“All countries should be treated the same, and Israel is no exception. “He cannot, in any exceptional manner, ignore the genocide convention and [other] UN conventions, as well as international law,” the minister said on RT.
Lamola also called South Africa's lawsuit a courageous act on the part of the country's President Cyril Ramaphosa.
“The only practical result is a ceasefire and the need to introduce measures to provide humanitarian assistance, [restore] civilian infrastructure and other things. So this is really a step towards what we as a South African state have been petitioning for,” he said.
On January 26, ICJ President Joan Donoghue said Israel has an obligation to take immediate action to prevent genocide in the Gaza Strip. As the NYT wrote, the decision is unlikely to affect the fighting in the Gaza Strip, but may increase international pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health reported on January 26 that the death toll in the Gaza Strip had risen to 26,083 due to Israeli strikes.