Posted on July 4, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
Two reports have been recently released by the fact-finding missions posted by the major international NGO, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch (HRW) to the Gaza Strip and South Israel following the 22-day war that took place in the region between December 2008 and January 2009. The Amnesty International investigation team arrived in the Gaza [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International and national law, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Non Governmental Organizations, Public International Law, Publications, United Nations | 3 Comments »
Posted on June 17, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
On 10 June 2009, the Israeli Supreme Court (HCJ) rendered another stultifying judgment with regards to the occupied Palestinian territories (OPT), this time on the evacuation of what the Court refers to as ‘unauthorised settlements’ or squats in the occupied West Bank. It should be noted as a point of clarification that the state and [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International and national law, International Humanitarian Law, Middle East Crisis, Non Governmental Organizations, Public International Law | Leave a Comment »
Posted on June 11, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
By Sharon Weill and Valentina Azarov Currently, the fate of one of the only remaining venues that offers a redress mechanism for Palestinians is at stake. It is one that can bring accountability of Israeli officials and decision-makers who committed war crimes and crimes against humanity. The amendment of universal jurisdiction laws, often incommensurably restricting [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International and national law, International Criminal Law, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law, Responsibility to protect | 4 Comments »
Posted on June 5, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
The Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa (HSRC) has released a study conducted by a high-profile group of legal experts, indicating that Israel is practicing both colonialism and apartheid in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT)(See the Executive Summary of the Study). The interim report, will form part of a discussion at an upcoming HSRC [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law, Publications, Responsibility to protect | 2 Comments »
Posted on June 1, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
On 3 April 2009, the President of the Human Rights Council established an international independent Fact Finding Mission with the mandate “to investigate all violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law that might have been committed at any time in the context of the military operations that were conducted in Gaza during [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law, United Nations | Leave a Comment »
Posted on May 30, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
The question of the Palestinian refugees from 1948 onwards is often righteously seen at the crux of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the discussion surrounding this issue is too often politicised to the degree that there is no sight of the actual applicable international legal framework. Professor Mutaz Qafisheh presently a professor of international law at [...]
Filed under: History of International Law, Human Rights, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law, Publications, Relevant Literature, United Nations | Leave a Comment »
Posted on May 15, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
The Israeli Supreme Court has recently rejected a petition that was filed by two NGO demanding that a criminal investigation be conducted into the 2004 Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip, including, amongst other atrocities, the indiscriminate killings that took place in Rafah and the disproportionate damage incurred by the population of the southern [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Non Governmental Organizations, Public International Law, Publications | 1 Comment »
Posted on April 30, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
Michael Sfard a renowned Israeli human rights lawyer who is often recalled for his work with cases concerning the route of the Separation Wall in the OPT and the founding of the lawyers’ volunteer network, Yesh Din, has recently published an article titled ‘The Price of Internal Legal Opposition to Human Rights Abuses’ in the [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International and national law, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Non Governmental Organizations | 3 Comments »
Posted on April 29, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
The UN Special Rapporteur on the situation in the Palestinian Territories occupied since 1967 has come out with updated reports on the situation in the region in the last months. In fact, he has produced two separate reports: the first report is a combined report by a number of different UN Rapporteurs (inc. the Special [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International Criminal Law, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law, Publications, United Nations | 2 Comments »
Posted on April 26, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
UN Committee’s against Torture (CAT) 42nd session is on its way and it has recently been receiving reports from various international and local NGO as well as various other expert bodies with regards to a particular region for the purpose of assessing their compliance with the provisions of the Convention. Israel submitted its state report [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International and national law, International Humanitarian Law, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law, United Nations | 1 Comment »
Posted on April 12, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
The Israeli government has been demolishing houses in East Jerusalem and across the West Bank and Gaza Strip since it commenced its belligerent occupation of the Palestinian territories in 1967. There are three main types of house demolitions: operation, administrative and punitive. The last type is not only the most barbaric from a moral point [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law | Leave a Comment »
Posted on April 5, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
A number of developments have taken place since the end of the war in the Gaza Strip between the Israeli army and the Hamas armed brigades. The Gaza Strip, it should be recalled, remains occupied under international humanitarian law, this being also the official legal position of the UN and that which complies with the [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Non Governmental Organizations, Public International Law | 3 Comments »
Posted on April 2, 2009 by David McGrogan
The new administration in the White House has decided to reverse one of the more controversial of George W. Bush’s policies: disengagement with the Human Rights Council. At the time of the HRC’s creation, the election of countries such as China, Cuba and Saudi Arabia to council seats was seen as a continuation of the [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law, United Nations | Leave a Comment »
Posted on March 26, 2009 by David McGrogan
The UN Human Rights Council’s 10th Regular Session is currently coming to a close. As usual, the various reports available make for fascinating and frustrating reading, not least because of the design of the OCHR’s website, which could charitably be described as eccentric. The major point of interest was the report of Richard Falk, the [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law, United Nations | 2 Comments »
Posted on March 18, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
On 10 March 2009, Diakonia IHL Program, 4th International Humanitarian Law Session on Air warfare with Ove Bring, a Professor of International Humanitarian Law at the University of Stockholm. The discussion concerned the normative framework of rules applicable to air warfare, and contextualised specific rules to the case of the recent war on Gaza. The [...]
