President Geingob said Germany could not “morally express commitment to the United Nations Convention against genocide, including atonement for the genocide in Namibia” and at the same time support Israel.
“The German Government is yet to fully atone for the genocide it committed on Namibian soil” he added.
On Friday the German government said the accusation of genocide against Israel was completely unfounded and amounted to a “political instrumentalisation” of the UN genocide convention.
“In view of Germany’s history and the crime against humanity of the Holocaust, the government sees itself as particularly committed to the genocide convention,” it said.
It said Hamas – which attacked Israel on 7 October, triggering the current war – aimed to destroy Israel, which was acting in self defence.
Hamas killed about 1,300 people, most of them civilians, and took about 240 others hostage on 7 October.
Since then Israel has killed nearly 24,000 people, mostly children and women, in its retaliatory attacks on Gaza, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. The UN and humanitarian organisations have warned of the risk of famine in Gaza as well as the spread of disease among displaced people and have urged that more aid be allowed into the territory.
The scale of the Israeli response prompted South Africa to ask the ICJ to consider whether Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza.
Pretoria’s case included a litany of alleged Israeli offences, from the indiscriminate killing of Palestinian civilians to the wholesale destruction of Gaza’s infrastructure.
Israel has strongly rejected the allegation, calling it “baseless” and its legal team was scathing about South Africa’s submission, arguing that if anyone was guilty of genocide, it was Hamas.
BBC
