Jeremy Corbyn asked this question of Angela Rayner, in her role as Deputy Prime Minister, yesterday:
Yesterday 86 people were killed in Gaza by Israeli forces. A further 56 were shot dead while queuing for food to try to sustain themselves under the occupation of the Israeli forces. Israel stands condemned for acts of genocide, for war crimes, for its occupation of Gaza and for its activities in the west bank. Let me ask the Deputy Prime Minister two questions. Why does Britain still supply parts for the F-35 jets that have been used to take so much life in Gaza, and how has this country got to a situation in which we stand on the wrong side of international law where war crimes and genocide are concerned? Will the Deputy Prime Minister support my private Member's Bill, calling for an independent inquiry into how our policies evolved into this parlous situation?
She replied:
Israel's recent action is appalling and counterproductive, and we strongly oppose the expansion of military operations, settler violence and the blocking of humanitarian aid. We have suspended free trade agreement talks and sanctioned extremists supporting settler expansion in the west bank. It is a long-standing principle that genocide is determined by competent international courts and not by Governments, and we do not sell arms directly to the Israel Defence Forces when that might breach international humanitarian law.
The italics were added by me.
Think about what Rayner said for a moment. According to her, genocide cannot have taken place until an international criminal court says it has. But that makes no sense at all. Someone has to think it has, and bring a case suggesting that is the case, before any court can decide whether that is true or not. So, it is quite impossible to claim, as Rayner and the UK government are, that genocide has not taken place because a court has not decided it has, because one of the competent authorities capable of asking an international court to decide on this issue might be the UK government. In other words, it can decide if it thinks genocide has taken place before an international court confirms that it is the case. Indeed, it might be obliged to do so. In other words, she talked total nonsense. Of course it is possible to suggest genocide has taken place before an international court decides that is the case, and even if it never does so.
What Rayner said was nonsense promoted to defend Israel's actions, with which the government of which she is a part is complicit. Anyone who can talk total nonsense about genocide in this way is not fit to be prime minister.
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Organisations accusing Israel of genocide:
❌Amnesty International
❌Palestinian Center for Human Rights and Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights
❌Center for Constitutional Rights (US)
❌International Court of Justice
❌Belgium, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Egypt, Ireland, Spain, Libya, Maldives, Mexico, Nicaragua and Turkiye
Source: “Who accuses Israel of committing genocide in Gaza?” (Dec 2024)
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/12/6/who-accuses-israel-of-committing-genocide-in-gaza
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She really has sold her soul, hasn’t she?
To be fair, she was covering PMQ’s. The first part of her statement sounds like her and the second part is government orthodoxy. The time to state she thinks it is genocide really cannot be at PMQ’s; she would need to do it as her own statement.
The word ‘competent’ is crucial. It literally means the dismissal of ICJ/ICC and ‘court’ is used to dismiss UN. Labour introduced ‘not competent business’ as an instruction to rule out discussions and motions it had effectively banned. This was an immediate instruction from the then Gen Sec David Evans on the accession of Starmer, and aimed at no discussion of the treatment of Corbyn. So what Rayner was saying in LINO Speak was ” we don’t recognise any institution that’s called it genocide”. Corrupted, totally.
Two ridiculous things logically follow from Rayner’s prepared scripted and very stupid answer, and should make it clear to anyone with more than one functioning brain cell that we are in very deep S**t as a country right now.
If she is correct (and she isn’t)…
1. No government can bring a genocide case to an international court to seek a judgement unless that court has already issued a judgement that genocide has occurred. ?????
2. No UK Government will ever bring a genocide case to any international court no matter what happens in the Occupied Territories or even if someone somewhere else starts gassing minorities by the million and cremating their bodies in concentration camps. No sanctions, no action, because -no court judgement. ?????
So the next thing is to ask, how many genocide or other IHL judgements have their been since we invented international courts?
How many were brought by governments?
Has she heard about the South African case, relating to Israel, or does she not recognise the post-apartheid State of South Africa as legitimate?
Is she not aware that in fact such cases are MEANT to be brought domestically, and that the international courts are only there to pick up the tab when states FAIL to prosecute?
https://blog.lselawreview.com/2022/03/14/the-incorporation-of-the-genocide-convention-in-france-and-the-uk-a-grudging-fight-against-impunity/
Of course the foulsmelling truth is that the UK, even AFTER a court has ruled, has a deep seated allergy to IHL prosecutions.
https://rwandajustice4genocide.org.uk/uk-and-genocide/
Of course it does. Someone might start prosecuting OUR war criminals, most of whom have knighthoods or peerages.
That’s before we even start to discuss Russia…
Rayner is spouting nonsense, legally AND morally.
It’s disgusting.
Trust Corbyn to quietly and hopelessly to hit the nail on the head, again.
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The Americans have a great word for stuff like this: ‘lame’.
If something has been defined and explained by an authority that has had to deal with it, it has been done so for a reason – apparently to enable it not to happen again.
So, our politicians are unwitting, uncaring accomplices in state murder. They are not worth listening to. So we’d better find some better people. Here’s a bloke with the right message and on the right side of humanity (although he is no longer with us bless him).
https://youtu.be/8CM2YMaZSWk
And here’s another one of his ditties which made me think of you and your work Richard (I hope that the links work).
https://youtu.be/Sxa9wNl2OjE
Good stuff
What the government should be saying is ‘given the heavy and increasing weight of evidence for genocide available we will not risk the high probability of being complicit and suspend all sales and military involvement forthwith until such time as the courts provide a ruling’. Now most right minded people could probably get behind a statement like this so it immediately begs the question; why will our government not?
We all here can have a fair stab at the answer – the military industrial industry needs to be fed and its priorities trumps little children having their faces blown off.
Agreed
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/attorney-general-presents-uk-intervention-in-ukraine-case-against-russia-at-international-court-of-justice
A little bit of recent (Tory) UK legal IHL history for Angela Rayner to peruse.
More homework for Rayner and her boss(es)…
https://hansard.parliament.uk/lords/2018-09-13/debates/CB30CF91-D412-4C1C-84A0-88A2E9D951CA/GenocideAndCrimesAgainstHumanity
from former LibDem MP, Lord (David) Alton
Thanks
Jeremy Corbyn; the only decent human being in the government. No wonder he is so isolated! It is quite pathetic to see the rest of our politicians ( from all western governments)helplessly trying to do nothing to offend Donald Trump while excusing the humanitarian disaster in Gaza. Apparently France and MBS and others are meeting while France decides if it has the guts to pronounce a 2 state solution. Immediately condemned by Israel as a “reward for Oct 7th” Will they do it? Will they defy Trump? What is the point of all our governments upping what they spend on weapons by huge amounts if they don’t have the morality to use them o the right occasions?
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(24)01169-3/fulltext
Puts the number of dead in Gaza at 186000, ie over 100 Palestinian dead for every Israeli who lost their life in the Hamas attack
And thats from The Lancet