South Africa’s foreign minister, Naledi Pandor, is flying to The Hague to be present on Friday when the international court of justice (ICJ) delivers its highly anticipated verdict on South Africa’s request for an interim ruling in its genocide case against Israel.
The ruling, if granted, would probably take the form of an order to Israel to announce a ceasefire in Gaza and allow more UN humanitarian aid into the country.
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A judgment on the merits of the South African claim that Israel is committing genocide under the 1948 Geneva convention is many years off, but the ICJ, the UN’s highest court, has powers to issue the equivalent of an interim injunction.
Israel is not a signatory to the Rome Statute, which established the International Criminal Court (ICC). So it is not clear how judicially valid the decision can be.
While Israel is UN member, and technically by extension is a member of ICJ too, but so is US. And we know that US does not recognize ICJ decision against US as valid.
Israel did ratify the Genocide convention though; as a result
The fact that ICJ adopted the convention at later time does not necessarily mean that Israel gave ICJ right to judge it. Israel signed the convention, not the ICJ.
Whether they have jurisdiction is part of the case. South Africa argued that they have standing and the ICJ likely has jurisdiction because both countries are parties to the Genocide Convention. The ICJ can’t really enforce a ruling anyway. Israel’s taking it so seriously because it’ll have an enormous political impact.
This episode of the New York Times’ The Daily goes over the various nuances of the international law, the obligations and responsibilities of various nations / states / actors, etc. And it doesn’t matter if Israel agrees with it or not, they are absolutely subject to the obligation to protect civilians.