BYM welcomes ICJ ruling on Israel

The UN's International Court of Justice has ruled that the Israeli presence in all occupied Palestinian territory must end

Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM) welcomed the UN’s International Court of Justice (ICJ)’s ruling last month that the Israeli presence in all occupied Palestinian territory, including the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza, is unlawful, must come to an end, and must not be supported by third party states. The court found multiple breaches of international law by Israel, including activities that amounted to apartheid.

BYM called on the new British government ‘to take its legal obligations seriously and review its own decades-long complicity in perpetuating the pain and suffering of all those – Palestinian and Israeli – harmed by the occupation’.

‘We pray that today marks a turning point in the history of the Holy Land. We hold in the Light all those working towards an end to the occupation and towards a peace with justice, equality and freedom for all at its heart,’ BYM said, in a statement on the Quakers in Britain website on 19 July.

ICJ’s historic but non-binding ruling was provided in response to a request from the UN general assembly in 2022 and precedes Israel’s military operation in Gaza, which began after the Hamas-led attack in Israel on 7 October 2023. This operation is the subject of a separate case at the ICJ, brought by South Africa, which accuses it of genocide in its response to the taking of hostages and killings. 

BYM also welcomed the UK government’s resumption of funding to UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees. The funding is ‘a lifeline for nearly two million Gazans facing unimaginable suffering today’, it said.

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