spokesperson for UNRWA. These days, Gunness is the executive director of the Myanmar Accountability Project.

Listen to our conversation in today’s podcast. Click on the play button above, or go here.

Watch our complete conversation here:

“The old world is dying and the new world struggles to be born,” Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci famously wrote, from a fascist prison, back in the 1930s.

“Now is the time of monsters, Gramsci said.

Almost a century later, the monsters are back again, committing unspeakable crimes with absolute impunity; laying waste to the 20th century’s most fundamental international laws, set forth in the wake of European fascist horror; turning the 21st century into a lawless, dangerous place.

“The world is approaching a dangerous precipice, the front edge of which is in Palestine,” a People’s Tribunal on the Gaza genocide declared last week in Sarajevo, and “dangerous forces” are “pushing us toward the abyss.”

The Sarajevo Declaration of the Gaza Tribunal culminated three days of public hearings at the International University of Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Inspired by past People’s Tribunals — most notably the 1966 Russell Tribunal on the US war on Vietnam, and the 2003-2005 World Tribunal on the US’s war on Iraq – the Gaza Tribunal was launched in London in November 2024.

Listen to an abbreviated version of the Sarajevo Declaration in today’s podcast, read by Penny Green, Professor of Law and Globalisation at Queen Mary University of London, and the Gaza Tribunal’s acting chair, at the close of last week’s hearings.

Here’s the complete Gaza Declaration.

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