Blazingcatfur

An Israeli judge who survived the Holocaust has been sent to represent his country in a UN court against claims it is committing genocide against Palestinians in the war in Gaza.

Aharon Barak, 87, who was smuggled out of a ghetto in a potato sack in 1944 and went on to lead Israel’s supreme court, is heading a delegation that will arrive to begin court proceedings on Thursday morning.

The UN’s International Court of Justice (ICJ), is being asked to rule on whether to open a full case on South Africa’s claim that the country intends to commit genocide in Gaza.

The cops delivering the coffee was the image that went ‘round the world. But long before members of the Toronto Police Department handed over the Tim Hortons goodies to pro-Palestinian protesters who have been targeting a highway overpass adjacent to a neighbourhood with a significant Jewish population, many Canadian Jews have felt unsettled, even unsafe.

To be clear, the officers did not purchase the coffee, but dropped it off on behalf of protest supporters who were not allowed on the overpass. Still, it felt like a scalding metaphor.

A week after the horrors of October 7, when the Biden administration first convinced Israel to open up the siege of Gaza and allow in international aid, it promised Hamas would not get it.

“If Hamas in any way blocks humanitarian assistance from reaching civilians, including by seizing the aid itself, we’ll be the first to condemn it. And we will work to prevent it from happening again,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken pledged.

The problem with such a promise was obvious once Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer struggled to explain to CNN how it would stop Hamas from taking the aid.