One was filed Tuesday by the French Jewish Union for Peace (UFJP) and “a Franco-Palestinian victim.”
In this complaint, also revealed by Le Monde, the plaintiffs, supported by the organization Urgence Palestine, denounce “the organization, participation and call to participate in concrete actions to block humanitarian aid to the territory occupied Gaza, in particular by physically preventing the passage of trucks at border crossings controlled by the Israeli army.
“This deliberate submission of the Gazan population to conditions of existence likely to bring about its destruction, and more particularly the use of famine, characterizes, both according to international law and according to French law, the crime of genocide,” support the plaintiffs in a press release.
“If the legal qualification of genocide may be shocking, it is here the most appropriate in view of the facts committed (…). It is essential to name precisely what is happening,” commented their lawyers, Mes Damia Taharraoui and Marion Lafouge with AFP.
Their complaint with civil party for complicity in genocide and incitement to the commission of genocide targets figures from Israel is forever and Tzav-9, pro-Israel associations, presented as having French nationality.
“It's been 14 months since my family suffered the genocide in Gaza. I stopped counting at the fiftieth person murdered there,” the Franco-Palestinian complainant, who refuses to testify under her real name, tells AFP. fear of consequences for his loved ones remaining in Gaza.
“I see my loved ones passing away. I am now forced to ask them: + have you eaten today? +”, declares this woman whose 70-year-old father, according to her, “lost 24 kilos” due to lack of food and now in fact “50 all wet for 1m80”.
Her nephews, “emaciated, tired”, told her on Monday “to only eat bread with zaatar (spices, Editor's note) twice a day” and that “they are hungry”, she still recounts, not hiding her anger at Israel is forever and Tzav, two associations according to her “accomplices and active actors in the massacre”.
A second complaint with the constitution of a civil party, consulted by AFP, was filed on Wednesday by the association Lawyers for Justice in the Middle East and the Coordination of Appeals for a Just Peace in the Middle East (CAPJPO) – Europalestine, for “complicity in genocide”.
Relying in particular on photos, videos and public statements, they also accuse officials of Israel is Forever of having blocked humanitarian vehicles.
“The offense of complicity in genocide appears to be the fairest criminal expression to qualify the facts (…). We must now hope that the French courts will find the courage to investigate under this qualification”, commented to AFP the lawyers of the associations, Messrs Matteo Bonaglia and Ala Adas.
Complaints with civil party status aim to be brought before an investigating judge.
A complaint closed
In mid-November, a special UN committee affirmed that the war methods used by Israel in the Gaza Strip, in response to the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023, “correspond to the characteristics of a genocide”.
On January 26, the International Court of Justice asked Israel to do its utmost to prevent any act of genocide during its military operations.
Israel strongly contests these accusations, asserts its “right to defend its population” and accuses Hamas of using civilians as “human shields”.
In September, the National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor's Office (Pnat) closed a complaint from associations denouncing torture attributed to a Franco-Israeli on men presented as Palestinian prisoners.
The Pnat, which opened an investigation into terrorist assassinations relating to the Hamas attack of October 7, indicated to AFP in early October that it had not opened any investigation “at this stage” concerning possible victims of Israeli strikes. in Gaza or Lebanon.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants on November 21 against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and the head of Hamas's armed wing Mohammed Deif for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Asked at the beginning of the week, the Pnat indicated that it had “no new information to communicate” regarding the consequences of the ICC decision on French procedures.
