Safeguards in International Law - Yeah, We Were Just Kidding About That
Under the Barak government, Clinton pushed Israel to within an inch of signing away its soverignty to the International Criminal Court before both countries backed out. Ostensibly, the reason that Israel could feel safe in the ICC was because, as long as their own courts were functioning, the ICC had no jurisdiction over anything that happened in Israeli territory - this was the critical safeguard that was supposed to ensure that Israel did not suffer from politicized prosecutions. Israel was told that the Court would want to protect its own legitimacy, and so would avoid politically contentious issues. And besides, promised the European advocates of international law, even if Israel does get railroaded - the US can always veto any binding decision.
Opponents of the Court insisted that even attempts at politicized prosecutions would create their own international momentum, providing a forum for anti-Israel mobilization. The drama that played out at the Hague regarding the Seperation Fence is evidence that those opponents actually underestimated the mendacity of the international legal regime. The Hague willfully disregarded it's lack of jurisdiction and issued an ostensibly "nonbinding" opinion against Israel. So the first safeguard - the promise that even politicized judges would obey the norms of international law and issue opinions only within their jurisdiction - proved to be an empty promise when it came to Israel.
The second safeguard, that Israel would be protected from binding decisions, has proven in the face of the Hague fiasco to be a similar mirage, as Israel has been denied funding on the basis of that supposedly non-binding decision:
Most of the donor countries are also committed to the ruling of the International Court of Justice in The Hague concerning the separation fence. That source said that most of the donor countries are carefully examining the projects they finance to make sure the projects do not inadvertently sustain the fence or the settlements, as the international court ruled.
Safeguards are important in juridical situations, where all of the players are committed to playing by the rules. The problem is that the worst-kept open secret in international diplomacy is that international institutions have become hollow, nothing more than staging areas for anti-Israel bashing (consider that the United Nations actually condemned Israel for the fence violating international law before the Court ruled - the phrase you're looking for is "foregone conclusion). Palestinians and Arab countries routinely violate international law, with nary a peep from the United Nations, let alone the Hague. People continue to play the game as if these institutions have some sort of genuine credibility - but the entire edifice relies on everyone squinting and pretending that jokes like the Hague do indeed decide cases fairly. All of the arguments presented for why the ICC would be fair to Israel would have applied to a genuine court interested in its credibility as a court - but that is not what international institutions are interested in when it comes to Israel. As long as Israel continues pretending that these institutions are genuine, it will continue to be railroaded. Outright rejecting the Hague's jurisdiction in the Seperation Fence case was a good start, but it needs to be expanded across the board to all the international circuses that pretend to be vested with the mantle of fair and equitable law.
Opponents of the Court insisted that even attempts at politicized prosecutions would create their own international momentum, providing a forum for anti-Israel mobilization. The drama that played out at the Hague regarding the Seperation Fence is evidence that those opponents actually underestimated the mendacity of the international legal regime. The Hague willfully disregarded it's lack of jurisdiction and issued an ostensibly "nonbinding" opinion against Israel. So the first safeguard - the promise that even politicized judges would obey the norms of international law and issue opinions only within their jurisdiction - proved to be an empty promise when it came to Israel.
The second safeguard, that Israel would be protected from binding decisions, has proven in the face of the Hague fiasco to be a similar mirage, as Israel has been denied funding on the basis of that supposedly non-binding decision:
Most of the donor countries are also committed to the ruling of the International Court of Justice in The Hague concerning the separation fence. That source said that most of the donor countries are carefully examining the projects they finance to make sure the projects do not inadvertently sustain the fence or the settlements, as the international court ruled.
Safeguards are important in juridical situations, where all of the players are committed to playing by the rules. The problem is that the worst-kept open secret in international diplomacy is that international institutions have become hollow, nothing more than staging areas for anti-Israel bashing (consider that the United Nations actually condemned Israel for the fence violating international law before the Court ruled - the phrase you're looking for is "foregone conclusion). Palestinians and Arab countries routinely violate international law, with nary a peep from the United Nations, let alone the Hague. People continue to play the game as if these institutions have some sort of genuine credibility - but the entire edifice relies on everyone squinting and pretending that jokes like the Hague do indeed decide cases fairly. All of the arguments presented for why the ICC would be fair to Israel would have applied to a genuine court interested in its credibility as a court - but that is not what international institutions are interested in when it comes to Israel. As long as Israel continues pretending that these institutions are genuine, it will continue to be railroaded. Outright rejecting the Hague's jurisdiction in the Seperation Fence case was a good start, but it needs to be expanded across the board to all the international circuses that pretend to be vested with the mantle of fair and equitable law.
