{"id":1476915,"date":"2024-02-01T19:59:36","date_gmt":"2024-02-01T19:59:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/?p=459681"},"modified":"2024-02-01T19:59:36","modified_gmt":"2024-02-01T19:59:36","slug":"after-historic-ruling-lawyers-vow-to-keep-fighting-biden-over-complicity-in-gaza-genocide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2024\/02\/01\/after-historic-ruling-lawyers-vow-to-keep-fighting-biden-over-complicity-in-gaza-genocide\/","title":{"rendered":"After Historic Ruling, Lawyers Vow to Keep Fighting Biden Over Complicity in Gaza Genocide"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A federal judge<\/span> declared on Wednesday that Israel is plausibly engaging in genocide in Gaza and implored the Biden administration to reconsider its \u201cunflagging support\u201d for Israel\u2019s attacks on Palestinians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The comments came in a ruling in response to a lawsuit<\/a> that accused President Joe Biden and senior administration officials of complicity in and failure to prevent Israel\u2019s genocidal acts, as required by both international and U.S. law. The Center for Constitutional Rights, a nonprofit legal organization, filed the lawsuit<\/a> on behalf of two Palestinian human rights organizations and Palestinians in Gaza and in the United States. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The judge, Jeffrey S. White of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, dismissed the lawsuit on jurisdictional grounds \u2014citing legal doctrine that prevents the judiciary from interfering in matters of foreign policy. But his strong-worded statement is unprecedented, as was his unusual decision to allow more than three hours of testimony from Palestinian plaintiffs during a powerful hearing<\/a> last week, including a doctor calling into court from a Gaza hospital hallway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During that hearing, which took place <\/a>in Oakland just hours after the International Court of Justice in The Hague ruled<\/a> that Israel had plausibly engaged in genocide in Gaza, White described the case as the \u201cmost difficult\u201d of his career.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is every individual\u2019s obligation to confront the current siege in Gaza, but it [is] also this Court\u2019s obligation to remain within the metes and bounds of its jurisdictional scope,\u201d he wrote in his decision<\/a> to dismiss the case. \u201cThere are rare cases in which the preferred outcome is inaccessible to the Court. This is one of those cases.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Justice Department attorneys had asked the judge to dismiss the case on a technicality, citing the jurisdictional question, but did not challenge the suit on its merits. In court last week, government lawyers did not cross-examine witnesses, with the exception of a scholar of the Holocaust who testified that Israel\u2019s actions in Gaza amounted to genocide. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At a press briefing on Thursday afternoon, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller declined to comment on the lawsuit and the judge\u2019s ruling but said that \u201cit remains our conclusion that the allegations of genocide are unfounded.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Brad Parker, a senior adviser at Defense for Children International Palestine, one of the two organizational plaintiffs in the case, said that the decision was \u201cdisappointing,\u201d but that the judge\u2019s findings \u2014 and the fact that such a hearing could take place in a U.S. courtroom in the first place \u2014 were of \u201csignificant, historic meaning.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe know that U.S. weapons are integral in the genocide.\u201d<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe know that U.S. weapons are integral in the genocide that we\u2019re documenting as a Palestinian human rights organization,\u201d Parker told The Intercept. \u201cBut similar to the historic ICJ decision and the increasing recognition that what Israel is carrying out is a genocide and the U.S. is complicit in those genocidal acts, I think the strong language from a U.S. federal court judge increasingly works to isolate Israel\u2019s actions and also bring pressure on the Biden administration to change course.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s clear what President Biden\u2019s complicity is in the destruction of Palestinian life,\u201d Parker added. \u201cAnd we\u2019re committed to doing everything that we can to end that complicity, and ultimately end the genocide.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n