Photo: ICC.
The United States, Canada, Europe – what we know as the collective West – have turned their backs on the legal commitments undertaken 80 years ago to “save succeeding generations from the scourge of war” and abandoned the over-arching values of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the obligations undertaken pursuant to the 1948 Genocide Convention to prevent – not only punish – the crime of genocide.
Instead of strengthening the United Nations Charter as the best hope of survival for humanity, and the only valid “rules based international order”, the collective West has systematically undermined the United Nations system of multilateral negotiation, and is playing really hard ball by a financially blackmailing the Organization and its specialized agencies.
As the global majority in Latin America, Africa and Asia advances toward enhanced cooperation, as the BRICS countries strengthen their economic ties, we in the “West” seem to have lost our way, persist in our obsolete exceptionalism, sterile solipsism, continue provoking others, refusing to resolve disputes by diplomacy, always with a “holier-than-thou” attitude. Our Himalayan hypocrisy, this infantile hubris toward other peoples and cultures further aggravates our isolation. The fantasy that we are by definition “the good guys” is universally rejected. Only some ideologues in the West keep repeating the old narrative of our “mission” to bring democracy and human rights to the rest of the world. Wiser observers including Professor John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago, Jeffres Sachs of Columbia University, and Ilan Pappé of Exeter University, have demonstrated that our political leaders and the mainstream media are out of touch with reality[1].
Worse than that: We in the West, once upon a time considered the world leaders in human rights and humanitarian law, are morally bankrupt. It is inconceivable that we continue to give military, economic, political, economic, propagandistic support to a State that has practised Apartheid since 1948 and committed the crime of ethnic cleansing since the Nakba. Israeli government is in a state of moral meltdown. We in the West engage in blatant “apology of the crime of genocide”, align ourselves with the State of Israel, which is in open rebellion against international law, the UN Charter, fundamental humanity. Our credibility is shot.
We citizens of supposedly democratic countries have a duty to protest, a duty to go out in the streets and condemn the ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people. We must shout — as my generation did in the late 1960s and early 1970s – “if the government does not stop the Vietnam war, we will stop the government institutions”. Back then we shouted “Not in our name”. Vietnam was not our enemy. Today we must reaffirm that the Palestinians are not our enemies, and Israel cannot be our ally in any name, shape or form. If we ally ourselves with the State of Israel, we are ourselves guilty of genocide.
Back in 1975 student protests and a better mainstream media than today succeeded in stopping the slaughter in Vietnam – but only after some 4 million Vietnamese, Laotians and Cambodians had been killed in the name of “freedom”, but actually in the name of militant capitalism. Practically no one was ever held accountable for the horrors we visited upon innocent people. We just “turned the page”. It pays to read again the 1970 book by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh My lai 4, A Report on the Massacre and its Aftermath[2]. One of so many massacres during a profoundly unjust war.
The “collective West” bears responsibility for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by NATO forces in many theatres — Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria. But today the collective West has advanced to committing and justifying all-out genocide against the Palestinian people. Our governments are all complicit. Will there be accountability?
As the International Court of Justice is busy with numerous contentious cases concerning the Israeli genocide against the Palestinians[3], the Geneva International Peace Research Institute(GIPRI)[4] continues to call for an end of the slaughter, prevention of future conflicts, and accountability of the perpetrators. It is the function of the United Nations to take effective measures to prevent genocide, and if massacres of this magnitude are occurring, the United Nations must act. It is far more than just a matter of “Responsibility to Protect”, it is a make-or-break situation. The UN will lose all credibility if it cannot stop this genocide. Thus, the United Nations must call on all UN members to impose an arms embargo on Israel, break all commercial relations with the genocidal state. The UN should act to withdraw the credentials of Israeli diplomats, as it rejected the accreditation of the Apartheid South African diplomats in 1974[5].
The United Nations has the power to adopt a resolution under article 6 of the UN Charter to expel Israel from the UN. Of course the Unted States will then veto it in the Security Council, but a resolution by the General Assembly would itself have considerable symbolic significance for the international community. The serial vetoes of the United States to block condemnation of the crimes and atrocities of the government of Israel constitute a flagrant rejection of international law and the whole philosophy of the primacy of law over geopolitics, the necessary respect for the international “rule of law” as the only alternative to tyranny and chaos.
It is a major dysfunction of the international legal system when judgments and advisory opinions of the International Court of Justice are ignored by Israel, the United States, and Europe. The international community has seen this blatant disregard with regard to the Court’s Advisory Opinions of 9 July 2004[6] and 19 July 2024[7]. The United States has effectively rendered the pronouncements of the highest judicial instance of the United Nations unenforceable.
