WASHINGTON: Wartime aid for Ukraine was left hanging in the Senate Wednesday after Republicans blocked a bipartisan border package that had been tied to the funding, then struggled to coalesce around a plan to salvage the aid for Kyiv.
After GOP senators scuttled months of negotiations with Democrats on legislation intended to cut back record numbers of illegal border crossings, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer tried to push ahead to a crucial test vote on a $95 billion package for Ukraine, Israel and other US allies — a modified package with the border portion stripped out.
But a deeply divided Republican conference was scrambling to find support for the wartime funding, even though it has been a top priority for Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell. It was the latest sign of the longtime Republican leader’s slipping control over his conference and underscored how the traditional GOP tenet of robust foreign involvement is giving way to Donald Trump’s “America First” nationalism. At stake is the future of Ukraine’s defense against Russia.
The Senate floor settled into an hours-long stall Wednesday night as Republicans huddled to see if they could gain the votes necessary to push it through the chamber. Schumer then closed the floor, saying he would “give our Republican colleagues the night to figure themselves out” ahead of a crucial test vote Thursday.
Republicans planned to meet in the morning to plot a path forward.
Some GOP senators have grown skeptical of sending money to Ukraine in its war with Russia, but Schumer warned earlier Wednesday that “history will cast a permanent and shameful shadow” on those who attempt to block it.
“Will the Senate stand up to brutish thugs like Vladimir Putin and reassure our friends abroad that America will never abandon them in the hour of need?” Schumer asked as he opened the Senate.
The roughly $60 billion in Ukraine aid has been stalled in Congress for months because of growing opposition from hard-line conservatives in the House and Senate who criticize it as wasteful and demand an exit strategy for the war.
“We still need to secure America’s borders before sending another dime overseas,” Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah wrote in a post on X.
The impasse means that the US has halted arms shipments to Kyiv at a crucial point in the nearly two-year-old conflict, leaving Ukrainian soldiers without ample ammunition and missiles as Russian President Putin has mounted relentless attacks.
Ukraine’s cause still enjoys support from many Senate Republicans, including McConnell, but the question vexing lawmakers has always been how to craft a package that could clear the Republican-controlled House.
A pairing of border policies and aid for allies — first proposed by Republicans — was intended to help squeeze the package through the House, where archconservatives hold control. But GOP senators — some within minutes of the bill’s release Sunday — rejected the compromise as election-year politics set in.
Many Republicans said the compromise wasn’t enough and they would rather allow the issue be decided in the presidential election. Supporters of the bill insisted it represented the most comprehensive bipartisan border proposal in years and included many Republican priorities.
The vote failed 49-50 — far short of the 60 ayes needed to take up the bill — with four Republicans voting to move forward with the legislation and six Democrats, some of whom said the border compromise went too far, voting against it.
The bipartisan group of senators who negotiated the compromise for the last four months said it was a missed opportunity to try to make some progress on one of the most intractable issues in American politics.
In a speech on the Senate floor just before the vote, Republican Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma, who crafted the proposal, said it was a chance for the Senate to decide “if we’re going to do nothing, or something.”
“It’s an issue that’s bedeviled, quite frankly, this body for decades,” Lankford said. “It’s been three decades since we’ve passed anything into law to be able to change border security.”
Independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona blamed Republicans for not giving the bill a chance.
“Finally, it seemed, we had the opportunity to solve the nightmare my state has lived for over 40 years,” she said, scolding Republicans for using the border for “campaign photo ops” but rejecting the chance to enact law.
“Turns out they want all talk and no action,” she said. “It turns out border security is not a risk to our national security. It’s just a talking point for the election.”
The White House said President Joe Biden believes there should be new border policy but would also support moving the aid for Ukraine and Israel alone, as he has from the start.
“We support this bill which would protect America’s national security interests by stopping Putin’s onslaught in Ukraine before he turns to other countries, helping Israel defend itself against Hamas terrorists and delivering life-saving humanitarian aid to innocent Palestinian civilians,” said White House spokesman Andrew Bates.
The standalone $95 billion package would invest in domestic defense manufacturing, send funding to allies in Asia, and provide $10 billion for humanitarian efforts in Ukraine, Israel, Gaza and other places.
The revamped package includes legislation to authorize sanctions and anti-money laundering tools against criminal enterprises that traffic fentanyl into the US A separate section of the compromise border legislation that would have provided a long-awaited pathway to residency for tens of thousands of Afghan refugees was dropped in the slimmed-down bill.
