THE HAGUE: Bolivia has joined South Africa’s case against Israel at the International Court of Justice that alleges the Israeli Gaza offensive breaches the UN Genocide Convention, the court said on Wednesday.
The South American country is the latest of several nations, including Colombia, Libya, Spain and Mexico, adding their weight to the case against Israel, which vehemently denies the accusations.
Bolivia already announced in November it was severing diplomatic ties over what it described as the “disproportionate” attacks on Gaza by Israel.
At the time, Israel slammed the move as “a surrender to terrorism.”
In a January 26 ruling that made headlines around the world, the ICJ told Israel to do everything possible to prevent acts of genocide during its military operations in Gaza.
The court has also ordered Israel to ensure “unimpeded access” to UN-mandated investigators to look into allegations of genocide.
South Africa has returned several times to the ICJ, arguing that the dire humanitarian situation in the territory compels the court to issue further fresh emergency measures.
In its submission to the court made public on Wednesday, Bolivia argued: “Israel’s genocidal war continues, and the Court’s orders remain dead letters to Israel.”
While ICJ rulings are legally binding, the court has no concrete means to enforce them.
In a separate ruling in July, the ICJ issued an “advisory opinion” that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory was “unlawful” and should end as soon as possible.
Israel’s Gaza campaign has killed at least 42,010 people, the majority of them civilians, according to figures provided by the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.
The UN has described the figures as reliable.
The offensive was prompted by Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack which resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures that include hostages killed in captivity.
Israel has intensified strikes on Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon since September 23, leaving more than 1,150 people dead, according to an AFP tally of official figures.
Bolivia joins South Africa’s ICJ genocide case against Israel
https://arab.news/zj3b5
Bolivia joins South Africa’s ICJ genocide case against Israel
Gisèle Pelicot recounts harrowing discovery of her husband’s rape crimes
PARIS: Gisèle Pelicot’s brain froze as the French police officer revealed the unthinkable.
“Fifty-three men had come to our house to rape me,” she recalls him telling her.
Sharing details of the horror that until now had largely been reserved for French courts, Pelicot is publicly telling her story of survival and courage in her own words, in a book and her first series of interviews since a landmark trial in 2024 turned her into a global icon against sexual violence and imprisoned her husband who knocked her out with drugs so other men could assault her inert body.
Extracts of “A Hymn to Life, Shame Has to Change Sides,” published by French newspaper Le Monde, rewound to Nov. 2, 2020 — the day when her world fell apart. Her then-husband, Dominique Pelicot, had been summoned by police for questioning after a supermarket security guard caught him secretly taking video up women’s skirts.
Gisèle accompanied him and was completely unprepared for the bombshell delivered by the officer, Laurent Perret. Gradually, and with care, he explained how the man she regarded as a loving husband and whom she described as “a super guy” had, in fact, made her the unwitting victim of his perversions.
“I am going to show you photos and videos that are not going to please you,” the officer said, words she recounts in the book.
The first showed a man raping a woman who had been laid out on her side and dressed up in a suspender belt.
“That’s you in this photo,” the officer said. He then showed her another photo, and another after that — drawn from a collection of images that Dominique Pelicot took of his wife over the years when he regularly knocked her unconscious by lacing her food and drink with drugs, so strangers he invited to their home could assault her while he filmed.
