Brazil to join South Africa’s ICJ ‘genocide’ case against Israel

Brazilian Foreign Ministry says international community ‘cannot remain inactive’ in the face of ‘ongoing atrocities’.

Brazil has said that it will move to intervene in a case before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) alleging that Israel is committing “genocide” in Gaza, as non-Western countries step up calls for greater pressure.

The Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Wednesday that it was in the “final stages” of submitting a formal intervention to the ICJ regarding the case, originally brought by South Africa.

“The international community cannot remain inactive in the face of ongoing atrocities,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. “Brazil believes there is no longer room for moral ambiguity or political omission. Impunity undermines international legality and undermines the credibility of the multilateral system.”

Brazil’s planned intervention in the case, earlier reported by the Brazilian paper Folha de S Paulo, comes as Israeli abuses in Gaza, including harsh restrictions on aid that have brought the Gaza Strip to the brink of mass famine, are under growing scrutiny.

The “Brazilian government announces that it is in the final stages of submitting a formal intervention in the ongoing case at the International Court of Justice, brought by South Africa under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide”, the statement said.

“The Brazilian government expresses deep indignation at the recurring episodes of violence against the civilian population in the State of Palestine, not limited to the Gaza Strip but extending to the West Bank.”

Increasingly vocal

The South American nation said that civilians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank have been subjected to “recurring episodes of violence” and serious rights violations, including the “shameless use of starvation as a weapon of war”.

Several other countries, including Spain, Turkiye and the Republic of Ireland, have also asked to intervene in the case, urging the ICJ to state that Israel is in violation of its obligations under the 1948 Genocide Convention.

Brazil has itself become increasingly vocal in its criticism of Israel, with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva denouncing Israel’s actions in Gaza as a genocide at a BRICS meeting earlier this month. The Foreign Ministry statement notes that the decision to intervene in the case is based on the “plausibility that the rights of Palestinians to protection against acts of genocide are being irreversibly impaired”.

The Israeli Embassy in Brasilia said the Brazilian statement used “harsh words that do not fully portray the reality of what is currently happening in Gaza”, while Brazil had also “completely ignored” the role of Hamas.

Brazil’s National Israeli association CONIB said in a statement in response to Wednesday’s decision: “The breaking of Brazil’s longstanding friendship and partnership with Israel is a misguided move that proves the extremism of our foreign policy.”

The ICJ has yet to rule on whether Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, but issued an order in January 2024, demanding that Israel take action to prevent genocide in the Strip through acts such as allowing greater access to humanitarian aid.

However, pressure has had little impact, and the United States and other Western allies have remained firmly supportive of Israel despite a growing chorus of experts and rights groups warning of systematic rights abuses in Gaza.

Israel initiated a full blockade in March that barred all aid from Gaza for several months, before allowing a limited resumption of assistance through the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a group closely tied to Israel and the US.

Israeli forces have killed more than 1,000 Palestinians waiting for aid at GHF distribution sites since May, as reports of Palestinians dying of starvation continue to mount.

United Nations officials have denounced the sites as “death traps”, and said they will not cooperate with the GHF, which supplanted existing international aid groups that Israel has largely barred from operating in Gaza.