Still, it was not clear whether the new plan, even if it passed the Senate, would gain support from House Speaker Mike Johnson. House Republicans are still insisting on a border plan, even though they rejected the deal negotiated in the Senate as insufficient.
“We’ll see what the Senate does,” Johnson told reporters Wednesday morning. “We’re going to allow the process to play out.”
Some were skeptical that a standalone aid package would be viable in the House.
“I don’t see how that moves in this chamber. I don’t know how the speaker puts that on the floor,” House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Alabama, said, adding that he still wanted tougher border policies attached.
After Donald Trump, the likely Republican presidential nominee, eviscerated the Senate’s bipartisan border proposal, Johnson quickly rejected it. Trump has also led many Republicans to question supporting Ukraine, suggesting he could negotiate an end to the war and lavishing praise on Russian President Vladimir Putin, including after Moscow’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Johnson said this week he wanted to handle wartime aid for Israel and Ukraine in separate packages, but a bill he advanced that only included funds for Israel failed on the House floor Tuesday night.
House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries was still hoping the House could take up the comprehensive package next week.
“That is the only path forward,” he said.
Republican senators block bipartisan US border package, then scramble to find support for Ukraine aid
https://arab.news/bwf4g
Republican senators block bipartisan US border package, then scramble to find support for Ukraine aid
- Republicans had sought to tie US aid for Ukraine, Israel and other allies to an illegal border crossings legislation
- When the border-wartime aid package was up for voting, Republicans killed it to deny Biden an election campaign material
US military says Gaza Strip pier project is completed, aid to soon flow as Israel-Hamas war rages on
US military says Gaza Strip pier project is completed, aid to soon flow as Israel-Hamas war rages on
- Overnight construction sets up a complicated delivery process more than two months after US President Joe Biden ordered it to help Palestinians facing starvation
The final, overnight construction sets up a complicated delivery process more than two months after US President Joe Biden ordered it to help Palestinians facing starvation as food and other supplies fail to make it in as Israel recently seized the key Rafah border crossing in its push on that southern city on the Egyptian border.
Fraught with logistical, weather and security challenges, the maritime route is designed to bolster the amount of aid getting into the Gaza Strip, but it is not considered a substitute for far cheaper land-based deliveries that aid agencies say are much more sustainable. The boatloads of aid will be deposited at a port facility built by the Israelis just southwest of Gaza City and then distributed by aid groups.
US troops will not set foot in Gaza, American officials insist, though they acknowledge the danger of operating near the war zone.
Heavy fighting between Israeli troops and Palestinian militants on the outskirts of Rafah has displaced some 600,000 people, a quarter of Gaza’s population, UN officials say. Another 100,000 civilians have fled parts of northern Gaza now that the Israeli military has restarted combat operations there.
Pentagon officials said the fighting in Gaza wasn’t threatening the new shoreline aid distribution area, but they have made it clear that security conditions will be monitored closely and could prompt a shutdown of the maritime route, even just temporarily. Already, the site has been targeted by mortar fire during its construction and Hamas has threatened to target any foreign forces who “occupy” the Gaza Strip.
The “protection of US forces participating is a top priority. And as such, in the last several weeks, the United States and Israel have developed an integrated security plan to protect all the personnel who are working,” said Navy Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, a deputy commander at the US military’s Central Command. “We are confident in the ability of this security arrangement to protect those involved.”
Israeli forces will be in charge of security on the shore, but there are also two US Navy warships near the area in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, the USS Arleigh Burke and the USS Paul Ignatius. Both ships are destroyers equipped with a wide range of weapons and capabilities to protect American troops off shore and allies on the beach.
Aid agencies say they are running out of food in southern Gaza and fuel is dwindling, which will force hospitals to shut down critical operations and halt truck deliveries of aid. The United Nations and other agencies have warned for weeks that an Israel assault on Rafah, which is on the border with Egypt near the main aid entry points, would cripple humanitarian operations and cause a disastrous surge in civilian casualties.
More than 1.4 million Palestinians — half of Gaza’s population — have been sheltering in Rafah, most after fleeing Israel’s offensives elsewhere.
The first cargo ship loaded with 475 pallets of food left Cyprus last week to rendezvous with a US military ship, the Roy P. Benavidez, which is off the coast of Gaza. The pallets of aid on the MV Sagamore were moved onto the Benavidez. The Pentagon said moving the aid between ships was an effort to be ready so it could flow quickly once the pier and the causeway were installed.
