One Year Anniversary of Int’l Criminal Court Opinion on The Wall in Palestine

ICJ Ruling/BDS Call from Palestinian Civil Society Anniversary

Three years ago today, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) issued an Advisory Opinion on the “Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory”. In an unprecedented move by an international judicial body to hold Israel accountable for its violations of human rights and international law, the ICJ ruled that:

* The Wall Israel is building in the Palestinian West Bank and East Jerusalem is illegal under international law.

* Israel must cease construction of the Wall, dismantle it, and pay compensation to Palestinians damaged by it.

* All signatories to the 4th Geneva Convention have an obligation not to recognize the illegal situation created by the Wall and not to aid Israel in the maintenance of it.

* All signatories to the 4th Geneva Convention, including the United States, have an obligation to insure Israel’s compliance with international humanitarian law in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

For a legal analysis of the ICJ’s Advisory Opinion by the Palestine Center, a member group of the US Campaign, click here.

On the one year anniversary of Israel non-compliance with the ICJ Advisory Opinion, more than 170 Palestinian civil society organizations issued a statement entitled “Palestinian Civil Society Calls for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel Until It Complies with International Law and Universal Principles of Human Rights”.

The US Campaign endorsed this call from Palestinian civil society for campaigns of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) and has since produced educational resources and toolkits designed to assist U.S.-based organizations in conducting these campaigns (see below).

U.S. civil society has a special responsibility to promote BDS campaigns because our government not only fails to insure Israel’s compliance with international law, but also provides military, diplomatic, and economic support to Israel to maintain the Wall in direct violation of the ICJ’s ruling. In fact, in 2005 the United States gave Israel $50 million of economic aid that was supposed to be for the Palestinians to build high-tech terminals into the Wall in the West Bank under the guise of “eas[ing] the movement of Palestinian people and goods in and out of Israel.” For additional details, see a previous US Campaign action alert by clicking here.

Therefore, on the anniversary of the ICJ’s ruling and the Palestinian civil society call for campaigns of boycott, divestment, and sanctions, the US Campaigns urges all of its individual supporters and member organizations to initiate or continue campaigns of BDS against Israel and corporations that profit from its human rights violations.

For more information go to http://www.endtheoccupation.org/