RSS
Ireland Officially Joins South Africa’s Genocide Case Against Israel
Anti-Israel demonstrators stand outside the Israeli embassy after Ireland has announced it will recognize a Palestinian state, in Dublin, Ireland, May 22, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Molly Darlington
Ireland has officially joined South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the latest move by Dublin against the Jewish state amid a downward spiral in relations between the two countries.
In a brief statement released on Tuesday, the top UN court said that Ireland the prior day joined Nicaragua, Colombia, Mexico, Libya, Bolivia, Turkey, the Maldives, Chile, Spain, and “Palestine” in asking to intervene in the case.
Since December 2023, South Africa has been pursuing its case at the ICJ accusing Israel of committing “state-led genocide” in its defensive war against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Gaza.
Nearly a year later, in November, the Irish parliament passed a non-binding motion saying that “genocide is being perpetrated before our eyes by Israel in Gaza.” As the measure passed, Irish Foreign Minister Micheal Martin said that the government intended to join South Africa’s case before the end of the year.
Weeks later, Martin said that he had received the government’s approval to intervene in the case against Israel.
“By legally intervening in South Africa’s case, Ireland will be asking the ICJ to broaden its interpretation of what constitutes the commission of genocide by a state,” Ireland’s Foreign Affairs Department said in a statement at the time last month. “We are concerned that a very narrow interpretation of what constitutes genocide leads to a culture of impunity in which the protection of civilians is minimized.”
The statement claimed that there has been “a collective punishment of the Palestinian people through the intent and impact of military actions of Israel,” adding, “Ireland’s view of the [Genocide Convention] is broader and prioritizes the protection of civilian life.”
Ireland’s declaration of intervention puts forward no further allegations against Israel not already alleged by South Africa.
In January, the ICJ ruled there was “plausibility” to South Africa’s claims that Palestinians had a right to be protected from genocide. However, the top UN court did not make a determination on the merits of South Africa’s allegations — which Israel and its allies have described as baseless and may take years to get through the judicial process. Israeli officials have strongly condemned the ICJ proceedings, noting that the Jewish state is targeting terrorists who use civilians as human shields in its military campaign.
Pro-Israel advocates welcomed the ICJ ruling because it did not impose a unilateral ceasefire in Gaza and called for the release of the hostages taken by Hamas last Oct. 7. Rather than declare that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza and order the Jewish state to stop its military campaign in the Palestinian enclave, the court issued a more general directive that Israel must make sure it prevents acts of genocide.
In late October, South Africa filed the bulk of the relevant material to support its allegations.
Ireland’s latest move, proceeded by a wave of fierce criticism from the Irish government directed at Israel, led the Jewish state to shutter its embassy in Dublin. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar announced the move and explained the key reason was Ireland’s decision to join South Africa’s case at the ICJ and its support for redefining genocide in order to secure a conviction against Jerusalem.
Israel accused the Irish government of undermining Israel at international forums and promoting “extreme anti-Israel policies.”
Ireland has “crossed all the red lines,” Sa’ar told reporters at the time, calling the Irish government’s actions “unilateral hostility and persecution” rather than mere criticism.
The announcement came after Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris condemned Israel’s actions in Gaza, accusing the country of “the starvation of children” and “the killing of civilians” — remarks that Sa’ar slammed as “antisemitic” and historically insensitive. Sa’ar also noted how “when Jewish children died of starvation in the Holocaust, Ireland was at best neutral in the war against Nazi Germany.”
Ireland has been among Europe’s fiercest critics of Israel since Hamas’s invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
In May, Ireland officially recognized a Palestinian state, prompting outrage in Israel, which described the move as a “reward for terrorism.” Israel’s Ambassador in Dublin Dana Erlich said at the time of Ireland’s recognition of “Palestine” that Ireland was “not an honest broker” in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
More recently, Harris in October called on the European Union to “review its trade relations” with Israel after the Israeli parliament passed legislation banning the activities in the country of UNRWA, the United Nations agency responsible for Palestinian refugees, because of its ties to Hamas.
Recent anti-Israel actions in Ireland came shortly after the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (Impact-se), an Israeli education watchdog group, released a new report revealing Irish school textbooks have been filled with negative stereotypes and distortions of Israel, Judaism, and Jewish history.
Antisemitism in Ireland has become “blatant and obvious” in the wake of Hamas’s Oct. 7 onslaught, according to Alan Shatter, a former member of parliament who served in the Irish cabinet between 2011 and 2014 as Minister for Justice, Equality and Defense. Shatter told The Algemeiner in an interview earlier this year that Ireland has “evolved into the most hostile state towards Israel in the entire EU.”
Three months ago, an Irish official, Dublin City Councilor Punam Rane, claimed during a council meeting that Jews and Israel control the US economy, arguing that is why Washington, DC does not oppose Israel’s war against Hamas.