The installation of the pier several miles (kilometers) off the coast and of the causeway, which is now anchored to the beach, was delayed for nearly two weeks because of bad weather and high seas. The sea conditions made it too dangerous for US and Israeli troops to secure the causeway to the shore and do other final assembly work, US officials said.
According to a defense official, the Sagamore’s initial shipment was estimated to provide enough to feed 11,000 people for one month. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to provide details not yet made public.
Military leaders have said the deliveries of aid will begin slowly to ensure the system works. They will start with about 90 truckloads of aid a day through the sea route, and that number will quickly grow to about 150 a day. But aid agencies say that isn’t enough to avert impending famine in Gaza and must be just one part of a broader Israeli effort to open land corridors.
Biden used his State of the Union address on March 7 to order the military to set up a temporary pier off the coast of Gaza, establishing a sea route to deliver food and other aid. Food shipments have been backed up at land crossings amid Israeli restrictions and intensifying fighting.
Under the new sea route, humanitarian aid is dropped off in Cyprus where it will undergo inspection and security checks at Larnaca port. It is then loaded onto ships — mainly commercial vessels — and taken about 200 miles (320 kilometers) to the large floating pier built by the US military off the Gaza coast.
There, the pallets are transferred onto trucks, driven onto smaller Army boats and then shuttled several miles (kilometers) to the floating causeway, which has been anchored onto the beach by the Israeli military. The trucks, which are being driven by personnel from another country, will go down the causeway into a secure area on land where they will drop off the aid and immediately turn around and return to the boats.
Aid groups will collect the supplies for distribution on shore, with the UN working with the US Agency for International Development to set up the logistics hub on the beach.
Sabrina Singh, Pentagon spokeswoman, told reporters that the project will cost at least $320 million, including the transportation of the equipment and pier sections from the United States to the coast of Gaza, as well as the construction and aid delivery operations.
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Associated Press writer Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report.
What will be the repercussions of Biden’s new China tariffs?
- Biden’s move “may accelerate pressure on the EU to adopt a similarly strong posture in its own China tariff review," say analysts
- Beijing has warned it would “take resolute measures” to defend its interests
WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden unveiled steep tariff hikes on Chinese green tech this week, hitting imports like electric vehicles, chips and solar cells — and adding stress to US-China ties.
But despite targeting $18 billion in imports across new and already targeted sectors, analysts do not expect a major economic impact, assuming Beijing does not retaliate significantly.
So what will be the repercussions of his moves?
Biden’s EV, semiconductor and battery tariffs “will not have a noticeable impact on US inflation or GDP,” said economist Ryan Sweet at Oxford Economics.
There were already levies on Chinese EVs, causing automakers to avoid the US market — though the new increase takes the tariff level from 25 percent to 100 percent.
“Last year, China exported around $400 million in battery EVs to the US while the European Union exported nearly $7.5 billion to the US,” Sweet said.
Oxford’s model assumes China does not retaliate significantly, given the current weaknesses seen in the world’s second largest economy, he said.
Tianlei Huang, research fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, believes tariffs could hurt some Chinese companies’ sales and profitability.
But “the direct impact of those tariff hikes is actually quite limited,” he told a virtual event. “It’s more of a signal.”
More restrictive trade policies can cause low-carbon technologies to be less competitive against rivals like combustion engine vehicles, according to research from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
But research scenarios found that “rising trade frictions didn’t overcome the still-falling costs of clean energy,” said Joseph Majkut, director of the energy security and climate change program at the think tank.
US policies like the Inflation Reduction Act, which puts funding toward supporting the green transition, will still support the creation of domestic content too, he added.
China warns of retalization
Beijing has warned it would “take resolute measures” to defend its interests.
Policymakers could target industries in US swing states to impact Biden’s election chances, or opt for a symbolic retaliation, the Trivium China policy analysis group said in a newsletter.
China’s response, or lack thereof, will be telling in terms of how officials plan to address acts they deem as “economic suppression” moving forward, Trivium added.
“The challenge for the Chinese is, how do they do it in a way that doesn’t freak out foreign businesses?” said Bill Bishop, who publishes the Sinocism newsletter.
With Beijing previously announcing export controls on two rare metals essential for the manufacture of semiconductors, action on critical minerals remains possible, he said.
Beijing-based economist Mei Xinyu expects the response to be targeted, and analysts generally do not expect tit-for-tat actions.
