Our Region After the World Court's Decision

Whether the military operations Israel is conducting in Gaza will evolve into a regional conflict remains a subject of curiosity. In this turmoil—by the way, this expression means “in the meantime” rather than “in chaos”—the application for provisional measures filed by South Africa with the International Court of Justice, doing what hundreds of states did not do, has also been decided. The only shortcoming of the decision from the perspective of the Palestinian front is that it does not explicitly call for a ceasefire. Otherwise, when looking at the articles of the decision text, it will be seen that it necessarily sets forth provisional measures containing plenty of “immediately” clauses for Israel to stop the war crimes it is alleged to have committed in Gaza.

For an international court, which is also referred to as the “World Court”—we could also call it the “Global Court”—to tell a state, “Do not commit genocide,” or “Prevent your army from carrying out acts that constitute the crime of ‘genocide’,” is a stain that is not easily removed for any state. Therefore, it has been registered with this decision that Israel, and the US which has supported it until now—especially the latter, which leads the so-called “rules-based” international order—are facing a serious collapse on both legal and moral levels. Everyone should rejoice at this decision.

The international level is perhaps where the law functions the least. Despite this, we have once again seen how important positions courts and the law are, and that their independence must be protected. Legitimacy continues to be one of the most important elements of hegemony despite everything. The organic intellectuals of US imperialism do not directly care about legitimacy, but they love to claim that they uphold certain “values.” In this respect, this decision is actually a victory for the entire Global South in the person of South Africa. The current administration in Israel has no intention of implementing these provisional measures, which the court found necessary and which have international binding force. Therefore, as long as Israel continues this operation, it will now be committing crimes not only against humanity but directly against international law. From the destruction of Hamas to the longer-term goals intended by this operation, it is doubtful which one is worth Israel turning into an object of international hatred to this extent.

This picture is increasingly leading to the characterization of the “Axis of Resistance”—as they call it—led by Iran, finding resonance in world public opinion for the “Great Satan” label they use for the US. If the US and Israel cannot find a way back from here or cannot be part of a peace formula in any way, they will increasingly face harsher responses from both the region and the world. Commentaries in the Western press this week emphasize that three US soldiers lost their lives as a result of drone attacks on a base near Jordan's border with Syria and Iraq, where there had been no military casualties until the past week. This situation creates a serious dilemma for the Joe Biden administration in the US, which has entered the election cycle. If they retaliate, they will be drawn into a bloodier conflict, and some point out that Israeli elements might be behind the scenes, primarily provoking Iran and Iran-backed organizations with attacks targeting key figures.

For Israel, any conflict is welcome. The spread of the conflict to the entire region would prevent Iran, other groups, and indeed the entire world public opinion from focusing on what Israel is doing in Gaza; moreover, this time it would make the US the main scapegoat. For this reason, the US was careful to ensure that the conflict did not spread to the entire region and remained limited to Gaza. However, on the other hand, not responding at all would cast a shadow over the imperial prestige of the US. As a result, as has happened many times before, it seems that a vicious cycle of attack, revenge, and revenge for revenge, where the parties target each other with limited attacks but are careful not to invite total war, will continue in every case where Iran is not included in a new agreement process.

Most recently, after it was understood that some employees of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), which is under the UN, took part in Hamas's October 7 attacks, some leading Western countries suspended the funds they provided to this agency. For right-wing populism, which is prone to racism and has become a strong wave in Europe, this situation emerged as a good opportunity to target the entire migration, immigrant, and asylum mechanism along with immigrants, whom they already do not view favorably. Israel also resembles a bull in a china shop with its attitude in recent weeks toward its neighbors like Egypt and Jordan, with whom it had barely established diplomatic relations in the past and had not experienced serious problems with until now. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu most recently made negative remarks about Qatar during a visit to a hostage family. It is seen that Israel, which also endangers the Abraham Accords process, whose main future link is expected to be Saudi Arabia, is also putting the US in a difficult position. Indeed, as soon as Netanyahu's words became news, the US felt the need to make a statement acknowledging Qatar's importance for regional peace.

Israel has not reflected the flexibility it showed regarding the prisoner exchange in the first month of the Gaza operation to other areas, even though the process has long exceeded one hundred days. The absence of a possibility of meaningful change in the US and Israel, along with the right-wing rise parallel to the amorphous left in Europe, makes the situation worse. Polarization and irrationality are spreading in every field. The European left continues to pay the price for the lack of secular alternatives in the Middle East. This international political climate is more conducive to quickly expanding any conflict rather than limiting it. Unfortunately.