The Hague: South Africa launched a case Friday at the United Nations’ top court accusing Israel of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza and asking the court to order Israel to halt its attacks. Israel swiftly rejected the filing “with disgust.”

South Africa’s submission to the International Court of Justice alleges that “acts and omissions by Israel … are genocidal in character” as they are committed with the intent “to destroy Palestinians in Gaza” as a part of the broader Palestinian national, racial and ethnic group.

It also asks the Hague-based court to issue an interim order for Israel to immediately suspend its military operations in Gaza. A hearing into that request is likely in the coming days or weeks. The case, if it goes ahead, will take years.

The Israeli government “rejected with disgust” the South African genocide accusations, calling it a “blood libel.” A Foreign Ministry statement said the case lacks a legal foundation and constitutes a “vile exploitation and cheapening” of the court.

Israel also accused South Africa of cooperating with Hamas who attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7 triggering the ongoing war in Gaza.

The statement also said Israel is committed to and operates according to international law and focuses its military actions solely against Hamas, adding that the residents of Gaza are not an enemy. It asserted that it takes steps to minimize harm to civilians and to allow humanitarian aid to enter the territory.

South Africa can bring the case under the Genocide Convention because both it and Israel are signatories to the convention.

Whether it will succeed in halting the war remains to be seen. While the court’s orders are legally binding, they are not always followed.

In March 2022, the court ordered Russia to halt hostilities in Ukraine, a binding legal ruling that Moscow flouted as it pressed ahead with its devastating attacks on Ukrainian towns and cities.

South Africa has been a fierce critic of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. Many including President Cyril Ramaphosa have compared Israel’s policies in Gaza and the West Bank with South Africa’s past apartheid regime of racial segregation.

Ramaphosa has accused Israel of war crimes and acts “tantamount to genocide.”

JERUSALEM: Palestinians said they felt “no joy” this Christmas as Israel bombed Gaza on Monday, with no end in sight to the war that Hamas says has claimed more than 20,000 lives.

Festivities were effectively scrapped in the occupied West Bank city of Bethlehem, revered as the birthplace of Jesus Christ, with few worshippers or tourists on the usually packed streets.

In the besieged Gaza Strip, the Hamas-run ministry of health said early Monday Israeli strikes had killed at least 18 people in the southern city of Khan Yunis, the centre of recent fighting.

At a hospital in the city, Fadi Sayegh — whose family has previously received permits to travel to Bethlehem for celebrations — said he would not be celebrating Christmas this year.

“There is no joy. No Christmas tree, no decorations, no family dinner, no celebrations,” he said while undergoing dialysis. “I pray for this war to be over soon.”

Sister Nabila Salah from the Catholic Holy Church in Gaza — where two Christian women were killed by an Israeli sniper earlier this month according to the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem — struck a sombre tone.

“All Christmas celebrations have been cancelled,” she told AFP. “How do we celebrate when we are… hearing the sound of tanks and bombardment instead of the ringing of bells?”

The war broke out when Hamas fighters attacked southern Israel on October 7 and killed about 1,140 people, mostly civilians, and seized 250 hostages, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.

Israel has vowed to eliminate Hamas in response and its military campaign, which has included massive aerial bombardment. The campaign has killed 20,424 people, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s health ministry.

Pope Francis kicked off global Christmas celebrations on Sunday with a call for peace.

“Our heart goes to Gaza, to all people in Gaza but a special attention to our Christian community in Gaza who is suffering,” the Catholic leader said.

Just ahead of Christmas, the Hamas-run health ministry said at least 70 people were killed in an Israeli air strike on Sunday at the Al-Maghazi refugee camp in central Gaza.

Health ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra said the “toll is likely to rise” as many families were thought to be in the area at the time of the strike.

In a separate incident, the ministry said 10 members of one family were killed in an Israeli strike on their house in the Jabalia camp in northern Gaza.

AFP was unable to independently verify either toll.

Vast areas of Gaza lie in ruins and its 2.4 million people have endured dire shortages of water, food, fuel and medicine due to an Israeli siege, alleviated only by the limited arrival of aid trucks.

