The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has begun hearings today on Nicaragua’s case against Germany, accusing Berlin of facilitating “genocide” in Gaza by providing political and military support to Israel.
In his opening remarks, Nicaraguan Ambassador Carlos Jose Arguello Gomez said his country requests the court to order Germany to stop providing support for Israel in its war in Gaza.
“The case before us involves momentous events affecting the life and wellbeing of hundreds of thousands of people, and even the destruction of an entire people,” he said.
“Serious breaches of international humanitarian law, and other peremptory norms of international law, including genocide, are taking place in Palestine,” he stressed.
The ambassador underlined that by providing political and military support to Israel, Germany is violating the 1948 Genocide Convention and international humanitarian law.
“Nicaragua is requesting the court to order that Germany to cease providing support to Israel in its campaign of destruction of the Palestinian people,” he said.
“Germany cannot but be aware that the munitions, the military equipment, and the war weapons it is supplying” to Israel are supporting its attacks in Gaza, says Gomez, even if such equipment is not immediately being used for that purpose.
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“It does not matter if an artillery shell is delivered straight from Germany to an Israeli tank shelling a hospital or university, or whether that artillery shell goes to replenish Israel’s stockpile for use at some later date,” he added.
“It doesn’t matter whether the planes used in combat to drop one-tonne bombs [on Gaza’s population] were made entirely in Germany, or just their spare parts and maintenance were supplied,” Gomez continued.
“The fact is that the assurance of supplies and replacement of armaments is crucial to Israel’s pursuit of the attacks in Gaza.”
The German government remains one of the strongest supporters of Israel’s military offensive in Gaza, despite growing public pressure.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz has repeatedly said Germany bears special responsibility for Israel because of its Nazi history.
Berlin approved €326.5 million ($354 million) worth of weapons exports to Israel in 2023, the majority of which were approved after October 7, 2023, a tenfold increase compared to 2022.
Berlin is one of Israel’s key allies and the second biggest arms provider to Israel, after the United States, accounting for 30 percent of Israel’s arms imports, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
Germany was also the second biggest donor to UNRWA before it cut funding in January following Israeli allegations that members of the UN agency were connected to the October 7 Hamas attacks.
Israel has yet to provide evidence for those allegations.
German government spokesman Wolfgang Buechner says Berlin will present its position in court but added that it believes the case is unjustified.
Israel has waged a military offensive on Gaza since an October 7 cross-border attack led by Hamas in which nearly 1,200 Israelis were killed.
Nearly 33,200 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have since been killed in Gaza, and almost 75,000 injured besides mass destruction, displacement and shortages of necessities.
Israel has also imposed a crippling blockade on the Gaza Strip, leaving its population, particularly residents of northern Gaza, on the verge of starvation.