China does not import American EVs while “Beijing and Shanghai have been very supportive of the one major US EV player, Tesla, in the China market,” said Paul Triolo, partner for China at Albright Stonebridge Group.
European tariffs
Biden’s move “may accelerate pressure on the EU to adopt a similarly strong posture in its own China tariff review, which is forthcoming,” said CSIS senior fellow Emily Benson.
The European Union launched an inquiry into Chinese electric car subsidies last year, fearing a threat to Europe’s auto industry. This could culminate in a tariff hike from the current 10 percent.
For now, the leaders of Germany and Sweden have expressed reservations about new European tariffs on Chinese EVs.
But if multiple major developed economies are on board with a tariff approach, China will likely be concerned from both an economic and propaganda standpoint, Bishop told AFP.
US tariffs may also “force Brussels’ hand” as it could divert trade to Europe, said Atlantic Council senior fellow Joseph Webster in an analysis.
“Brussels will have to act quickly, either to put its own tariffs in place or to accept a flood of Chinese-made products,” Webster added.
Analysts said the latest tariffs probably didn’t come as a surprise to China, given the signals from US officials ahead of the announcement.
But Bishop noted that the underlying problems between Washington and Beijing run deep — and that while both sides are talking again, their behaviors do not appear to have changed.
“These new actions just chip away at that very, very thin facade of stability,” he said.
Slovak PM shooting suspect named as 71-year-old writer; aides say Fico now out of danger
- The assassination attempt happened while Fico visited the central Slovak town of Handlova
- Slovak media say the suspect is the founder of the DUHA (Rainbow) Literary Club and was from the town of Levice
- The attack comes as political campaigning heats up three weeks ahead of Europe-wide elections to choose lawmakers for the European Parliament
BRATISLAVA: A suspect detained for shooting Slovakia Prime Minister Robert Fico is a 71-year-old writer from the center of the European nation, the interior minister said Wednesday, after media identified the man.
“I think I can confirm this, yes,” Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok told reporters when asked about reports identifying the man detained at the scene of the shooting in the town of Handlova.
A grey haired suspect was seen being handcuffed on the ground just after Fico was shot several times after a government meeting in Handlova.
The populist prime minister was shot multiple times and gravely wounded Wednesday, but his deputy prime minister said he believed Fico would survive.
The prime minister had been greeting supporters at an event when the attempted assassination took place, shocking the small country and reverberating across Europe weeks before an election.
“I guess in the end he will survive,” Tomas Taraba told the BBC, adding: “He’s not in a life threatening situation at this moment.”
Doctors fought for Fico’s life several hours after the pro-Russian leader, 59, was hit in the abdomen, Defense Minister Robert Kalina told reporters at the hospital where Fico was being treated.”
Five shots were fired outside a cultural center in the town of Handlova, nearly 140 kilometers (85 miles) northeast of the capital, government officials said. Fico was shot while attending a meeting of his government in the town of 16,000 that was once a center of coal mining.
A suspect was in custody, and an initial investigation found “a clear political motivation” behind the assassination attempt, Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok said as he briefed reporters alongside the defense minister.
Media reports said the suspect was a founder of the DUHA (Rainbow) Literary Club and was from the town of Levice.
The reports, which also named him, said he has written three poetry collections and is a member of the official Association of Slovak Writers.
The association confirmed on Facebook that the man had been a member since 2015, adding that if his identity as the suspected shooter was confirmed “the membership of this despicable person will be immediately canceled.”
The suspect’s son told Slovak news site aktuality.sk that he had “absolutely no idea what father was thinking, what he was planning, why it happened.”
He said his father was a legally registered gun owner.
When asked if he felt any hatred toward Fico, the son said: “I’ll tell you this: he didn’t vote for him. That’s all I can say about it.”
Vlasta Kollarova, head of a local library in the man’s hometown told Dennik N daily: “He was rebellious when he was young, but not aggressive.”
Several political statements by the man, who AFP has chosen not to name, could be found on social media.
“The world is full of violence and weapons. People seem to be going crazy,” he said in a video eight years ago posted online.
In the video, he also spoke about concern over immigration and “hatred and extremism” and said European governments “have no alternative to this chaos.”
He also said in the video that he had founded a “Movement Against Violence” in Levice.
The movement, which also has its Facebook page, defines itself as “an emerging political party whose goal is to prevent the spread of violence in society. To prevent war in Europe and the spread of hatred.”
