Egypt to Join South Africa's Genocide Case Against Israel

Since the October 7 Al-Aqsa Flood operation by Hamas, Israel has killed more than 35,000 Palestinians in Gaza, mostly women and children according to Palestinian authorities. According to official Israeli numbers, roughly 1,100 Israelis were killed in the surprise Hamas attack.

Egypt says it will seek permission to join South Africa’s case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which accuses Israel of violating its obligations under the Genocide Convention, the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Sunday.

The announcement by Egypt marks the third country to ask to join the South African case, which was brought in January. Earlier this year, Colombia and Turkiye also asked the court to join the case.

In the announcement, Egypt blamed escalating aggression by Israel against Palestinian civilians.

“The submission… comes in light of the worsening severity and scope of Israeli attacks against Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip, and the continued perpetration of systematic practices against the Palestinian people, including direct targeting of civilians and the destruction of infrastructure in the Strip, and pushing Palestinians to flee,” the statement reads.

Last week, Israel seized the Palestinian side of the Rafah border crossing, which sits between Gaza and Egypt and was the only entry port into Gaza that was not controlled by Israel and was the primary entry point for aid flowing into Gaza. According to Palestinian authorities, Israel has held up aid at that point since. Egypt’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs called the action a “perilous escalation [and] a threat to the lives of more than one million Palestinians who majorly depend on that crossing.”

However, the ministry also said that the decision to join South Africa’s case was already being studied before Israel started preparing to invade Rafah against the warnings of several countries including Egypt and Jordan, two key strategic partners of Israel in the region.

Egypt was the first country to normalize relations with Israel in 1979, with Jordan following in 1994. Turkiye, while not considered an Arab state, has a majority Muslim population and has normalized relations with Israel since 1950. That two of those nations, Turkiye and Egypt, have now formally accused Israel of genocide is a major blow to Israel's diplomatic goals.

Speaking, to local media, Egyptian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ahmed Abu Zeid said that Israel’s actions in Gaza “led to an unprecedented humanitarian crisis, creating unlivable conditions in the Gaza Strip, blatantly violating international law, international humanitarian law, and the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War.”

South Africa brought its case against Israel in January, accusing Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. In a preliminary hearing, the ICJ ruled that there was enough evidence of a plausible risk of genocide to order Israel to take actions to prevent genocide, though it did not order an immediate ceasefire.