The Israeli “genocide” against the Palestinian people is being committed with the help of the United States, which bars the Palestinians from international protection, Cuban deputy foreign minister Anayansi Rodriguez Camejo said on Wednesday.

On Monday, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) began public hearings on the legal consequences of Israel’s policies in Gaza and East Jerusalem. 

Fifty-two states and three international organisations are expected to attend the hearings, which are held at the Peace Palace in The Hague.

The hearings will last until February 26.

“The genocide against the Palestinian people is not limited to the current stage of the extermination war by Israel. 

“All these, with the complicity of the United States of America, which prevents the international community from acting to protect the Palestinian people.

“The justification for fighting terrorism and exercising the right to self-defence is deceitful when they are risen by the aggressors themselves,” Mr Camejo said at a hearing broadcast by the UN.

Cuba suggested considering the Israeli actions as an act of “low-intensity genocide,” which is carried out with “systematic and effective cruelty,” Mr Camejo said.

“To qualify Israel’s actions merely as acts of apartheid would leave out the implicit intention to exterminate the Palestinian people, either in part or as an ethnic and religious group, to whom the right to self-determination is denied,” the Cuban diplomat added.

On Monday, the Palestinian delegation addressed the ICJ, asking to recognise the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories as illegal, as it might be the last chance for the establishment of the two separate states of Israel and Palestine.

On October 7, 2023, Palestinian movement Hamas launched a large-scale rocket attack against Israel from the Gaza Strip and breached the border, killing 1,200 people and abducting around 240 others.

Israel launched retaliatory strikes, ordered a complete blockade of Gaza, and started a ground incursion into the Palestinian enclave with the declared goal of eliminating Hamas fighters and rescuing the hostages.

At least 29,000 people have been killed so far in the Gaza Strip, local authorities said.

On November 24, Qatar mediated a deal between Israel and Hamas on a temporary truce and the exchange of some of the prisoners and hostages, as well as the delivery of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip.

The ceasefire was extended several times and expired on December 1.

More than 100 hostages are still believed to be held by Hamas in Gaza. 

(Sputnik/NAN)