Divisive figure
Fico has long been a divisive figure in Slovakia and beyond, but his return to power last year on a pro-Russian, anti-American message led to even greater worries among fellow European Union members that he would lead his country further from the Western mainstream.
Kicking off his fourth term as prime minister, his government halted arms deliveries to Ukraine, and critics worry that he will lead Slovakia — a nation of 5.4 million that belongs to NATO — to abandon its pro-Western course and follow in the footsteps of Hungary under populist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
Thousands have repeatedly rallied in the capital and across Slovakia to protest Fico’s policies.
A message posted to Fico’s Facebook account said he was taken to a hospital in Banská Bystrica, 29 kilometers (17 miles) from Handlova, because it would take too long to get to the capital, Bratislava.
The attack comes as political campaigning heats up three weeks ahead of Europe-wide elections to choose lawmakers for the European Parliament. Concern is mounting that populist and nationalists similar to Fico could make gains in the 27-member bloc.
But politics as usual were put aside as the nation faced the shock of the attempt on Fico’s life.
“A physical attack on the prime minister is, first of all, an attack on a person, but it is also an attack on democracy,” outgoing President Zuzana Caputova, a political rival of Fico, said in a televised statement. “Any violence is unacceptable. The hateful rhetoric we’ve been witnessing in society leads to hateful actions. Please, let’s stop it.”
President-elect Peter Pellegrini, an ally of Fico, called the shooting “an unprecedented threat to Slovak democracy. If we express other political opinions with pistols in squares, and not in polling stations, we are jeopardizing everything that we have built together over 31 years of Slovak sovereignty.”
The recent elections that brought Fico and his allies to power have underlined deep social divisions, exacerbated by the war in Ukraine, Slovakia’s neighbor to the east.
Gábor Czímer, a political journalist at Slovakian news outlet Ujszo.com, said Fico’s return to power had uncovered signs that “Slovak society is strongly split into two camps” — one that is friendly toward Russia and another that pushes for stronger connections with the EU and the West.
“At the same time, I couldn’t imagine that it would lead to physical violence,” Czímer said.
Estok, the Slovak interior minister, told reporters outside the hospital that the country was “on the edge of a civil war” from the political tension.
“Such hateful comments are being made on social networks today, so please, let’s stop this immediately,” he said.
US President Joe Biden said he was alarmed by the assassination attempt. “We condemn this horrific act of violence,” he said in a statement.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg posted on the social media platform X that he was “shocked and appalled” by the attempt on Fico’s life. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called it a “vile attack.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky denounced the violence against a neighboring country’s head of government.
“Every effort should be made to ensure that violence does not become the norm in any country, form or sphere,” he said.
Slovakia’s Parliament was adjourned until further notice. The major opposition parties, Progressive Slovakia and Freedom and Solidarity, canceled a planned protest against a controversial government plan to overhaul public broadcasting that they say would give the government full control of public radio and television.
Progressive Slovakia leader Michal Simecka called on all politicians “to refrain from any expressions and steps which could contribute to further increasing the tension.”
Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala wished the premier a swift recovery. “We cannot tolerate violence, there’s no place for it in society.”
The Czech Republic and Slovakia formed Czechoslovakia until 1992.
Xi, Putin hail ties as ‘stabilising’ force in chaotic world
- It is Putin’s first trip abroad since his March re-election and the second in just over six months to China
- Xi Jinping told his “old friend” Vladimir Putin that China-Russia relations were “conducive to peace”
BEIJING: Leaders Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin framed their nations’ ties as a stabilising force in a chaotic world as they met Thursday in Beijing, where the Russian president is seeking greater Chinese support for his war effort in Ukraine and isolated economy.
It is Putin’s first trip abroad since his March re-election and the second in just over six months to China, an economic lifeline for Russia after the West hit it with unprecedented sanctions over its military offensive in Ukraine.
Putin was greeted by Xi at a grand welcoming ceremony outside Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, footage by state broadcaster CCTV showed.
The national anthems of both countries and martial tunes played as the two leaders met, kicking off a two-day visit by Putin that is expected to see the countries deepen a relationship they have declared has “no limits.”
In a meeting, Xi then told his “old friend” Putin that China-Russia relations were “conducive to peace,” according to a readout from Beijing’s foreign ministry.
“China is ready to work with Russia to... uphold fairness and justice in the world,” Xi added.
“The China-Russia relationship today is hard-earned, and the two sides need to cherish and nurture it.”
Putin, in turn, told Xi the two countries’ relations were “stabilising factors in the international arena.”
