UKLFI Charitable Trust held a webinar on Unravelling the ICJ Advisory Opinions with Natasha Hausdorff and Olivia Flasch on Thursday 22 August.
On 19 July 2024, the Judges of the International Court of Justice gave their advisory opinions in the case titled “Legal consequences arising from the policies and practices of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem”.
Although the opinions are not binding and were given on the basis of documents provided by the UN of dubious accuracy and without hearing arguments in support of Israel, opponents of Israel regard them as putting wind in the sails of the BDS movement.
Apart from the main opinion, there were 14 separate opinions or declarations of the various judges. In fact there were only two judges, Bhandari and Sebutinde, who did not provide two or more opinions.
The Court’s Vice President, Sebutinde, dissented entirely from the main opinion. Three other judges dissented from the most serious conclusions, that Israel’s continued presence anywhere in the Gaza Strip, West Bank or East Jerusalem is unlawful and must be ended by Israel as rapidly as possible.
Moreover, many aspects of the majority Opinion are ambiguous and difficult to reconcile with other opinions by the same judges in this case, let alone with other cases and the facts.
In this webinar, international law experts, Natasha Hausdorff and Olivia Flasch, will seek to elucidate what happened in the case and its implications.
To View on Youtube PRESS HERE
Natasha Hausdorff is a barrister at 6 Pump Court Chambers and a frequent speaker on International Law. She has a law degree from Oxford University, qualified as a solicitor at Skadden, and subsequently gained an LLM from Tel Aviv University, focussing on public international law and the law of armed conflict.
She clerked for Miriam Naor, President of Israel’s Supreme Court, and was a Fellow at Columbia Law School’s National Security Program. Natasha is legal director of UKLFI Charitable Trust.
In the course of the current conflict, Natasha has been interviewed frequently on television to explain the application of the law of armed conflict. Tweets of her interview by Katya Adler on the BBC News Channel went viral with over 4 million views. Videos of many of her interviews can be viewed HERE.
Olivia Flasch is a legal consultant in public international law, with a particular focus on armed conflicts and the use of force. She has worked with governments, UN agencies and international organisations on a wide range of topics, including the verification of digital evidence in international criminal proceedings, and the development of AI in the military domain.
She is the author of numerous articles relating to Israel and international law in outlets such as the Jerusalem Post, EJIL Talk!, the Times of Israel and the Lawfare Institute.