Eighty per cent of Gazans have been displaced, according to the UN, many fleeing south and now shielding against the winter cold in makeshift tents.

The head of the UN refugee agency, Filippo Grandi, called for an end to the suffering.

“A humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza is the only way forward,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “War defies logic and humanity, and prepares a future of more hatred and less peace.”

World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus also renewed calls for a ceasefire, saying: “The decimation of the Gaza health system is a tragedy.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday the war was exacting a “very heavy price”, as the death toll of soldiers killed in the conflict continued to mount.

“But we have no choice but to keep fighting,” he said, adding: “This will be a long war.”

The army said Monday two more soldiers had been killed, taking to 17 the number of troops killed since Friday and 156 since Israel’s ground assault began on October 27.

Israeli military spokesman Jonathan Conricus indicated that forces were close to gaining control in northern Gaza and that now “we focus our efforts against Hamas in southern Gaza”.

Two freed detainees and a medic said Sunday that Palestinians held by the Israeli army in the Gaza Strip had suffered torture, a charged denied by the military.

The two men were among hundreds detained by Israeli forces over alleged links with Hamas during Israel’s ground offensive.

About 20 men released from Israeli custody “have bruises and marks of blows on their bodies”, Marwan al-Hams, hospital director in the southern city of Rafah, told AFP.

PALU: The death toll following the explosion of a smelting furnace at a Chinese-owned nickel plant on Indonesia’s Sulawesi island rose to 18 on Tuesday, as police ordered the plant to stop operations until an investigation into the incident is completed.

The accident, which occurred on Sunday, was the latest in a series of deadly incidents at nickel smelting plants in Indonesia that are part of China’s ambitious transnational development program known as the Belt and Road Initiative.

Four Chinese and nine Indonesian workers died instantly on Sunday when the furnace exploded while they were repairing it, said Central Sulawesi police chief Agus Nugroho. Three more victims died a day later while being treated at a local hospital.

Two more workers died on Tuesday at the hospital, bringing the total number of fatalities to 18, including eight workers from China, said Deddy Kurniawan, a spokesperson for PT Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park, known as PT IMIP, the parent company of PT Indonesia Tsingshan Stainless Steel, where the accident occurred.

The plant is in the Bahodopi neighborhood of Morowali Regency.

“We have ordered PT Indonesia Tsingshan Stainless Steel to stop its operation until our entire investigation is completed,” said Nugroho, the police chief, adding that authorities had set up a team to determine whether negligence by the company led to the deaths.

The blast was so powerful it demolished the furnace and damaged parts of the side walls of the building, Nugroho said.

PT IMIP said in a statement on Sunday that the furnace was under maintenance and not operating at the time of the accident. However, “residual slag in the furnace” came in contact “with flammable items,” causing the furnace walls to collapse and the remaining steel slag to flow out.

Rescuers extinguished the fire and evacuated workers after a nearly four-hour operation, Kurniawan said.

About 44 workers are still being treated at a hospital and the company’s clinic on Tuesday with serious to minor injuries, including 11 Chinese nationals, Kurniawan said.

In a news briefing on Monday, Chinese Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning expressed condolences for the victims and said that China is “saddened by the casualties caused by the accident.”

She said her ministry is working closely with authorities in Indonesia and has instructed the Chinese Embassy in Jakarta to assist in the aftermath, including ensuring medical treatment is provided to the injured and helping to determine the cause of the accident.

It was the third deadly incident this year at Chinese-owned nickel smelting plants in Central Sulawesi province, which has the largest nickel reserves in Indonesia.

Two dump truck operators were killed when they were engulfed by a wall of black sludge-like material following the collapse of a nickel waste disposal site in April.

In January, two workers, including a Chinese national, were killed in riots that involved workers of the two nations at an Indonesia-China joint venture in neighboring North Morowali regency.

Last year, a loader truck ran over and killed a Chinese worker while he was repairing a road in PT IMIP’s mining area, and an Indonesian man burned to death when a furnace in the company’s factory exploded.

Nearly 50% of PT IMIP’s shares are owned by a Chinese holding company, and the rest are owned by two Indonesian companies. It began smelter operations in 2013 and is now the largest nickel-based industrial area in Indonesia.