Filed under: Conference, International Humanitarian Law, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law | 1 Comment »
Posted on March 9, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
Ben-Naftali and Zamir have recently published an article in the Journal of International Criminal Justice titled ‘Whose ‘conduct unbecoming’? The shooting of a Handcuffed, Blindfolded Palestinian Demonstrator’. The work considers the case of HCJ 7195/08 Abu Rhama et al. v Military Advocate General – the petition in the case is available in English. The case [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International Courts, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law, Publications, Responsibility to protect, United Nations | Leave a Comment »
Posted on March 6, 2009 by Ole W. Pedersen
In a week when much of the international law attention has been focused on the ICC and its arrest warrant against President Bashir of Sudan, little attention has been afforded to the news that Iran is currently hosting a conference looking into the possibility of seeking prosecution of a number of Israeli officials for alleged [...]
Filed under: ICC, International Criminal Law, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law | Leave a Comment »
Posted on March 3, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
Modern warfare has for a considerable time presented a challenge for the application of the classical laws of war, thereby contributing to their distortion. One of the foundational rules of international humanitarian law, which has been affected by this very symptom, is the principle of distinction. In other words, the question that is asked of [...]
Filed under: International Humanitarian Law, Law of Treaties, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law | 1 Comment »
Posted on February 16, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
* This post was co-authored with Benjamin Agsteribbe, formerly of the University of Amsterdam, and currently a researcher at HaMoked – Center for the defence of the individual in East Jerusalem. —- Some of our, and others’, previous posts have taken to outline the main legal issues that arise of the recent declaration submitted by [...]
Filed under: ICC, International Courts, International Criminal Law, international justice, Law of Treaties, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law | 2 Comments »
Posted on February 14, 2009 by Valentina Azarov
The UK Home Office has issued a February 2009 Operational Guidance Note on Israel, Gaza and the West Bank setting out the main types of asylum claim, human rights claim and Humanitarian Protection claim (whether explicit or implied) that are expected to be submitted on behalf of individuals arriving to the UK from the region. [...]
Filed under: EU Common Foreign and Security Policy, EU/EC Law, International Humanitarian Law, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law | 1 Comment »
Posted on February 11, 2009 by Ole W. Pedersen
Following Dominik’s post below with regard to the Prosecutor of the ICC launching a “preliminary analysis” into the fighting in Gaza and the applicability of the ICC Statute, it might be worth directing the attention of our readers to the website of the ICC where you can find the actual documents relating to this “preliminary [...]
Filed under: ICC, International Humanitarian Law, international justice, Middle East Crisis | 1 Comment »
Posted on February 5, 2009 by David McGrogan
White phosphorous has become well-known in recent years, mainly as a result of the controversy surrounding its use during the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, and the recent conflicts between Israel and Hizbollah and Hamas. It is primarily a smokescreen-producing agent, used to conceal troop movements, and is also a means of illuminating the [...]
Filed under: International Humanitarian Law, Middle East Crisis, Non Governmental Organizations, Public International Law | 9 Comments »
Posted on February 4, 2009 by Dominik Zimmermann
Just as the first-ever trial at the ICC got on its way, several news agencies reported early this week that the prosecutor of the court would conduct a “preliminary analysis” of alleged crimes committed by Israelis during the recent offensive in the Gaza Strip (AFP; IHT; AP). Leaving the obviously one-sided character of the underlying [...]
Filed under: ICC, International Courts, International Criminal Law, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law | 11 Comments »
Posted on January 31, 2009 by David McGrogan
Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions was adopted in 1977 to ‘remedy shortcomings‘ in the original conventions of 1949. It contains a more detailed set of standards in all areas of international armed conflict, and expands the definition of ‘international armed conflict’ to include wars of national liberation (Art. 1.4.). (Non-international armed conflicts are [...]
Filed under: Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, Law of Treaties, Middle East Crisis, Public International Law | 7 Comments »