On the positive side, the International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu[8] and his former Secretary of “Defence” Yoav Gallant[9]. Yet, to this day, these arrest warrants have not been implemented. It is a matter of great concern for the authority of judicial institutions that European States, ostensibly committed to the rule of law, and signatories of the Statute of Rome, have hitherto refused to arrest these persons. This has had a devastating effect on the credibility of the United Nations and on the image of the Europeans as defenders of the rule of law.
On 22 May 2024 the Geneva International Peace Research Institute submitted a 29-page legal brief to the Proseuctor of the International Criminal Court, Karim Khan, requesting him under article 15 of the Statute of Rome to initiate an investigation into the issue of complicity in genocide, complicity by the US, UK, and many European countries. Beyond that, GIPRI proposed an investigation into the complicity of the European Commission, and in particular Ursula von der Leyen, who has been a relentless defender of Israel’s criminal actions against the Palestinians in the Occupied territories and Gaza. Undoubtedly, she and other EU officials have become complicit in the crime of genocide by providing, on behalf of the European Commission, support to a genocidal state.
On 15 May 2025, GIPRI submitted a follow-up communication to its earlier communication. The text of the new GIPRI submission to the ICC reads in part
“This is a follow-up on the communication submitted to the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) by the Geneva International Peace Research Institute (GIPRI) and other institutions on 22 May 2024[10], This initial communication set forth in detail the grounds justifying opening an investigation against the current president of the European Commission, Mrs. Ursula von der Leyen, a national of Germany, for complicity in grave violations of international humanitarian law, amounting to crimes within the jurisdiction of the ICC, in contravention of articles 6, 7 and 8 of the Rome Statute, committed by the Israeli armed forces (IDF) against Palestinian civilians in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), including the Gaza Strip.
“This follow-up communication by the Geneva International Peace Research Institute, made pursuant to Article 15 of the Rome Statute of the ICC, urges the Prosecutor to initiate investigations proprio motu on the basis of the existing information provided against Mrs. Ursula von der Leyen, the cumulative evidence in the public domain and the solidly documented submissions to the International Court of Justice by numerous governments, including those of South Africa[11] and Nicaragua[12].
“GIPRI renews its call on the Prosecutor to proceed as requested in the legal brief submitted on 22 May 2024 and recently confirmed in the appeal of the Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights Situation in the Palestinian Territories Occupied since 1967[13]. On 4 May 2025 Albanese again called for accountability of Mrs. Ursula van der Leyen and other European Union officials for complicity in the genocide being perpetrated against the Palestinian people, a crime within the meaning of article 6 of the Rome Statute and article III e of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide[14]. Albanese stated: “The fact that the two highest figures of the EU continue business as usual engagements with Israel is beyond deplorable …I’m not someone who says, ‘History will judge them’ — they will have to be judged before then. And they will have to understand that immunity cannot equate with impunity.”[15] Professor William Schabas of Middlesex University in London has commented: “Von der Leyen is clearly reflecting a position taken by many EU governments, which is one of very unconditional support of Israel, and they’re doing this flying in the face of public information suggesting that Israel is committing terrible crimes in Gaza and the West Bank.”[16]
“Since the filing of the GIPRI communication of May 2024, the genocide in Gaza has not only continued but has become more deliberate, thorough and systematic. The complicity of European institutions and personally of Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, is public record. Ursula von der Leyen’s own words demonstrate her complicity, as documented by governmental and non-governmental institutions. At issue is not only the crime of complicity, but also the concerted effort to deny that the crimes and atrocities committed by Israeli forces against Palestinians constitute genocide, and the attempt by official European institutions to downplay the use of hunger as a weapon of war as being somehow justified as “self-defense”. The crime of apology of genocide and crimes against humanity can also be understood as a form of “incitement” to hatred and violence within the meaning of article III c of the Genocide Convention.”
Abundant evidence of the crime of genocide and of the complicity of Ursula von der Leyen and other European institutions has been submitted to the International Court of Justice, including during the hearings held from 28 April to 2 May 2025 concerning the pending General Assembly request to the ICJ to issue an Advisory Opinion concerning the Obligations of Israel in relation to the Presence and Activities of the United Nations, Other International Organizations and Third States in and in relation to the Occupied Palestinian Territory Presence and Activities of the United Nations.[17] GIPRI further refers to the pertinent Reports of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel[18].
