The UN’s independent international commission of inquiry has just released a report that may go down as one of the most significant documents in modern international law. After nearly two years of investigation, the commission has concluded that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

Chaired by former UN human rights chief Navi Pillay and supported by human rights experts Miloon Kothari of India and Chris Sidoti of Australia, the commission made the explosive determination of “genocidal intent”. It’s a legal and moral threshold that few international bodies have thus far dared to cross.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are pressing ahead with a new ground offensive in Gaza City, despite criticism from human rights bodies as well as many of Israel’s allies and large numbers of Israeli citizens, who have protested against the ongoing military operation.

So, the UN commission’s report prompts an important question: does this determination matter? And if the UN’s most serious legal finding cannot compel action to prevent further genocidal acts (if that is what Israel is guilty of), what is the fate of the rules-based international order?

What makes this report fundamentally different from prior condemnations is its focus on intent. Accusations of war crimes and crimes against humanity have been levelled before, but genocide, as defined by the 1948 convention, requires a specific mindset. To prove genocide, it’s necessary to show an “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group”.

The commission’s finding is not merely an interpretation of Israel’s actions but a direct indictment of its leadership’s purpose. The report cites statements by senior Israeli officials as “direct evidence of genocidal intent” – such as Yoav Gallant describing Gazans as “human animals” when the then-defense minister announced that Israel would impose a total siege of Gaza, two days after the October 7 Hamas attack.

Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, is also quoted by the report saying: “It’s an entire nation out there that is responsible. It is not true, this rhetoric about civilians who were not aware and not involved. It is absolutely not true.” His words are taken by the commission as “incitement to the Israeli security forces personnel to target the Palestinians in Gaza as a group as being collectively culpable for the 7 October 2023 attack in Israel”.

The report cites Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s reference to the bible story in which God tells the Israelites to wipe out their enemies in the town of Amalek – “kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey” – as evidence of genocidal intent. It further notes that IDF personnel “yelled and chanted direct references to Amalek as they launched attacks in Gaza”.

The UN commission also singles out the destruction of Gaza’s only IVF clinic. The clinic had stored an estimated 4,000 embryos and 1,000 sperm samples. Deliberate targeting of the clinic was, the report said, “a measure intended to prevent births among Palestinians in Gaza”.

It concludes that “genocidal intent was the only reasonable inference that could be drawn from the totality of the evidence”.

Does this determination matter?

This is the first time an international body has named a genocide as it unfolds. In Rwanda in 1994, officials avoided the word “genocide” until most of the killing had already taken place. In Bosnia, the Srebrenica massacre was only formally recognised as genocide years later by international courts. In Myanmar, the UN fact-finding mission waited until 2018 – a year after the military’s campaign against the Rohingya – to conclude that the generals acted with genocidal intent.

Here, the UN is recognising genocide as it takes place. The Commission’s report could provide fresh evidence for the ongoing cases against the state of Israel and its leaders that are before the International Court of Justice and International Criminal Court (ICC).

Yet here lies the core problem. Courts can issue orders and warrants but without cooperation from states, enforcement is weak. Israel is not an ICC member, and its powerful allies are unlikely to surrender any of Israel’s leaders who may face charges.

Meanwhile the UN security council, paralysed by the US’s use of its veto, cannot compel action. Israel has repeatedly ignored all UN resolutions and reports, calling them biased.

The UK, too, has continued to do business with Israel. Just this month, its prime minister, Keir Starmer, hosted Herzog in Downing Street. Enforcement depends on state power. If the US, UK and EU continue to shield Israel diplomatically, the commission’s report will not translate into any tangible resolutions or actions – thereby illustrating the weakness of international law.

International law at stake

Genocide against the Palestinian people must be prevented at all costs. But the credibility of international law is also at stake if nothing is done in response to the UN commission’s determination.

The UN charter was designed to prevent the very kind of impunity we are witnessing. Yet when one permanent member of the security council, the US, can unilaterally block action, the system itself breaks down.

The commission’s report lays bare the hypocrisy of a global system that claims to be governed by law but is, in practice, governed by the political will of a few powerful states.

If a formal legal finding of genocide has no practical effect on the ground – if it does not stop the killing, the starvation or the destruction – this implies that international law is merely a suggestion, not a mandate, when powerful nations are at the centre of the controversy.

For Palestinians, the report is validation. For international law, it is a test. Either the genocide determination triggers real accountability – sanctions, arms embargoes, prosecutions – or it exposes the gap between lofty promises and political reality.

The UN commission’s report is likely to fuel pressure in the UN general assembly. It will undoubtedly energise civil society and may strengthen ongoing legal cases. But whether it has concrete consequences depends on states being willing to act against Israel – and, crucially, whether the US and UK maintain their protective stance.

The UN still counts for something, but perhaps not in the way it once did. Its power is not in the capacity to enforce, but in the power to name, to document and to judge.

The future of international law may well be judged on what happens next: whether the gravest crime in its canon can be recognised but left unchecked.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit, independent news organization bringing you facts and trustworthy analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. It was written by: Malak Benslama-Dabdoub, Royal Holloway University of London

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Malak Benslama-Dabdoub does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.