Secretary general of Amnesty International Agnes Callamard holding a press conference, in London, 23 April 2023 (AFP)
Agnes Callamard says it’s time for ICC to charge Israeli leaders with the crime of committing genocide in Gaza
The secretary general of Amnesty International, Agnes Callamard, has urged British politicians to revise their denial that genocide is being committed in Gaza, following a major report by the group concluding that Israel is guilty of genocide.
The world’s leading human rights group on Thursday declared that Israel has committed and continues to commit genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, based on extensive legal and field research covering the period between 7 October 2023 and early July 2024.
“I hope that Prime Minister Keir Starmer and his foreign minister will read through the 300 pages of evidence that we have provided,” Agnes Callamard told Middle East Eye following the release of Amnesty’s report
“Genocide is not a matter of belief. Genocide is not a matter of desire. Genocide is a matter of law. Genocide is a matter of fact.”
Callamard also said the UK, US and German governments may be found complicit in genocide, as a result of their support for the Israeli army.
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“For the last 14 months, we’ve had a few governments that have supported Israel: the United States, Germany, and the UK.
“They have supported them and they have sold weapons. Therefore, they are facing the real risk of being complicit in the crime of genocide,” she told MEE.
UK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWREGenocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
This article was originally posted 6/12/24 but was deleted, probably my mistake.
UK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWRE
An F-35 arriving back at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus, June 24, 2019
THE government has been forced to review its decision to export F-35 fighter jet components to Israel, legal groups announced today.
Global Legal Action Network (Glan) and Al-Haq wrote to the government last month, threatening to file an emergency injunction over its failure to revoke licences for all arms to the country as it continues its genocide in Gaza.
Labour eventually moved to suspend just 30 out of 350 arms exports in September, but components for F-35s, which have dropped 2,000lb bombs on Gaza, were exempt.
In the High Court last month, the government admitted that there was a “clear risk” that the components could be used by Israel to violate international humanitarian law.
But it continued to export them anyway after Defence Secretary John Healey warned that it would disrupt the global supply programme they are part of and “undermine US confidence in the UK.”
Glan and Al-Haq said that they have now been notified that the government is reconsidering its decision.
Glan lawyer Dearbhla Minogue said: “The position they took is, in our estimation, legally untenable and we hope they will finally do the only reasonable thing — stop the transfer of any British weapons for use by Israel against Palestinians.”
Genocide denying UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy says that UK is suspending 30 of 350 arms licences to Israel. He also confirms the UK government’s support for Israel’s Gaza genocide and the UK government and military’s active participation in genocide.Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
Amnesty International’s 296-page report – ‘You Feel Like You Are Subhuman’: Israel’s Genocide Against Palestinians in Gaza – documents how, during its military offensive launched in the wake of the deadly Hamas-led attacks in southern Israel on 7 October 2023, Israel has unleashed hell and destruction on Palestinians in Gaza brazenly, continuously and with total impunity.
Over the past two months the crisis has grown particularly acute in the North Gaza governorate, where a besieged population is facing starvation, displacement and annihilation amid relentless bombardment and suffocating restrictions on life-saving humanitarian aid.
Amnesty’s report examines in detail Israel’s violations in Gaza over the nine months between 7 October 2023 and early July 2024, with Amnesty interviewing 212 people – including Palestinian victims and witnesses, local authorities in Gaza and healthcare workers – while conducting fieldwork and analysing an extensive range of visual and digital evidence, including satellite imagery. Amnesty also analysed statements by senior Israeli government and military officials, and official Israeli bodies. On multiple occasions, Amnesty shared its findings with the Israeli authorities but has received no substantive response.
Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General, said:
“Amnesty International’s report demonstrates that Israel has carried out acts prohibited under the Genocide Convention, with the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza.
“These acts include killings, causing serious bodily or mental harm and deliberately inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction.
“Month after month, Israel has treated Palestinians in Gaza as a subhuman group unworthy of human rights and dignity, demonstrating its intent to physically destroy them.
“Our damning findings must serve as a wake-up call to the international community: this is genocide. It must stop now.
“States that continue to transfer arms to Israel at this time must know they are violating their obligation to prevent genocide and are at risk of becoming complicit in genocide.
“All states with influence over Israel, particularly key arms suppliers like the USA and Germany, but also other EU member states – the UK and others – must act now to bring Israel’s atrocities against Palestinians in Gaza to an immediate end.
“The International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity issued last month offer real hope of long-overdue justice for victims.
“States must demonstrate their respect for the court’s decision and for universal international law principles by arresting and handing over those wanted by the ICC.”
Sacha Deshmukh, Amnesty International UK’s Chief Executive, said:
“As a state party to the Genocide Convention, the UK has a legal obligation to use all reasonable means to help prevent genocide.
“The UK must take urgent steps to make clear to Israel that this country does not support genocidal acts against Palestinians in Gaza, and those acts must end immediately.
“The UK government must, as an urgent first step, work with other countries by all diplomatic and legal means to press Israel into fully implementing the provisional measures ordered by the International Court of Justice.
“To avoid the risk of itself being complicit in genocide, the UK must immediately end all arms transfers to Israel.
“The UK should also press for multilateral targeted sanctions at the UN Security Council against Israeli and Hamas officials most implicated in crimes under international law.
“The UK must act to ensure justice and accountability, supporting the ongoing International Criminal Court investigation into Palestine and executing any ICC arrest warrants.”
Genocide denying UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy says that UK is suspending 30 of 350 arms licences to Israel. He also confirms the UK government’s support for Israel’s Gaza genocide and the UK government and military’s active participation in genocide.
Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy gives a press conference in Abuja on 4 November, 2024 (AFP/Kola Sulaimon)
Scottish National Party MP Chris Law accuses David Lammy of exposing UK to ‘significant risk’
British Foreign Secretary David Lammy has been warned that the UK as a state, “alongside individual ministers and government officials as individuals”, is at “significant risk of future legal action for complicity in acts of genocide”.
In a letter to Lammy on Monday, seen by Middle East Eye, Scottish National Party MP Chris Law accused the foreign secretary of failing to “demonstrate any responsibility of the UK government to prevent genocide”.
“Do you accept that the UK’s obligations [under the Genocide Convention] should have been triggered from the moment the government became aware of a serious and imminent risk that genocide could be perpetrated,” Law asks in the letter.
The Scottish politician goes on to accuse the foreign secretary of appearing to “diminish the very definition of genocide”, after Lammy suggested last month in parliament that Israel’s actions in Gaza do not constitute genocide because fewer than millions of people have been killed.
Lammy said that terms like genocide “were largely used when millions of people lost their lives in crises like Rwanda, the Second World War, the Holocaust, and the way that they are used now undermines the seriousness of that term.”
