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International Court of Justice hearing of the South Africa's genocide case against Israel - day 2
Tal Becker
Madame President, members of the Court - On Saturday, October 7th, a Jewish religious holiday, thousands of Hamas and other militants breached Israeli sovereign military by sea, land, and air, invading over 20 Israeli communities, bases, and the site of a music festival. What proceeded, under the cover of thousands of rockets fired indiscriminately into Israel, was the wholesale massacre, mutilation, rape, and abduction of as many citizens as the terrorists could find, before Israel’s forces repelled them. Openly displaying elation, they tortured children in front of parents, and parents in front of children, burned people, including infants, alive, and systematically raped and mutilated scores of women, men, and children.
Baby repeatedly stabbed and thrown in the trash
Slitting the stomach of a pregnant woman
All told, some 1200 people were butchered that day, more than 5,500 maimed, and some 240 hostages abducted, including infants, entire families, persons with disabilities, and Holocaust survivors, some of whom have since been executed, many of whom have been tortured, sexually abused, and starved in captivity. Representatives of the hostage’s families are in this courtroom today, and we acknowledge their presence and their boundless suffering.
We know of the brutality of October 7th, not only from the harrowing testimonies of the survivors, the unmistakable proof of carnage and sadism left behind, and the forensic evidence taken at the scene, we know it because the assailants proudly filmed and broadcast their barbarism. The events of that day are all but ignored in the applicants submissions, but we are compelled to share with the court some fraction of its horror, the largest calculated mass murder of Jews in a single day since the Holocaust. We do so, not because these acts, however sadistic and systematic, release Israel of its obligations to uphold the law as it defends its citizens and territory. That is unquestionable. We do so, because it is impossible to understand the armed conflict in Gaza without appreciating the nature of the threat that Israel is facing, and the brutality and lawlessness of the armed force confronting it. In the volume of materials submitted to members of the court, access has been provided to a portion of the raw footage, for separate screening. But I am obliged to put before the court today, some small fragment of the scenes of unfathomable cruelty that took place in hundreds of locations on that horrible day.
Yoni Sementov, a wheat farmer, and his wife Tamara, an activist for women’s rights, lived in Kibbutz Nir Oz. When the rocket fire started, they hid in the safe room with their four year old son Omer, and their six year old twins Arbel and Shaha. During their rampage, Hamas militants set fire to their house. Yoni texted his sister Renee - “they’re here, they’re burning us, we’re suffocating”. The whole family was burned alive, to ashes, making DNA identification especially difficult.
A survivor of the Nova music festival massacre, testified to police to witnessing a Hamas militant brutally raping a young woman, as another militant cut off her breast and toyed with it. A second militant then raped her again, shooting her in the head while still inside her.
In one video recorded by a home surveillance system, a Hamas militant throws a grenade into a saferoom, where a father and his two sons have rushed to hide. The father is killed, the two sons are injured and bleeding. As the militant pulls them into the living room, one child can be heard screaming to his brother, “Why am I alive? I can’t see anything, they’re going to kill us.” The militant casually opens the fridge, takes out a bottle, and drinks. And then there is this recording, from Kibbutz [unintelligible].
Alleged Hamas Fighter: “Dad I’m talking to you from a Jewish woman’s phone, I killed her and her husband, I killed ten people with my own hands! Dad, ten with my own hands! Dad open WhatsAspp and see how I killed Dad. Open the phone, Dad, I’m calling you on WhatsApp, open the phone, go. Ten, ten with my own hands. Their blood is on their hands, put Mom on.”
As stated, none of these atrocities absolve Israel of its responsibilities under the law.