New Delhi: A group of Palestinian organisations and individuals have moved a federal court in the United States to prohibit President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, and Secretary of Defense Llyod Austin from providing arms, money, and diplomatic support to Israel as there is an "unfolding genocide" by Israel against the civilian population of Gaza, a press statement said.

"The US officials have a legal duty to prevent, and not further, this most serious of crimes," the statement added.

The petitioners in the case are the Palestinian human rights organisations Defense for Children International–Palestine and Al-Haq; the individuals Ahmed Abu Artema, and Mohammed Ahmed Abu Rokbeh, who are in Gaza; and Mohammad Monadel Herzallah, Laila Elhaddad, Waeil Elbhassi, Basim Elkarra, and “A.N.”, who are US citizens with family in Gaza; and Omar Al-Najjar, a medical intern at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis. All have had multiple family members killed, subjected to the closure of Gaza, and displaced.

According to the petitioners, Biden, Blinken, and Austin are "sued in their official capacity for failing to prevent an unfolding genocide where they have influence over the State of Israel to do so, and directly abetting its development with weapons, funds, and diplomatic cover, in breach of duties enshrined in the Genocide Convention and customary international law".

The filing is accompanied by a declaration from William Schabas, a leading legal expert on genocide, who identifies features of the Israeli government’s statements, deadly military assault, and total siege as signs of genocide. He affirms the United States’ breach of its legal duty to prevent genocide.

Separately, another expert declaration by the genocide and Holocaust scholars John Cox, Victoria Sanford, and Barry Trachtenberg, explains "how the genocidal intentions and actions of Israeli leadership resemble other genocides in recent history".

"For the last five weeks, President Biden and Secretaries Blinken and Austin have stood shoulder-to-shoulder with an Israeli government that has made clear its intention to destroy the Palestinian population in Gaza. As neighbourhood after neighbourhood, hospital after hospital, and sheltering displaced Palestinians were bombed, while subject to a total siege and closure that denies 2.2 million people basic necessities for life, they have continued to provide both military and political support for Israel’s unfolding genocidal campaign while imposing no red lines," said Katherine Gallagher, a senior attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and one of the lawyers who brought the case.

CCR has filed the case on behalf of petitioners in the court. According to the press statement, the United States has a duty under Article 1 of the Genocide Convention to prevent and punish acts of genocide, an obligation the US Congress made law in 1988 when it ratified the Convention and passed the Genocide Convention Implementation Act (18 U.S.C. § 1091).

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