Meanwhile, the Catholic religious establishment in Ireland has also come under scrutiny for targeting Israel. In a New Year’s message last week by Archbishop Eamon Martin, the most senior Catholic figure in Ireland lambasted Israel’s military campaign in Gaza as “merciless” and a “disproportionate” response to Hamas’s Oct. 7 attacks.
Martin was not the first prominent Irish cleric to use his platform to castigate Israel in recent days.
In November, Reverend Canon David Oxley came under fire for delivering an antisemitic memorial sermon in which he suggested that Israelis and Jews see themselves as a “master race” that justifies “eliminating” other groups “because they don’t count.”
Oxley delivered the sermon at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin during a Remembrance Sunday service attended by Irish President Michael Higgins and other high-ranking dignitaries.
The post Ireland Officially Joins South Africa’s Genocide Case Against Israel first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
UN Data: Nearly 90 Percent of Gaza Aid ‘Intercepted’ Before Reaching Intended Recipients
Palestinians collect aid supplies from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, June 9, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Hatem Khaled
The vast majority of humanitarian aid entering Gaza is intercepted before reaching its intended civilian recipients, newly released data from the United Nations shows, fueling growing concerns among Israeli officials and international observers about systemic aid diversion by armed groups in the enclave.
According to figures tracking humanitarian assistance for Gaza from May 19 to Aug. 1 of this year, out of the 2,010 UN trucks (carrying 27,434 tons of aid) collected from any of the crossings along Gaza’s perimeter, only 260 trucks (4,111 tons) reached their intended destination. That equates to a staggering 87 percent of all trucks and 85 percent of all tonnage of aid being stolen and not getting into the hands of civilians at the intended destination.
The UN’s own data, posted on the website of the UN Office for Project Services (UNOPS) as part of the “UN2720 Monitoring & Tracking Dashboard,” reveals that almost all the aid — 1,753 trucks (23,353 tons) — has been “intercepted, either peacefully by hungry people or forcefully by armed actors” while being transported inside Gaza over the past few months.
No breakdown is provided of how much aid has been seized by armed groups versus civilians.
The data also shows that much of the UN aid offloaded at any of the crossings along Gaza’s perimeter has not been collected to enter the war-torn enclave during this period. Out of 40,012 tons of aid (2,134 trucks) being delivered to the crossings, just 27,434 tons (2010 trucks) have been picked up. It’s unclear what exactly led to this discrepancy, with issues such as poor internal coordination and security concerns potentially delaying aid shipments.
The UN2720 mechanism, created earlier this year, was intended to boost transparency by verifying and tracking aid shipments via QR codes at key checkpoints. The system monitors each pallet from offloading to delivery and flags any discrepancies in a centralized database.
Israel has facilitated the entry of thousands of aid trucks into Gaza, with Israeli officials condemning the UN and other international aid agencies for their alleged failure to distribute supplies, noting much of the humanitarian assistance has been stalled at border crossings or stolen by the ruling Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.
On Sunday, Israel announced a halt in military operations for 10 hours a day in parts of Gaza and new aid corridors as Arab and European countries began airdropping supplies into the enclave.
However, the UN and several Western governments have increased pressure on Israel to allow more aid into Gaza, blaming the Jewish state for what they described as a hunger crisis and insufficient amounts of aid reaching civilians.
Israeli officials have said that claims of mass starvation in Gaza are false and being amplified by not only Hamas, which has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades, but also international humanitarian organizations and media organizations to manipulate global opinion.
RSS
Dutch Nurse Under Police Investigation for Alleged Threats Against Israeli Patients
Pro-Hamas demonstrators march in the Dutch city of Nijmegen. Photo: Reuters/Romy Arroyo Fernandez
A Muslim nurse in the Netherlands is under police investigation after allegedly threatening to administer lethal injections to Israeli patients — an incident that has sparked public outrage and intensified fears over rising antisemitism and patient safety in Europe’s health-care systems.
The comments were widely circulated by Israeli influencer Max Veifer, who also exposed a recent case in Australia where two nurses were suspended for two years over antisemitic threats and remarks.
In a video shared on social media, Veifer denounced Dutch-Muslim nurse Batisma Chayat Sa’id’s remarks as a serious violation of medical ethics.
“Someone like that should be prosecuted and barred from treating patients. Imagine your grandparents being cared for by someone so hateful,” the Israeli influencer said.
Zorgwekkende dreiging op Instagram: Nederlandse verpleegkundige is bereid om “zionisten een extra spuitje te geven” en bereid “zionisten te laten sterven binnen de gezondheidszorg.” pic.twitter.com/xTnXNi1wH5
— CIDI
(@CIDI_nieuws) July 29, 2025
The incident was sparked when an Israeli-Dutch woman living in the Netherlands commented on a social media post by far-right politician Geert Wilders, who cautioned about what he called the country’s looming radical Islamization by 2050.
