Benny Gantz war crimes in Gaza case goes to Dutch appeals court
September 17, 2021 - Quds News Network
▻https://qudsnen.co/?p=29406
Dutch court will hear an appeal on 23 September against a ruling that granted immunity to two former Israeli military commanders in a lawsuit related to war crimes in Gaza.
One of those commanders is Benny Gantz, who was Israeli forces Chief and currently Israel’s war minister and deputy prime minister and the other is Amir Eshel, then air force chief.
The Palestinian-Dutch citizen Ismail Ziada has been suing Gantz and Eshel, for the decision to bomb his family’s home during Israel’s 2014 aggrrssion on Gaza Strip.
The Israeli aggression that time reduced his family’s three-floor building in al-Bureij refugee camp to rubble and killed his 70-year-old mother Muftia, his brothers Jamil, Yousif and Omar, sister-in-law Bayan, and 12-year-old nephew Shaban, as well as a seventh person visiting the family.
Ziada sued the Israeli generals for more than $600,000 in damages plus court costs.
During the 51 days of the 2014 aggression on Gaza, Israel attacked residential and other civilian buildings, an independent investigation commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council revealed.
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In January 2020, the district court in The Hague denied Ziada access to justice by granting immunity to the Israeli commanders because the alleged crimes were committed while they acted in an official capacity.
This ruling flew in the face of the Nuremberg principles – established after the trials of Nazi war criminals – that those who commit war crimes or crimes against humanity cannot hide behind their official functions, or the excuse that they were just following orders.
Indeed, in his appeal, to be heard next week, Ziada will argue that there can be no immunity for such grave crimes.
Although Ziada’s lawsuit is a civil action filed in the Dutch national courts, the principle that acting in an official capacity does not shield a person from accountability is now well recognized in international law.