GIPRI recalls that the 1948 Convention against Genocide constitutes jus cogens and that all States and all State institutions are obligated not only to punish, but far more importantly to prevent genocide. This is an erga omnesobligation reaffirmed in the ICJ Judgment in the case Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro[19]. Far from taking concrete measures to prevent the on-going genocide against the Palestinians, the European Commission, Kaja Kallas and Ursula von der Leyen have continued to support the criminal actions of the government of Israel by providing military, political, economic, diplomatic and propagandistic support to the genocidal State, including by furnishing the means for the commission of the crimes in question, within the meaning of Article 25(3)(c) of the Rome Statute.
Let us see whether in the light of GIPRI’s follow-up communication to the ICC, the Prosecutor will decide to open an investigation into the issue of complicity in genocide — not only by governments, but also by institutions and individuals acting in official capacities for the European Union and NATO.
In any event, it is up to us to pushback against and disavow the statements of the US State Department, of Keir Starmer, of the European Commission and its President Ursula von der Leyen. As concerned citizens of the world, we must demand an immediate stop to the genocide, immediate humanitarian assistance to the victims, the implementation of the right to return of all refugees and expellees, and accountability for the crimes hitherto committed.
All CounterPunch readers are invited to address petitions to the International Criminal Court and demand that the Prosecutor initiate investigations with a view to issuing arrest warrants not only against Netanyahu and Dayan, but also against Ursula von der Leyen, Kaja Kallas, Mark Rutte and all accomplices in this campaign to dismantle civilization. In the meantime, States that are respectful of the UN Charter and the Genocide Convention should consider activating the inter-State complains procedures provided for by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination, the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and by other international human rights treaties. Moreover, States should consider exercising universal jurisdiction and motu proprio initiating investigations of the perpetrators in absentia. Should any of these persons enter their territorial jurisdiction, they should be subject to arrest and prosecution on charges of complicity in the ongoing genocide. Counterpunch readers and other petitioners may address their communications to the
International Criminal Court
Boîte Postale 19519
2500 CM, La Haye
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otp.informationdesk@icc-cpi.int
Fax +31 70 515 8555
They can also go on the ICC site and submit petitions online. https://otplink.icc-cpi.int/faqs
https://otplink.icc-cpi.int/faqs
As Martin Luther King Jr said on 4 April 1967 in an address at New York City’s Riverside Church: “We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late.”[20] Gaza is today, the Palestinians are being exterminated. There is no doubt that the Israeli government aims at the “final solution of Palestine”, the ethnic cleansing and deportation of all Palestinians, so that Israel can complete its landgrab and illegal annexation of Palestinian territories. We must prevent this. It is our obligation as civilized human beings.
Alas, Western civilization appears to be in a state of moral collapse, and the operators sit in Washington, London, Paris, Berlin and Jerusalem. Let us hope for a moral revival in the US, UK, France, Germany and Israel. The Global Majority must take the lead in demanding an immediate stop to the war against the Palestinians. All women and men of good will must demand concrete measures to stop the genocide. NOW!
Notes.
[1] John Mearsheimer, The Great Delusion, Yale University Press, 2018. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Pbx94vzKOA.https://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/18/62/546393/Books/Reviews/Historian-Ilan-Papp;%E2%80%99s-unflinching-indictment-of-t.aspx. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Epq9x0Px5Yk
[2] https://archive.org/details/mylai4reportonth00hers
[3] https://www.icj-cij.org/case/192, https://www.icj-cij.org/case/193
[4] https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/05/27/call-for-the-icc-to-investigate-ursula-von-der-leyen-for-complicity-in-war-crimes-and-genocide/
[5] https://media.un.org/photo/en/asset/oun7/oun7593912
[6] https://www.icj-cij.org/case/131
[7] https://www.icj-cij.org/case/186
[8] https://www.icc-cpi.int/defendant/netanyahu
[9] https://www.icc-cpi.int/defendant/gallant
[10] https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/05/27/call-for-the-icc-to-investigate-ursula-von-der-leyen-for-complicity-in-war-crimes-and-genocide/
[11] https://www.icj-cij.org/case/192
[12] https://www.icj-cij.org/case/193
[13] https://www.ohchr.org/en/special-procedures/sr-palestine
[14] https://www.ohchr.org/en/special-procedures/sr-palestine/francesca-albanese
[15] https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/eu-president-must-face-war-crimes-charges–albanese
https://www.sott.net/article/499421-UN-Special-Rapporteur-Francesca-Albanese-EUs-von-der-Leyen-beyond-deplorable-on-Gaza
[16] https://www.msn.com/en-us/politics/government/eu-president-should-be-tried-for-complicity-in-israel-s-war-crimes-says-top-un-expert-on-palestine/ar-AA1E6DID
[17] https://www.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/196/196-20250502-pre-01-00-en.pdf
[18] https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/4051243?v=pdf
[19] https://icj-cij.org/case/91
[20] https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkatimetobreaksilence.htm
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