How genocide perpetrators exploit legal framework

The present crisis in the Middle East highlights the urgency of reform

- SHAWN SIMPSON

THE world watched in horror as Gaza was reduced to rubble. Thousands of civilians have been killed, millions displaced. In the past two years, discussions of genocide have returned to the center of global politics.

Yet in Washington, most politicians have refused to use the infamous G-word, instead speaking only in euphemisms. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and, more recently, Bernie Sanders are two notable exceptions.

The rest of the world has been less squeamish. In 2023, South Africa filed a case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) accusing Israel of genocide. Belize and Bolivia have requested to join. Mexico, Cuba, Egypt, Spain, Ireland, and several others have publicly backed the case.

In August 2024, the International Association of Genocide Scholars accused Israel of committing genocide. A month later, an independent UN commission of inquiry concluded the same.

Despite these developments, international response has been slow if not nearly nonexistent. One major reason is that the legal definition of genocide - as set out in the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide - sets an exceptionally high bar for proving what's known as specific genocidal intent.

Article II defines genocide as certain acts "committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group." Acts alone are not enough; the perpetrator's mental state must be established to the point that genocidal intent is the "only reasonable inference."