Judges at the top United Nations court order Israel to immediately halt its military assault on the southern Gaza city of Rafah
\n United Nations
\nJudges at the top United Nations court ordered Israel to halt its offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah and withdraw from the enclave, in a case brought by South Africa accusing Israel of genocide, citing \u201cimmense risk\u201d to the Palestinian population.
\nFriday\u2019s decision marked the third time this year the 15-judge panel has issued preliminary orders seeking to rein in the death toll and alleviate humanitarian suffering in Gaza. While orders are legally binding, the court has no police to enforce them.
\nReading out a ruling by the International Court of Justice or World Court, the body\u2019s president Nawaf Salam said provisional measures ordered by the court in March did not fully address the situation in the besieged Palestinian enclave now, and conditions had been met for a new emergency order.
\nIsrael must \u201cimmediately halt its military offensive, and any other action in the Rafah Governorate, which may inflict on the Palestinian group in Gaza conditions of life that could bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part,\u201d Salam said, and called the humanitarian situation in Rafah \u201cdisastrous\u201d.
\nSouth Africa\u2019s lawyers had asked the ICJ in the Hague last week to impose emergency measures, saying Israel\u2019s attacks on Rafah must be stopped to ensure the survival of the Palestinian people.
\nReporting from The Hague, in the Netherlands, Al Jazeera\u2019s Step Vaessen said that 13 of the 15 ICJ judges agreed to call on Israel to halt its assault.
\n\u201c[Salam] said 800,000 are displaced, and that he doesn\u2019t believe Israel\u2019s word that they are provided safety and humanitarian access. He said there was no evidence of that,\u201d she noted.
\n\u201cThat\u2019s why the court has now made a very strong order that Israel should immediately stop its offensive and military operation in Rafah and withdraw its troops from there. He also made a ruling on border crossings, that they must be reopened as soon as possible to get humanitarian aid in,\u201d Vaessen added.
\nShe said that the judge also stressed that observers from the UN have to get access as soon as possible to make sure that no evidence of any possible war crimes disappear from the region.
\nThe ICJ has also ordered Israel to report back to the court within one month over its progress in applying measures ordered by the institution.
\nIsrael launched its assault on the southern city of Rafah this month, forcing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to flee a city that had become a refuge to about half of the population\u2019s 2.3 million people.
\nRafah, on Gaza\u2019s southern edge, has also been the main route in for aid, and international organisations say the Israeli operation has cut off the enclave and raised the risk of famine.
\nReporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, Al Jazeera\u2019s Hind Al Khoudary said that people in the Gaza Strip have not yet reacted to the ICJ ruling since many of them do not have internet connection.
\n\u201cPeople here in the Gaza Strip are currently trying to feed themselves \u2026 after being constantly displaced. So people are not very well aware of what\u2019s going on. They\u2019re asking journalists \u2026 if there is anything positive,\u201d she said.
\nKhoudary added that, as journalists in Gaza, they do not want to give people in the region false hope and are waiting to hear more information about how the ICJ\u2019s ruling will be implemented in Rafah, where the situation remains intense.
\nThe Palestinian Authority has welcomed the decision on Friday from the International Court of Justice, saying it represents an international consensus to end the war on the Gaza Strip, Palestinian presidential spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeina told Reuters news agency.
\nShortly after the ruling, Israel\u2019s finance minister Bezalel Smotrich said on the social media platform X that \u201cthe State of Israel is at war for its existence\u201d.
\n\u201cThose who demand that the State of Israel stop the war, demand that it decree itself to cease to exist. We will not agree to that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Judges at the top United Nations court order Israel to immediately halt its military assault on the southern Gaza city of Rafah United Nations Judges at the top United Nations court ordered Israel to halt its offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah and withdraw from the enclave, in a case brought by South […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":409150,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-409121","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n