The South Africa ICJ Genocide Case Against Israel: Implications for Palestinian Health

Date and Time

February 7, 2024

11:00 am - 12:30 pm

Location

Webinar Recording

Date and Time: Wednesday, February 7 at 11:00am -12:30pm EST | 6:00pm – 7:30pm EEST

Location: Zoom – registration required

On January 11, 2024, the South African legal team argued at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) that Israel, in action and intent, breached the 1948 Genocide Convention by perpetrating the following acts of genocide in Gaza: mass killings of Palestinians; bodily and mental harm; forced displacement and food blockade; destruction of the healthcare system; and preventing Palestinian births.

Join the Palestine Program for Health and Human Rights for a webinar with legal and public health experts to discuss South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice. The event will focus on the connection between Israel’s long-standing attacks on the right to health in Palestine and the crime of genocide.

This webinar is co-sponsored by the Religion, Conflict, and Peace Initiative at Harvard Divinity School, the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, and the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University.

FXB Center Director Mary T. Bassett, MD, MPH will deliver introductory remarks.

Watch the recording of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) delivering its Order in the case South Africa v. Israel on January 26, 2024 here.

Read the Order document here.

Moderator:

A. Kayum Ahmed, PhD, MSt, MA, LLM, LLB

A. Kayum Ahmed is a South African human rights activist-scholar who teaches as an Assistant Professor at Columbia University’s school of public health. Previously, Kayum worked on ensuring equitable global access to Covid-19 vaccines as Division Director at the Open Society Foundations (OSF) Public Health Program, and served as Chief Executive Officer of the South African Human Rights Commission from 2010 to 2015.

Speakers:

Timothy Fish-Hodgson, LLM, MSc

Timothy Fish-Hodgson is responsible for designing and implementing ICJ’s work around Economic, Social and Cultural rights in Africa and assists with ICJ’s global work on ESC rights and has worked in a range of countries including South Africa, Swaziland, India, Myanmar and Uzbekistan. Before joining the ICJ, he worked as a Senior Researcher at the Socio-Economic Rights Institute (2016-17); as a Legal Researcher at SECTION27 (2013-16); and as a law clerk for Justice Zakeria Yacoob at the Constitutional Court of South Africa (2011-12). He holds a Master of Laws from the University of Michigan (2013) and a Master of Studies in International Human Rights Law from the University of Oxford (2017, with Distinction).

Katherine Iliopoulos, LLM

Katherine Iliopoulos is an international lawyer with over 10 years of professional experience in the field of human rights and international law. Currently, she is serving as the Legal Adviser for Libya and Palestine at the International Commission of Jurists. She previously worked as a Legal Officer for the United Nations, including at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), and the African Union-United Nations Hybrid Operation in Darfur (UNAMID). Most recently, she served as the Legal Advisor to the UN Fact-Finding Mission on Libya. Before joining the UN, she worked for a brief period at the Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights in Gaza. Katherine holds a Master of Laws, Public International Law, from Leiden University, Netherlands.

Tlaleng Mofokeng, MBChB

Dr. Tlaleng Mofokeng is the UN Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health. She holds a medical degree (MBChB) and a postgraduate certificate in health economics and policy from the London School of Economics. She is Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown University, Distinguished Lecturer at O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law, and Co-chair O’Neil-Lancet Commission on Racism, Structural Discrimination and Global Health. Her areas of focus in the right to health and underlying determinants have been on strategic litigation, legislative and policy frameworks, health systems and clinical care management, human rights standards setting, contribution to governmental and judicial processes, continued medical education and training, and advocacy.

Rania Muhareb

Rania Muhareb is an Irish Research Council and Hardiman PhD Scholar at the Irish Centre for Human Rights at the National University of Ireland, Galway. Her PhD research examines the relevance of the apartheid framework to the Palestinian struggle for decolonization. Between 2017 and 2020, she worked as a legal researcher and advocacy officer with the Palestinian human right organization Al-Haq. Rania holds an LLM in international human rights and humanitarian law from the European University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder) and an undergraduate degree from Sciences Po Paris.