Judge Nawaf Salam, president of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), presides over the ICJ during a ruling on South Africa’s request to order a halt to Israel’s Rafah offensive in Gaza, in The Hague, Netherlands, May 24, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Johanna Geron

According to the Palestinian Authority (PA), its request to join South Africa in the case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (IJC) is not about getting Israel to cease operations in Rafah, or even to stop the so-called “genocide” against Palestinians. Rather, the objective of the case is to “tighten the noose” around the entirety of “colonialist” Israel, and to “end it.”

This essentially includes a bid to put all of Israel on trial — its “governmental policy and institutions, legal system, governance system, and military system,” says PA Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Omar Awadallah.

To be clear, when the PA deputy foreign affairs minister refers to “this colonialist system,” he is referring to the State of Israel itself.

Awadallah is doing just what PA leader Mahmoud Abbas did at the UN when he defined Israel as “another entity in our historical homeland,” established and planted by Britain and the United States “for their own colonialist purposes” [Archive News, YouTube channel, May 15, 2023].

Awadallah is also reiterating the way PA Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh described Israel as “a colonialist entity that occupied our land and expelled our people” [Official PA TV, Oct. 23, 2023].

The following is the text of Awadallah’s interview on official PA TV:

Official PA TV host: “The State of Palestine asked to join South Africa in its lawsuit against Israel before the [UN] International Court of Justice.”

…

PA Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Omar Awadallah: “There are attempts by some of the states to show that in Israel — the authority that is actually managing the occupation — there are a few extremists who are committing a number of crimes against the Palestinian people, and we say to them “no.” The International Court of Justice is putting on trial the governmental policy and institutions, legal system, governance system, and military system in Israel, in the sense that all of Israel is accused of committing this crime, along with our process at the International Criminal Court (ICC) that is putting the individuals on trial  … As we have always said, this is part of the legal process that the Palestinian [PA] leadership is implementing to tighten the noose on this colonialist system to dismantle it and end it.”

[Official PA TV, June 3, 2024]

Ephraim D. Tepler is a contributor to Palestinian Media Watch (PMW). Itamar Marcus is PMW’s Founder and Director. A version of this article originally appeared at PMW.