While there is a lot of talk about promises of war in the war between Ukraine and Russia, there are no such accusations in the Middle East war. Lanz is met with incomprehension.
The presenter Markus Lanz accused Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock of hypocrisy in his politics talk show of the same name. During the program the war in Ukraine and the war in Gaza were covered.
Accordingly, it is unclear to Lanz why Russian dictator Vladimir Putin is accused of war crimes in attacks with civilian victims and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is not, reports “Bild”. “If someone like Vladimir Putin in Ukraine paralyzes, bombs, destroys, destroys waterworks, water pipes and energy supplies, then someone like Annalena Baerbock is completely right to stand up and say: Friends, that doesn’t work. War crimes,” explained the ZDF presenter .
At the same time, the expression is not used in connection with Gaza. According to the 55-year-old, there are therefore double standards. “From my very simple, empathic, human perspective: We, Germany, like to be a moral superpower in the world,” said Lanz. “And of course there is now something like the accusation of double standards. And there is the question: How do we deal with a certain level of hypocrisy?”
Historians and international law experts discuss the war in the Middle East
Two of Lanz’s guests in particular discussed the situation in the Middle East and the extent to which acts that violate international law are taking place. The historian Michael Wolffsohn and the international lawyer Kai Ambos exchanged their arguments.
Wolffsohn takes the Israeli perspective on the fighting around the Shifa Hospital. The terrorist organization Hamas “used the patients and medical staff as a protective shield, i.e. as cannon fodder,” said the historian, as the “Rheinische Post” reports. Wolffsohn described the destruction of the Iranian consulate in Damascus as a sign of the regional and global context and names Iran as the “real mastermind of this conflict.”
According to the historian, the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip is undeniable. However, he more or less agrees with Netanyahu’s statements about the tragic death of the seven aid organization employees and explains the incident by saying that “mistakes can always happen in war.”
You first have to determine the facts precisely
International lawyer Kai Ambos is also cautious about saying that the attack on World Central Kitchen is a violation of international humanitarian law or even a war crime, reports the “Rheinische Post”. You first have to determine the facts precisely. He made similar comments about the fighting over the Shifa Clinic. Whether the Hamas fighters really have such a strong presence, including the many tunnels – as Israel claims – has not been conclusively confirmed.
Instead, the debate should focus on the total number of victims. So far, around 32,000 deaths have been reported from the Gaza Strip, writes the “Rheinische Post”. According to the Israeli army, 10,000 of them were Hamas terrorists. Assuming that these killings were legitimate under international law, that would still leave 22,000 dead who were “clearly civilians.”
“Collateral damage” is intended to explain civilian casualties
According to the international lawyer, the dead civilians could only be explained by so-called “collateral damage”. “Even the Americans would consider such an understanding of collateral damage to be too broad,” says Amboss. And: “Collateral damage that is disproportionate to the military objective is also a war crime.” So the case could be investigated.
Because, according to Wolffsohn, it is a so-called “guerrilla war,” the historian rejects a distinction between soldiers and civilians, since Hamas uses civilians as cannon fodder. Accordingly, one cannot blame the Israeli army. Wolffsohn ignores the lack of an option for the Palestinian civilian population to flee the Gaza Strip.
Ambos disagrees and says that Hamas is also committing crimes under international law. “But that does not release Israel from protecting civilians,” the international lawyer makes clear.