A social media account belonging to the Muslim nurse also commented on the post, claiming it would happen by 2027, to which the Israeli woman responded, “Your dream is our nightmare. But people wake up from nightmares. Our Netherlands, our Israel.”
“Nothing belongs to you! My grandparents built the Netherlands. I was born and raised here, and I will do everything in my power to help this country get rid of the Zionist cancer,” the nurse further replied.
“You know what I’m doing with Zionists — giving an extra injection as a nurse specialist. Letting them go to heaven!” Sa’id continued.
When the Israeli woman threatened to report her, Sa’id replied: “Haha, try your best! I don’t have a boss — I’m the boss! All Zionists can die, inside healthcare and beyond, and I’m happy to help with that!”
Shortly after her posts gained widespread attention, Sa’id deleted all her social media accounts, insisting that her identity had been stolen and that she was not responsible for such comments.
On Wednesday, local police detained Sa’id for questioning, but she denied the allegations, asserting that someone had impersonated her online.
“It seems someone is pretending to be me, posting false and defamatory statements,” the nurse said. “I want to make it clear — I hold no hatred toward Jews or any people, race, religion, or identity.”
Even after announcing plans to file an identity theft complaint, she faces skepticism from authorities, who have assigned a digital forensics expert to scrutinize her online accounts.
Last year, an account under her name also posted threatening messages aimed at Jewish people, including “Your time will come — don’t spare anyone,” and another in which she described the burial of Israelis in Gaza as “a dream come true.”
Earlier this year, two Australian nurses — Ahmad Rashad Nadir and Sarah Abu Lebdeh — gained international attention after they were seen in an online video posing as doctors and making inflammatory statements during a night-shift conversation with Veifer.
The widely circulated footage, which sparked international outrage and condemnation, showed Abu Lebdeh declaring she would refuse to treat Israeli patients and instead kill them, while Nadir made a throat-slitting gesture and claimed he had already killed many.
Following the incident, New South Wales authorities in Australia suspended their nursing registrations and banned them from working as nurses nationwide.
They were also charged with federal offenses, including threatening violence against a group and using a carriage service to threaten, menace, and harass. If convicted, they face up to 22 years in prison.
RSS
French Authorities Halt Gaza Evacuations After Palestinian Student Expelled Over Viral Antisemitic Posts
Anti-Israel demonstration supporting the BDS movement, Paris France, June 8, 2024. Photo: Claire Serie / Hans Lucas via Reuters Connect
French authorities have halted evacuations from Gaza after a Palestinian student was expelled from the prestigious Sciences Po Lille and placed under investigation, following the viral circulation of hundreds of antisemitic posts praising Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and calling for the murder of Jews.
The incident drew widespread condemnation and public outrage, prompting French ministers to demand answers and call for an investigation into how the Gazan student was allowed into the country in the first place.
On Friday, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot announced that all further evacuations from Gaza would be suspended pending the completion of the investigation into the student’s background.
After receiving a scholarship, 25-year-old Nour Atalla, a Palestinian from Gaza, arrived in the country in early July to begin her master’s degree in law and communications this fall at the Institute of Political Science in Lille, northern France.
Barrot confirmed that discussions are ongoing about the student’s possible return to Gaza, making clear that she must leave the country pending the investigation’s outcome.
“She has no place at Sciences Po, nor in France,” the top French diplomat said.
On Thursday, local authorities reported that a criminal investigation is underway into Atalla, with the public prosecutor in Lille confirming the case was opened for “apology of terrorism, apology of crimes against humanity using an online public communication service.”
Barrot admitted lapses in the screening process that allowed her entry and has mandated a comprehensive review of everyone evacuated from Gaza to France.
“The security checks, carried out by the French services and Israeli authorities, did not detect the antisemitic content,” the French diplomat said.
Atalla is one of 292 Gazans admitted to the country following a court ruling that opened the door for Gazans to seek refugee status based on their nationality.
She was offered a place at Sciences Po Lille University based on “academic excellence” and following a recommendation by the French consulate in Jerusalem.
On Wednesday, the university announced it had revoked Atalla’s enrollment after hundreds of her past antisemitic and violent social media posts went viral, sparking widespread condemnation from political leaders and members of the local Jewish community.
In several of these posts, she glorified Hitler, praised Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, called for the execution of Israeli hostages and the killing of Jews, and expressed support for terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah.
In one post, Atalla shared a video of Hitler giving a speech about Jews, writing, “Kill their young and their old. Show them no mercy … And kill them everywhere.”
In another post shared on Oct. 7, 2023, the day of the deadliest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, she wrote, “We must do everything we can to match the bloodshed — as much as possible.”