Natasha Hausdorff: International law itself under attack by anti-Israel NGOs
Legal expert says that Israel does more than anyone else to protect civilians, and that the manipulation of international law to vilify Israel is a threat to Western civilization
Welcome to The Times of Israel’s Lazar Focus. Each Friday, join host diplomatic correspondent Lazar Berman for a deep dive into what’s behind the news that spins the globe.
Israel is doing well on the battlefield since October 7, but has lost significant ground in the information war.
Much of that discourse is rooted in legal language — war crimes, arrest warrants, illegal settlements, charges of genocide.
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International law and the conversation around international law is a central battlefield for Israel.
Natasha Hausdorff is one of Israel’s most prominent advocates, especially around questions of international law.
Hausdorff is a barrister in London with law degrees from Oxford and Tel Aviv University. She is the legal director of UK Lawyers for Israel Charitable Trust, and is the founder of the Center for International Rule of Law.
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She argues that there is an ecosystem of international organizations, NGOs, and foreign governments “promoting a particular agenda against Western civilization” and using the phraseology of international law to vilify Israel.
Hausdorff says Israel takes measures to protect civilians that go beyond those of any other army in the world. That includes the delivery of leaflets, phone calls to individual householders, evacuation corridors to humanitarian zones, and yes, estimates of collateral damage before strikes.
She also argues that the International Committee of the Red Cross does not have a clear mandate to access terrorist combatants in Israeli prisons.
Turning to the genocide question, she says the UN Commission of Inquiry that ruled Israel was committing genocide in Gaza was “essentially a copy and paste” of the Amnesty International report, which relied on a Human Rights Watch report.
Hausdorff calls it “a cycle of disinformation laundering… Hamas propaganda getting that stamp of UN authority.”
She also laments Navi Pillay’s Nobel Peace Prize, saying she is part of the effort to lower the threshold for genocide in order to find Israel guilty.
Lazar Focus is available on all podcast platforms. This episode was produced by Gabriella Jacobs and video edited by Yitzchak Ledee.
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