“Relations between Russia and China are not opportunistic and not directed against anyone,” Putin said, according to a Kremlin readout.
“Together, we uphold the principles of justice and a democratic world order that reflects multipolar realities and is based on international law,” he added.
Major offensive on Ukraine
The Russian leader’s arrival came hours after he hailed his country’s troops for advancing on “all fronts” on the battlefield in Ukraine, following a major new ground assault.
Xi, who returned last week from a three-nation tour of Europe, has rebuffed Western criticism of his country’s ties with Moscow, enjoying cheap Russian energy imports and access to vast natural resources, including steady gas shipments via the Power of Siberia pipeline.
“This is Putin’s first trip after his inauguration, and it is therefore intended to show that Sino-Russian relations are moving up another level,” independent Russian political analyst Konstantin Kalachev told AFP.
“Not to mention the visibly sincere personal friendship between the two leaders.”
But their economic partnership has come under close scrutiny from the West in recent months.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who met Xi in Beijing last month, warned China’s support for Russia’s “brutal war of aggression” in Ukraine had helped Russia ramp up production of rockets, drones and tanks — while stopping short of direct arms exports.
China claims to be a neutral party in the Ukraine conflict, which it has never condemned and in which it has sought to frame itself as a mediator.
Putin, in an interview published in Xinhua ahead of his visit, hailed Beijing’s “genuine desire” to help resolve the Ukraine crisis.
Russia-China growing partnership
China-Russia trade has boomed since the Ukraine invasion and hit $240 billion in 2023, according to Chinese customs figures.
But after Washington vowed to go after financial institutions that facilitate Moscow, Chinese exports to Russia dipped during March and April, down from a surge early in the year.
An executive order by President Joe Biden in December permits secondary sanctions on foreign banks that deal with Russia’s war machine, allowing the US Treasury to cut them out of the dollar-led global financial system.
That, coupled with recent efforts to rebuild fractured ties with the United States, may make Beijing reluctant to openly push more cooperation with Russia — despite what Moscow may want, analysts said.
Eight people from both countries involved in cross-border trade told AFP in recent days that several Chinese banks have halted or slowed transactions with Russian clients.
Putin’s post-election trip to Beijing echoes Xi’s own visit to Russia after his re-anointing as leader last year.
The two leaders are set to sign a joint declaration following the talks, the Kremlin said, and attend an evening marking 75 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries.
Putin will also meet Premier Li Qiang — China’s number two official — and travel to the northeastern city of Harbin for a trade and investment expo.
South Africa seeks halt to Israel’s Rafah offensive at World Court
- The hearings on May 16 and 17 will only focus on issuing emergency measures, to keep the dispute from escalating
THE HAGUE: South Africa will ask the top UN court on Thursday to order a halt to the Rafah offensive as part of its case in The Hague accusing Israel of genocide in the Gaza Strip.
The hearings at the International Court of Justice, also known as the World Court, come after South Africa last week asked for additional emergency measures to protect Rafah, a southern Gaza city where more than a million Palestinians have been sheltering.
It also asked the court to order Israel to allow unimpeded access to Gaza for UN officials, organizations providing humanitarian aid, and journalists and investigators. It added that Israel has so far ignored and violated earlier court orders.
On Thursday, South Africa will present its latest intervention seeking emergency measures starting at 3 p.m.(1300 GMT).
Israel, which has denounced South Africa’s claim that it is violating the 1949 Genocide Convention as baseless, will respond on Friday. In previous filings it stressed it had stepped up efforts to get humanitarian aid into Gaza as the ICJ had ordered.
Gilad Erdan, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations told Army Radio on Wednesday the short notice the court gave for the hearings did not allow sufficient legal preparation, adding that was “a telling sign.”
The Israel-Hamas war has killed nearly 35,000 people in Gaza, according to health authorities there. About 1,200 people were killed in Israel and 253 taken hostage on Oct. 7 when Hamas launched the attack that started the war, according Israeli tallies.
South Africa accuses Israel of acts of genocide against Palestinians. In January, the court ordered Israel to ensure its troops commit no genocidal acts against Palestinians in Gaza, allow in more humanitarian aid and preserve any evidence of violations.
The hearings on May 16 and 17 will only focus on issuing emergency measures, to keep the dispute from escalating. It will likely take years before the court can rule on the merits of the case.
The ICJ’s rulings and orders are binding and without appeal. While the court has no way to enforce them, an order against a country could hurt its international reputation and set legal precedent.
